Programming game

A programming game is a video game that incorporates elements of computer programming, enabling the player to direct otherwise autonomous units within the game to follow commands in a domain-specific programming language, often represented as a visual language to simplify the programming metaphor. Programming games broadly fall into two areas: single-player games where the programming elements either make up part of or the whole of a puzzle video game, and multiplayer games where the player's automated program is pitted against other players' programs.

Origins

The first programming game was Darwin, created in 1961 at Bell Labs by Victor A. Vyssotsky, Robert Morris, and Douglas McIlroy. It was a competitive game in which players sought to destroy each other's program.

As puzzle games

Programming games have been used as part of puzzle games, challenging the player to achieve a specific result once the program starts operating. Early games in the genre include System 15000 and Hacker. Another example of such a game is SpaceChem, where the player must use its visual language to manipulate two waldos as to disassemble and reassemble chemical molecules. In such games, players are able to test and debug their program as often as necessary until they find a solution that works. Many of these games encourage the player to find the most efficient program, measured by the number of timesteps needed or number of commands required. Other similar games include Human Resource Machine, Infinifactory, and TIS-100.