Payback
Overview
Payback addresses financial literacy, teaching wise investing, budget management, and asset accumulation through concepts like fixed deposits, stocks, and bonds.
My Role
Product and visual designer
Scope
Game mechanics, illustration,
Timeline
4 weeks
Setting the context
In India, a significant portion of the population lacks financial awareness. This low level of financial literacy can lead to poor financial decisions, limited access to financial services, and increased vulnerability to financial crises, making it imperative to prioritize financial education initiatives.
Understanding the need of the hour
In a dynamic economy, it's crucial to equip young learners with financial knowledge to make informed decisions.
In India, RBI reports, that only
27% of of India’s population is financially literate.
7 in every 10 people
find it difficult to identify a convenient meeting point.
In India, RBI reports, that only
27% of of India’s population is financially literate.
What India has to say
How users navigate decisions, compromises, and coordination.
Stage 1: The Trigger
"Coffee this weekend?"
Stage 2: The Trigger
Everyone suggests near themselves
Stage 3: The Route Research
One person becomes the unpaid travel agent
Stage 4: The wait
"Anywhere is fine"
(But it isn't)
Stage 5: Someone gives in
Default to the familiar
Stage 6: The meetup
Not Fair to Everyone
Why Financial Literacy matters for Students?
Prepares students for independent living as they begin managing money on their own between the ages of 15-20.
Builds awareness of common financial scams enabling students to make safer and more informed financial decisions.
Develops smart budgeting and investment habits for long-term financial well-being.
Encourages an entrepreneurial mindset by building confidence in managing money and taking financial initiative.
Initiatives taken by the country
Comics & Booklets
RBI and SEBI use comics and booklets to teach personal finance.
Games
Board and digital games introduce financial concepts.
Eg: Monopoly, Game of Life
YouTubers / Influencers
Social media has changed how people access financial information.
Eg: Finance with Sharan
Government Schemes
Ex: PMJDY, Atal Pension Yojana, Stand-Up India
Websites
Ex: RBI Financial Education, SEBI Investor Portal
Posters & Graphics
Ex: RBI & SEBI awareness campaigns
How might we make financial education more engaging and enjoyable for students?
Education shouldn’t be boring,
make it fun and it becomes unforgettable
Why Gamified Learning?
Gamification increases learner motivation through interactive experiences.
Knowledge Retention
Helps improve knowledge retention through active participation.
Immersive Learning
Makes learning more immersive and enjoyable.
Challenge & Rewards
Uses interactive challenges and rewards to increase engagement.
Introducing Payback
Payback is a board game we designed to address the issue of inadequate financial literacy for ages 15+. By introducing concepts like fixed deposits, stocks, and bonds, players learn to invest wisely while managing budgets, paying off liabilities, and focusing on asset accumulation.
Plan your meetup
Curated recommendations for your meetup
Balanced for convenience, relevance, and travel
Compare distances
Compare commute times at a glance and make better meetup decisions
Found great places? Share and decide together
Save places to a shared list where everyone can vote, react, and add their own suggestions
Final Screens
For tasks where the inputs are known and the outcome must be precise, structured interfaces outperform conversational ones.
Conversational AI is great for discovering places — but coordinating where multiple people should meet requires a structured, shareable interface that makes travel fairness visible.
Decisions that shaped the product
Ask Maps is great for discovery. A dedicated Midpoint Finder is optimized for coordinating between known locations.
A fair zone instead of a point on a map
Instead of recommending a single midpoint, a fair travel zone is calculated where travel distances are balanced across everyone in the group.
Contextual recommendations
Instead of ranking by ratings alone, recommendations weigh travel distance, venue ratings, and user preferences to surface the best options for the group.
Voting stays light, the conversation stays in chat
Instead of sharing multiple place links and creating a WhatsApp poll, the feature lets groups compare options and vote directly within Google Maps, while conversations stay in WhatsApp.
Distance at a glance, full comparison one tap away
Venue cards surface a quick fairness estimate (e.g., "5–7 km each") to support fast decisions. Exact travel distances for each person are available one tap away in the Compare view when you click on directions.
