Claude Code helped turn a 10-year-old dream into a playable energy tycoon game

The idea for PowerState first appeared on Reddit almost a decade ago, but building a complex energy/economy simulator as a solo project wasn’t realistic at the time.

Now most of the development is being done through Claude Code.

The game evolved through constant iteration, player feedback and one particularly useful setup: a test harness with explicit rules that Claude has to satisfy.

For example, every new feature is automatically checked to make sure the energy balances remain correct.

That’s probably one of the best use cases for AI coding.

Highly specific games for small audiences suddenly become realistic to build, even when they would never make economic sense for a traditional studio.