The McKinsey Imbellus game is the old candidate name for the assessment now called the McKinsey Solve Game. Imbellus was the simulation-assessment company that helped build the original platform; the name lives on in old prep material and candidate forums, while McKinsey's current digital-assessment page uses Solve instead.
If you searched "Imbellus" because you are preparing for McKinsey, the practical answer is simple: treat Imbellus as an old name for Solve, then check whether any guide you read still matches the current format. This article explains the naming map, the short company history, and where to go next if you need current prep guidance.
What Imbellus is (and what it isn't)
Imbellus was a company, not a test.
Imbellus, Inc. was a Los Angeles-based simulation-assessment startup founded in 2015. It designed gamified scenarios that scored how candidates reason and decide under uncertainty, rather than what they had memorized. McKinsey contracted Imbellus to design a screening assessment for consulting applicants, and because Imbellus was the named developer, early candidates began calling the assessment "the Imbellus game" or "the Imbellus test."
That candidate shorthand stuck for several years and still circulates in older prep guides, forums, and YouTube videos. McKinsey itself used different names: first the Problem Solving Game (PSG) internally and in some recruitment materials, and now McKinsey Solve as the official brand.
So when someone refers to "Imbellus" today, they almost always mean the assessment that McKinsey now calls Solve. The company that built it no longer exists as an independent business.
The naming map
Every name a candidate is likely to encounter, in order:
| Label | What it refers to | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Imbellus, Inc. | The company that designed the assessment | Acquired by Roblox in 2020; no longer independent |
| Imbellus Game / Imbellus Test / Imbellus Assessment | Early candidate names for the McKinsey assessment | Legacy shorthand; still used informally |
| McKinsey Problem Solving Game (PSG) | McKinsey's transitional official name | Phased out in favor of "Solve" |
| McKinsey Solve / Solve Game | McKinsey's current official name | Active. This is the assessment in use today |
| McKinsey Digital Assessment | Alternate official label used in some McKinsey materials | Active. Used interchangeably with Solve |
The shortest way to keep this straight: Imbellus was the company. Solve is the assessment. The two are not the same thing, and they were never meant to be. If you see "Imbellus" in a prep article from 2019 or 2020, it is referring to whichever version of the assessment was live at the time. The underlying product was renamed, not replaced.
Use the main McKinsey Solve guide when you need the current format and game mix. Use the McKinsey PSG mini-games guide when you need the older Imbellus-era game inventory.
A short history of Imbellus
2015, Founded in Los Angeles. Imbellus, Inc. was started by Rebecca Kantar (CEO) and Jack Buckley (President and Chief Scientist). The company's pitch was simulation-based assessments that measure how people think, not just what they know. Kantar had been a vocal critic of standardized testing; Buckley brought a measurement and psychometrics background, including prior leadership of the U.S. National Center for Education Statistics.
2017–2018, Partnership with McKinsey. Imbellus and McKinsey began working together to develop a new screening assessment that would replace the legacy McKinsey Problem Solving Test (PST), the pencil-and-paper math and logic exam McKinsey had used for years. The first Imbellus-built assessments rolled out to McKinsey applicants in select markets.
November 30, 2020, Acquired by Roblox. Reuters reported the acquisition while Roblox was preparing to go public, and Roblox later disclosed in its 2021 Form 10-K that the consideration consisted of 80,000 Class A shares, valued at $2.9 million, plus $8.8 million of cash including direct transaction costs. Rebecca Kantar and Jack Buckley joined Roblox as part of the deal, and Imbellus, Inc. wound down as an independent entity.
2023 onward, Kantar at Roblox. Roblox's newsroom describes Rebecca Kantar as leading education partnerships at Roblox. The Imbellus team's expertise carried over to Roblox's broader education and immersive-learning initiatives rather than to a continuing consulting-assessment product.
Around 2022, McKinsey retires the "Imbellus" brand. With the original company absorbed into Roblox, McKinsey moved fully to its own naming convention. The current digital-assessment page now describes the assessment as Solve (sometimes labeled "Solve, McKinsey's assessment game" or McKinsey Digital Assessment) and does not use "Imbellus."
That is the full arc: a 2015 startup, a roughly five-year partnership with McKinsey, an IP-assets acquisition by Roblox in 2020, and a McKinsey rebrand in 2022.
What "Imbellus" means today
Two things at once.
As a company, Imbellus no longer exists in any operational sense. The IP and team are inside Roblox; there is no Imbellus website, no Imbellus product line, and no Imbellus contract you can sign.
As a candidate-community term, "Imbellus" is still in active use. Older prep articles, YouTube walkthroughs, and forum threads use "Imbellus game," "Imbellus test," and "Imbellus assessment" interchangeably with what McKinsey now calls Solve. If you are reading material more than a few years old, treat "Imbellus" as a synonym for Solve: the assessment you will actually take was built by Imbellus, then taken over by McKinsey's own product and design teams.
A safer filter for old prep material: keep the broad habits that still matter, such as reading carefully, structuring decisions, and reasoning under time pressure with incomplete information. Do not treat the old "five cognitive dimensions" framing or any legacy game list as a map of the current assessment. If a guide describes specific games, scenarios, or timings, check those details against McKinsey's current assessment before treating them as current. If you are actively preparing, the how to prepare for McKinsey Solve guide covers what works today.
Frequently asked questions
Is Imbellus still used by McKinsey? Not under that name. The assessment Imbellus originally built is still in active use at McKinsey, but it is officially called Solve. McKinsey's current digital-assessment page no longer references "Imbellus."
Who owns Imbellus now? Roblox Corporation acquired Imbellus' IP assets on November 30, 2020. The original company no longer operates independently. Rebecca Kantar, the Imbellus founder, now leads education partnerships at Roblox.
Why did McKinsey stop calling it Imbellus? Imbellus was acquired by Roblox and wound down as an independent business. McKinsey moved the assessment fully under its own brand around 2022, renaming it Solve to match how the firm names its other internal products.
Is the Imbellus game the same as McKinsey Solve? Functionally, yes. Solve is the renamed, continued version of the gamified assessment Imbellus built for McKinsey. The branding changed; the assessment's role in McKinsey's recruiting funnel did not. The specific games inside the assessment have evolved over time, so the main McKinsey Solve guide is the source to check for the current format and game line-up.