Payback
Overview
Payback addresses financial literacy, teaching wise investing, budget management, and asset accumulation through concepts like fixed deposits, stocks, and bonds.
My Role
Product and visual designer
Scope
Game mechanics, illustration,
Timeline
4 weeks
Setting the context
In India, a significant portion of the population lacks financial awareness. This low level of financial literacy can lead to poor financial decisions, limited access to financial services, and increased vulnerability to financial crises, making it imperative to prioritize financial education initiatives.
Understanding the need of the hour
In a dynamic economy, it's crucial to equip young learners with financial knowledge to make informed decisions.
In India, RBI reports, that only
27% of of India’s population is financially literate.
7 in every 10 people
find it difficult to identify a convenient meeting point.
In India, RBI reports, that only
27% of of India’s population is financially literate.
What India has to say
How users navigate decisions, compromises, and coordination.
Stage 1: The Trigger
"Coffee this weekend?"
Stage 2: The Trigger
Everyone suggests near themselves
Stage 3: The Route Research
One person becomes the unpaid travel agent
Stage 4: The wait
"Anywhere is fine"
(But it isn't)
Stage 5: Someone gives in
Default to the familiar
Stage 6: The meetup
Not Fair to Everyone
Why Financial Literacy matters for Students?
Prepares students for independent living as they begin managing money on their own between the ages of 15-20.
Builds awareness of common financial scams enabling students to make safer and more informed financial decisions.
Develops smart budgeting and investment habits for long-term financial well-being.
Encourages an entrepreneurial mindset by building confidence in managing money and taking financial initiative.
Initiatives taken by the country
Comics & Booklets
RBI and SEBI use comics and booklets to teach personal finance.
Games
Board and digital games introduce financial concepts.
Eg: Monopoly, Game of Life
YouTubers / Influencers
Social media has changed how people access financial information.
Eg: Finance with Sharan
Government Schemes
Ex: PMJDY, Atal Pension Yojana, Stand-Up India
Websites
Ex: RBI Financial Education, SEBI Investor Portal
Posters & Graphics
Ex: RBI & SEBI awareness campaigns
How might we make financial education more engaging and enjoyable for students?
Education shouldn’t be boring,
make it fun and it becomes unforgettable
Why Gamified Learning?
Gamification increases learner motivation through interactive experiences.
Knowledge Retention
Helps improve knowledge retention through active participation.
Immersive Learning
Makes learning more immersive and enjoyable.
Challenge & Rewards
Uses interactive challenges and rewards to increase engagement.
Introducing Payback
Payback is a board game we designed to address the issue of inadequate financial literacy for ages 15+. By introducing concepts like fixed deposits, stocks, and bonds, players learn to invest wisely while managing budgets, paying off liabilities, and focusing on asset accumulation.
Plan your meetup
Curated recommendations for your meetup
Balanced for convenience, relevance, and travel
Compare distances
Compare commute times at a glance and make better meetup decisions
Found great places? Share and decide together
Save places to a shared list where everyone can vote, react, and add their own suggestions
Final Screens
For tasks where the inputs are known and the outcome must be precise, structured interfaces outperform conversational ones.
Conversational AI is great for discovering places — but coordinating where multiple people should meet requires a structured, shareable interface that makes travel fairness visible.
Decisions that shaped the product
Ask Maps is great for discovery. A dedicated Midpoint Finder is optimized for coordinating between known locations.
A fair zone instead of a point on a map
Instead of recommending a single midpoint, a fair travel zone is calculated where travel distances are balanced across everyone in the group.
Contextual recommendations
Instead of ranking by ratings alone, recommendations weigh travel distance, venue ratings, and user preferences to surface the best options for the group.
Voting stays light, the conversation stays in chat
Instead of sharing multiple place links and creating a WhatsApp poll, the feature lets groups compare options and vote directly within Google Maps, while conversations stay in WhatsApp.
Distance at a glance, full comparison one tap away
Venue cards surface a quick fairness estimate (e.g., "5–7 km each") to support fast decisions. Exact travel distances for each person are available one tap away in the Compare view when you click on directions.
