Games aren’t just for kids anymore.
As silly as it sounds, online money-making games are all the rage right now and can actually help you be more financially intelligent.
Now, we’re not talking about the games that help you earn money by playing them. The games we’ll be talking about go far beyond that.
Entertaining and educational, they’re a fun way to get on with those budgeting, investing, and financial skills.
Stay with us as we Join us as we explore how fun money games can improve financial intelligence and lead to better outcomes.
We’ll be talking about:
- Types of money games available online
- Benefits of playing money-making games
- How you can apply the benefits of these games in real life
- What you can learn from these games
Table of Contents
Types of Money Games
Stock market simulators
Stock market games let you buy stocks with virtual money and become a Wall Street whiz.
Build a virtual portfolio, research companies, and make strategic trade. Often, these incorporate real-time or historical market data to make the experience more realistic.
It’s a fun way to test investment waters, understand investment techniques and market fluctuations, and gain confidence before diving into real-world investing without risking any real cash.
Try Investopedia’s Stock Simulator, Wall Street Survivor, and MarketWatch’s Virtual Stock Exchange.
Budgeting Games
It includes games designed to teach players how to manage their money better. This category of activities includes interactions where players are challenged to make choices from utilities, shopping, entertainment, and savings.
Basically, these games help players manage their budgets, prioritize needs, and save for financial goals.
Some popular ones are You Need a Budget (YNAB) Knockout and FamZoo.
Business tycoon games
Tycoon games let the player take on the role of a CEO or business owner, who has full power to control all business activities of their very own virtual empire.
Various creative game options include grocery stores, mining businesses, florist shops, restaurants, and farming simulation games. You’ll manage activities like price setting, staff management, marketing strategies, operations expansion and competition to run a successful business.
Rollercoaster Tycoon Story, Lemonade Stand, and Twitchie Clicker are some catchy business tycoon games.
Real estate simulators
They can be a valuable starting point for laying a solid foundation and sparking an interest in real-world real estate investment.
Real-estate simulators allow the players to buy, sell, and manage virtual properties. You may get into the activities, including the building, the renovation, renting, and selling the different houses.
As you play, you better understand acquisition strategies, property values, market fluctuations, and the importance of strategic investment.
Flipgrid, Estate Agent Simulator and Virtual Landlord are some of the most-loved real-estate games.
Benefits of Playing Money Games
They’re one of the best ways to build real-world financial skills and confidence so you know how to (better) manage your money:
Knowledge of finances
Games about money provide a superb experience in managing money, budgeting expenses, and making critical financial decisions. That way, you’ll be introduced to the concepts of income, expenses, investment returns, interest rates, and saving.
Critical thinking
Players often encounter real-life complex financial situations, which can only be resolved after applying a good dose of analytical thinking and reasoning skills. These games constantly challenge you to carefully analyze information, thoughtfully predict potential outcomes, and identify the best course of action.
Planning a strategy
Money games for adults demand players to do some mental work—think several steps ahead, predict outcomes and create long-term proactive plans for their specific financial goals. This includes setting goals, assigning tasks properly, and continuously updating plans to reflect changes in circumstances. It’s something that can help you handle complex financial situations with a structured, focused mindset.
Managing risks
These games let players safely experiment with different strategies, experience both successful and risky decisions, and learn to calculate risks. Be it volatile stock markets, making high-stakes investments, or even entering new markets, these games teach you to balance potential gains against possible losses. Having these skills helps you identify and minimize risks so you can make smarter decisions.
Collaborate and negotiate
For example, these cash games often involve teaming up with other players, managing shared resources, and working together towards common goals. This will help you develop solid communication skills, build partnerships, and master negotiation, a valuable asset in a real-world financial setting.
How You Can Apply the Benefits in Real-life
Making a financial plan
Budgeting games teach you to track income and expenses and set short-term and long-term goals.
Take the skills you’ve learned in the game to set up a realistic budget and financial scheme for your own or the family household. Define specific money-making targets, track your expenses, plan your savings, and cut back where possible.
Strategy for investing
Analyzing market trends, researching assets, and diversifying your portfolio—there’s much to learn from the stock market and real-estate simulators.
Research investment options according to your budget, and read market trends carefully. Stocks, bonds, ETFs, and real estate are great start-small options for achieving high returns with low risks.
Manage your debts
Various games deal with debt, how interest rates affect it, and strategies for repaying it.
Develop a debt management plan using your financial game knowledge to help you pay off current debts and free yourself from the devil of debt. Give top priority to high-interest debts and explore your options for refinancing or debt consolidation.
Making critical decisions
You constantly get challenged to weigh your options and their potential consequences.
If you face a similar financial situation in real life, you can make wise decisions by using the skills you learned from financial games. Weigh both the pros and cons, look at all the options, and consider how the choice aligns with your long-term goals.
Emotional regulation
As you deal with market fluctuations and unexpected setbacks in the game, you’re likely to experience and manage disappointment.
Stay calm and rational during financial ups and downs. Focus on making rational, research-based decisions, and stick to your investment plan instead of being driven by fear, greed, or anything else.
How to Get the Most Out of These Games
Set clear learning goals: What skills do you want to improve from these video games? Organized budgeting? Business management strategies? Or buying the right stocks? Be clear on what you want to achieve.
Start at beginner’s level: It’ll give you a better grasp of the game’s rules, strategies, and basic concepts. As you play level after level, you’ll have a solid foundation for moving on to more challenging ones.
Experiment and take risks: Make your games a testing ground since they’re risk-free. Learn from your failures and apply different strategies that work for you in real-life scenarios. There’s much scope to learn and grow without massive consequences on our real-world lives.
Reflect on your decisions: After every game session, allow for some short moments of reflection on the action you chose and its consequences. Analyze what could have been more effective and decide what to do to improve it. Use this self-reflective exercise to revise what you’ve learned and adapt your approach accordingly. This will prepare you for real-world decision-making.
Seek feedback and guidance: Take advantage of in-game tutorials and the hints and feedback given to you by virtual advisors or mentors. Join online communities and forums related to your games where experienced players can share insights and strategies you can use outside games as needed.
Apply real-life principles: Observe patterns or traits between what’s in the game and what’s in reality. Put what you’ve learned in the game into practice through investments, budgeting strategies, business models, or real estate practices.
Track your progress: Create a checklist or maintain a scoreboard with your decisions and their outcomes. Keep a record of your successes, obstacles, decisions, outcomes, and lessons you have learned. It’ll help you gauge your progress and pinpoint areas for improvement.
Pro tip: Financial games are a great tool, but they’re just the start. Combine your in-game experience with real-world research, but always remember to seek professional financial advice just to be safer.
The bottom line
Playing money games is one way to get financially smart and master the art of money-making, accompanied by fun.
There’s so much to learn: budgeting, investing, business strategies.
Whether a stock simulator or a virtual real-estate empire, the risk-free environment allows you to analyze information, develop plans, manage risks, and learn from your decisions.
Apply these skills in real life to create a budget, explore smart investment options, and make informed financial choices that help you grow your wealth.
