Ukraine Didn’t Just Build Drones — It Built a Game That Works

Faced with an existential threat, Ukraine did not resort to conventional military procurement. It couldn’t. The state didn’t have the time or capacity to dictate every requirement, issue contracts, or wait years for results. Instead, it built a system that resembled something far more familiar to the digital generation: a multiplayer platform with real stakes, fast feedback, and tangible rewards.

At the centre of this system was Brave1 — a state-backed tech incubator that connects frontline needs with developers and rewards successful innovation. But the true genius of the system isn’t just that it’s fast or decentralised. It’s that it’s structured like a game.

Soldiers receive recognition — and in some cases, access to better tools — based on verified kills or successful missions. Tech teams compete to build more effective drones, with the most successful designs scaled up by the state. Operators log performance in real time, feeding back data that informs the next iteration. Everyone involved has a role, a score, a goal. The more impact you have, the more influence and resources you gain.

This isn’t war as procurement. It’s war as a massive, high-stakes, real-world game — with participation open to anyone who can contribute, and progress driven by performance, not hierarchy.

And crucially, it works because it aligns with how people — especially younger generations — already engage with the world. It borrows not from the logic of Cold War defence ministries, but from the logic of online platforms, gaming communities, and social networks: iterate fast, reward effort, give everyone a stake, and let the best ideas rise.

Gamification Isn’t a Gimmick — It’s a Design Philosophy

Too often, gamification is dismissed as superficial — a matter of badges and leaderboards. But Ukraine shows that it can be something much deeper: a structural way to motivate action, build feedback loops, and turn abstract goals into shared missions.

It works because it recognises something true about human psychology: people are more likely to act when the reward is clear, the outcome is measurable, and the system feels fair and open. That’s why the same young people who seem disengaged from politics will spend hours coordinating strategy in online games or investing time in platforms that offer clear, visible progression.

So why don’t our public systems work the same way? Why is climate action framed as sacrifice, not success? Why does staying healthy bring no personal benefit until it’s too late? Why is learning treated as obligation, not advancement?

It doesn’t have to be this way. The infrastructure now exists to build public systems that feel less like red tape and more like a dynamic platform — one where action is visible, rewarded, and communally meaningful.

Imagine a single citizen account — a kind of public impact wallet — that logs your contributions: taking public transport, recycling, attending a local council meeting, doing community service. Local authorities could post small civic tasks on a shared app: repainting a bench, checking on an elderly neighbour, helping with flood clean-up. Residents could earn points for completing tasks, or even upload proposals for new community projects, which others vote on. Once approved, these initiatives would be tracked, documented, and rewarded.

The points wouldn’t just be symbolic. They could translate into tax deductions, credits from a community fund, access to public grants, or other forms of recognition. The aim wouldn’t be to gamify government for its own sake — but to create a system where people are not only encouraged to act, but able to see the value of that action in real time.

From Authority to Architecture

What Ukraine has done, under immense pressure, is prove that public systems don’t have to rely on top-down authority to function. They can be architected to channel energy from the bottom up, provided the design is right.

That design is not about control — it’s about structure. You don’t need to tell every person what to do if the system is designed in a way that makes the right actions rewarding, visible, and meaningful. In that sense, gamification isn’t decoration — it’s governance by incentives.

This doesn’t mean trivialising public life. It means recognising that engagement is now a design challenge. And when the stakes are as high as they are in war — or climate change, or healthcare collapse — we can’t afford to ignore systems that actually motivate people to act.

The Choice Ahead

We are no longer constrained by the old tools. We can build public systems that work more like the digital spaces people already inhabit — not by copying aesthetics, but by applying the logic: reward action, learn fast, open participation, and design for impact.

The Ukrainians didn’t just survive by doing this. They innovated faster than entire defence industries. Not because they had better weapons — but because they had a better system. A system built on feedback, performance, and reward.

And that’s a model every public institution should now be studying — not because we’re at war, but because we finally have the tools to build systems that work like people do.