Introducing The Real Game: Where future plans meet real-world demands

The Real Game by Xello turns students’ future plans into a foundation for meaningful post-secondary plans.

For many students, future planning still feels abstract. A matchmaker quiz, a list of saved careers, and a few college searches—too often that’s where it ends. What’s missing? Context. Urgency. Ownership.

Helping every student understand the real-world implications of their post-secondary plans—cost of living, work/life balance, financial trade-offs—is time-consuming and intensive. Especially for counselors and teachers who are already stretched thin. And even when financial literacy is integrated into the core curriculum, it’s often siloed from postsecondary planning and hard for students to apply.

Add in a challenging economy and a generation of students who care deeply about purpose and well-being (alongside pay), and the stakes are even higher.

Students need more than a checklist. They need an experience that helps them connect the dots—early. That’s where The Real Game comes in.

What is The Real Game?

The Real Game is an immersive and highly interactive experience that helps students explore life after high school in a way that feels real, relevant, and motivating. It blends simulation, gameplay, and learning to give students a meaningful preview of adult life—and how their current decisions shape their future.

• Quick Simulations: Students run real-time affordability checks on their career and lifestyle preferences using local salary and expense data. As they compare simulations across careers, pathways, and lifestyle choices, they begin to understand what it’s going to take to live the kind of life they desire and how to adjust their plans to get them there.
• Games (coming soon!): Through long-form gameplay, students are transported into the future. They have a career, a bank account, and a challenge—to maintain their financial health, career demands, and personal well-being as they navigate real-world scenarios. Students flex their critical thinking skills as they weigh trade-offs and make decisions, while gaining exposure to the world of work and life as an independent adult.
• Comprehension Activities (coming soon!): Bite-sized videos and quick knowledge checks help students build practical financial literacy—like budgeting, credit, debt, and investing—through activities that can be completed independently or within games.

Bonus: The Real Game comes with ready-made resources to help educators facilitate high-quality classroom discussion—even if they’re new to teaching financial literacy.

What makes The Real Game unique?

Most CCR platforms help students set goals. With the addition of The Real Game, Xello helps them live out their plans in a safe, simulated environment—so they can make adjustments before it counts.

• Real-world decisions, not just theory: Students feel the impact of their choices—not just read about them.
• Grounded in local realities: Salary and expense data are customized down to the county—with the ability for students to compare data across the country.
• Designed to spark ownership: When students see how their plans affect the life they want, they start caring—and planning—differently.
• Built for classrooms, advisory, and 1:1 counseling: It’s flexible enough to fit wherever future readiness is taught.

Here’s what district leaders are saying

Educators across Florida had access to a beta version of The Real Game, known as ‘The Florida Life Simulator’, throughout the 2024-25 school year. They shared its early impact on students.

“Kids are using Xello’s simulations to give them the facts,” says Sandy Fink, ePathways College & Career Specialist at Seminole County Public Schools. “[They’re] saying, if it’s not what I can afford, I’ve got to go back to my matches and figure out what were some better choices?”

The Real Game helps students level-set expectations and reassess life choices. 

“One of my students realized that the job they want, no matter what level, was never going to pay what they anticipated,” says Valerie Santos, School Counselor at Pinellas County Schools. “So we had a conversation about it. Could they make less money? Is that job really going to make them happy? Or is there something else out there where they could make more money and still have that fulfillment.”

“The kids all kind of got the goal of it, you know,” says Fink. “I need to think about money, and I need to think about salaries, and I need to think about budgeting and the life I want to live. So that was pretty cool.”

Is The Real Game a fit for your district?

If you’re responsible for…

• CCR programming
• Financial literacy instruction
• Advisory period content
• CTE integration
• Equipping counselors and teachers with effective tools

…then The Real Game by Xello is for you.

It’s already being used in classrooms, advisory periods, and student services teams across Florida. Implementation is simple and comes with everything educators need to start strong.

Ready for The Real Game? Here’s how you can get started

• Register for The Real Game launch webinar on August 5th at 12 p.m. ET
  
• Download The Real Game one-pager to share with your CCR leads
  
• Talk to a Xello expert to learn how The Real Game can be implemented in your district