Payback
Overview
Payback addresses financial literacy, teaching wise investing, budget management, and asset accumulation through concepts like fixed deposits, stocks, and bonds.
My Role
Product and visual designer
Scope
Game mechanics, illustration,
Timeline
4 weeks
Setting the context
In India, a significant portion of the population lacks financial awareness. This low level of financial literacy can lead to poor financial decisions, limited access to financial services, and increased vulnerability to financial crises, making it imperative to prioritize financial education initiatives.
Understanding the need of the hour
In a dynamic economy, it's crucial to equip young learners with financial knowledge to make informed decisions.
In India, RBI reports, that only
27% of of India’s population is financially literate.
7 in every 10 people
find it difficult to identify a convenient meeting point.
In India, RBI reports, that only
27% of of India’s population is financially literate.
What India has to say
How users navigate decisions, compromises, and coordination.
Stage 1: The Trigger
"Coffee this weekend?"
Stage 2: The Trigger
Everyone suggests near themselves
Stage 3: The Route Research
One person becomes the unpaid travel agent
Stage 4: The wait
"Anywhere is fine"
(But it isn't)
Stage 5: Someone gives in
Default to the familiar
Stage 6: The meetup
Not Fair to Everyone
Why Financial Literacy matters for Students?
Prepares students for independent living as they begin managing money on their own between the ages of 15-20.
Builds awareness of common financial scams enabling students to make safer and more informed financial decisions.
Develops smart budgeting and investment habits for long-term financial well-being.
Encourages an entrepreneurial mindset by building confidence in managing money and taking financial initiative.
Initiatives taken by the country
Comics & Booklets
RBI and SEBI use comics and booklets to teach personal finance.
Games
Board and digital games introduce financial concepts.
Eg: Monopoly, Game of Life
YouTubers / Influencers
Social media has changed how people access financial information.
Eg: Finance with Sharan
Government Schemes
Ex: PMJDY, Atal Pension Yojana, Stand-Up India
Websites
Ex: RBI Financial Education, SEBI Investor Portal
Posters & Graphics
Ex: RBI & SEBI awareness campaigns
How might we make financial education more engaging and enjoyable for students?
Education shouldn’t be boring,
make it fun and it becomes unforgettable
Why Gamified Learning?
Gamification increases learner motivation through interactive experiences.
Knowledge Retention
Helps improve knowledge retention through active participation.
Immersive Learning
Makes learning more immersive and enjoyable.
Challenge & Rewards
Uses interactive challenges and rewards to increase engagement.
Introducing Payback
Payback is a board game we designed to address the issue of inadequate financial literacy for ages 15+. By introducing concepts like fixed deposits, stocks, and bonds, players learn to invest wisely while managing budgets, paying off liabilities, and focusing on asset accumulation.
Plan your meetup
Curated recommendations for your meetup
Balanced for convenience, relevance, and travel
Compare distances
Compare commute times at a glance and make better meetup decisions
Found great places? Share and decide together
Save places to a shared list where everyone can vote, react, and add their own suggestions
Final Screens
For tasks where the inputs are known and the outcome must be precise, structured interfaces outperform conversational ones.
Conversational AI is great for discovering places — but coordinating where multiple people should meet requires a structured, shareable interface that makes travel fairness visible.
Decisions that shaped the product
Ask Maps is great for discovery. A dedicated Midpoint Finder is optimized for coordinating between known locations.
A fair zone instead of a point on a map
Instead of recommending a single midpoint, a fair travel zone is calculated where travel distances are balanced across everyone in the group.
Contextual recommendations
Instead of ranking by ratings alone, recommendations weigh travel distance, venue ratings, and user preferences to surface the best options for the group.
Voting stays light, the conversation stays in chat
Instead of sharing multiple place links and creating a WhatsApp poll, the feature lets groups compare options and vote directly within Google Maps, while conversations stay in WhatsApp.
Distance at a glance, full comparison one tap away
Venue cards surface a quick fairness estimate (e.g., "5–7 km each") to support fast decisions. Exact travel distances for each person are available one tap away in the Compare view when you click on directions.
