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Catalogue record

In 90 Days

Humanitarian Leadership Academy, World Vision, PRELOADED

You are the field manager for an emergency that has just begun, and you have ninety days. Pick one of three crises: a conflict zone, a pandemic, or people displaced by climate change. Events then arrive one after another, and each makes you choose between the quality of your response, the speed of it and what it costs, with resources that never stretch far enough. Two communities start competing over clean water as displaced people arrive. An incident of gender-based violence has to be answered while everything else is still burning. What happens next depends on what you decided, so the same crisis unfolds differently the next time you play it. A run takes about half an hour, and finishing earns digital badges in areas such as coordination, staff treatment and resource management.

Our review

Emergency trade-offs in half an hour

A credible, well-made mobile simulation of emergency trade-offs

We could not play this game. The review below is based on official materials, other reviews and studies.

In 90 Days is a free mobile learning game about the first three months of an emergency response, released in 2021 by the Humanitarian Leadership Academy, part of Save the Children UK, and built with World Vision and the London studio PRELOADED. A play takes about thirty minutes and was available in Arabic, English, French, Spanish, Polish, Turkish and Ukrainian. The game is not available as of 2026 without any explanation, possibly because of the recent revision of the Core Humanitarian Standard.

What is it for?

Field managers in NGOs, international NGOs and UN agencies, and staff expecting to take that role. What makes this record unusual for the catalogue is that the publisher states outright that the learning outcomes and the behaviours the game rewards are structured on the Core Humanitarian Standard and the Core Humanitarian Competency Framework. Almost no other game here is built on the standard by design rather than by our inference. The nine published outcomes run from inclusive and intersectional programming through building on community capacities, adapting from complaints and feedback, choosing coordination mechanisms, treating staff fairly and safely, programmatic learning, and balancing resource use against quality, compliance, safety, risk and environment. Completion earns HPass digital badges. It does not teach technical sector skills — no water system design, no nutrition programming — and no facilitator guide or debrief pack has been published.

How do you play it?

You choose a scenario and run the response across a ninety-day clock. Events arrive, and each one asks you to prioritise quality, speed or cost. The studio names two example dilemmas: two communities competing over clean water during an influx of displaced people, and upholding the obligation to prevent and respond to gender-based violence. Outcomes differ between plays, so a scenario can be replayed for a different result. Failure states are not described anywhere we could find, so what happens when a response collapses is unknown.

Is it any good?

The central design choice is a sound one. Accountability costs time and money, and a game that makes you pay for it out of a visible budget teaches that better than a slide deck does. Three distinct crisis types stop the lesson hardening into one memorised script, and a bronze award for Best Learning Game at the Learning Technologies Awards in 2021 says something about the craft, if nothing about the learning.

The limits are real. We found no published evaluation of what players learn or retain, so the learning claim rests on design intent and expert input rather than measurement. More pointedly, thirty minutes is very little time for outcomes spanning most of the nine CHS commitments. Coverage will be broad and shallow, no single play can exercise all of it, and a manager who takes the badge list at face value will overestimate what a half-hour game has taught their staff. Affected people appear as pressures and as feedback, not as decision makers you answer to.

Game details

GenreSimulation
PurposeProfessional training
CostFree
AvailabilityDiscontinued
Duration30 min
PublishedJanuary 1, 2021
PlatformsAndroid, Web, iOS/iPadOS
AudiencesDevelopment Professionals, Humanitarian Professionals
LanguagesArabic, English, French, Polish, Spanish, Turkish, Ukrainian
TopicsClimate, Community Feedback, Community Participation, Conflict, Coordination, Disease, Displacement, Ethics, Humanitarian Response, Leadership, Resources, Staff Wellbeing

Core Humanitarian Standard alignment

1.1Direct

Ensure diversity, equity and inclusion considerations are integrated into the organisation's work with people and communities, with attention to the most marginalised.

Players are asked to deliver equitable and inclusive intersectional programming informed by analysis, naming gender, age and disability.

1.4Direct

Ensure people's participation in decisions and actions is meaningful for them and corresponds to their preferred ways of engaging.

The game encourages practising accountability to affected communities through meaningful participation and a collaborative approach

2.1Direct

Plan and implement programmes which respect and build upon local knowledge, capacities and existing actions.

Players are asked to build on community assets, capacities and existing preparedness plans rather than starting from scratch.

2.3Direct

Regularly monitor and adjust programmes to ensure actions are timely, accessible and address the priority needs of people and communities.

One of the six badge areas is the appropriateness, timeliness and relevance of the response, which is what the ninety-day clock and the quality-speed-cost trade-off are built to test.

2.4Strong inference

Apply relevant technical standards and recognised good practice in the organisation's work with people and communities.

The game covers events that require upholding recognised humanitarian obligations under pressure, giving prevention of and response to gender-based violence as its example, so the player applies accepted good practice when a faster or cheaper option is on the table.

3.2Strong inference

Support local capacities to anticipate and reduce risks of potential crises or disasters.

Learning outcomes cover preparedness plans and intentional action to avoid unintended effects, though whether the game has the player strengthen local capacity to anticipate risk, rather than draw on it, is not documented.

4.1Direct

Identify, prevent, mitigate and address potential and actual negative impacts of programmes on people and communities.

A published outcome asks the player to take intentional action to avoid unintended negative effects of their decisions.

4.2Possible

Identify, prevent, mitigate and address potential and actual negative impacts of programmes on the environment.

One outcome asks the player to weigh resource use against environmental considerations alongside quality, compliance, safety and risk, but how far the game models environmental harm from programme choices is not described anywhere.

6.1Direct

Ensure the work of the organisation is coordinated with and complementary to locally led and community-based actions, and those of relevant stakeholders.

A published outcome asks the player to judge which coordination mechanisms to use with other humanitarian entities serving the same communities, and coordination is one of the six badge areas — though the outcome names other agencies rather than locally led action.

7.1Direct

Regularly listen and respond to feedback and inputs from people and communities about the organisation and its work.

A published outcome asks the player to adapt programming based on complaints and feedback, and integrating community feedback is one of the badge areas.

7.3Strong inference

Use data from monitoring, feedback, complaints and learning to guide decision making, and to improve programmes and the organisation's ways of working.

A published outcome covers selecting tools and methods for programmatic learning and improvement across contexts, with organisational learning as a badge area, though how the game connects that learning to monitoring data is not described.

8.1Strong inference

Leadership, staff and volunteers promote and demonstrate an organisational culture of quality and accountability.

The player is the manager whose decisions the game judges on behalf of a team and the people it serves, so the play loop asks them to set the standard for a response rather than follow instructions within one.

8.2Direct

Maintain a safe and inclusive working environment, taking measures to protect the safety, security and well-being and dignity of all staff and volunteers.

A published outcome asks the player to ensure staff are treated fairly and equitably and supported in an empathetic, safe working environment with risks mitigated, and fair treatment of staff is one of the badge areas.

9.2Strong inference

Manage financial resources responsibly in line with recognised good practices.

The game economy runs on limited resources and competing pressures across ninety days, with every event weighing cost against quality and speed, so the player practises allocating funds and supplies and sees the consequences of spending them badly.

9.4Direct

Manage and use resources to achieve their intended purpose, minimising waste and the impact on the environment.

A published outcome asks the player to balance effective and appropriate use of resources against programme quality, compliance, safety, risk and environmental considerations.

Sources