Home / Games / JOY OF PROGRAMMING - Software Engineering Simulator
JOY OF PROGRAMMING - Software Engineering Simulator
Use real Python code to automate machines, robots, drones and more: Program self-driving vehicles; crack passwords; apply machine learning; automate logistics; use image processing to guide missiles. Gain real coding skills and solve exciting bite-sized programming challenges.
What players say
Steam review score and the most-helpful voices, which may include critical ones. Score via SteamSpy as of 2026-05-14.
“It scratches my brain just right. I work in manufacturing as a developer, so this kind of problem-solving feels right at home (at least the manufacturing scenario which is what I'm working on now). That said, this game will absolutely test your patience. It forces you to think…”
— a player, Steam review · 72 hrs played“Absolute Cinema ts is a peak game (I code C and Python for like 4 hrs a day)”
— a player, Steam review · 32 hrs played“To start, I have several years of professional python scripting experience as a sys admin. In game documentation is awful. Spinning the robot arm is the most unintuitive thing I have done. I thought this would be a great way to help others learn python but after testing it I…”
— a player, Steam review · 14 hrs playedPlayer activity
Monthly average concurrent players. Live count fetched 2026-08-02 19:34 UTC · history via SteamCharts.
Latest official news
Developer announcements via the Steam news API — links go to the original posts. More across all games on the news hub.
Small free content update
While I am currently quite busy with the development of my second game Card Coder, I did take some time to create a small content update for JOY OF PROGRAMMING. In particular, this update includes two
Games Forged in Germany Fest
I'm happy to announce that both of my games were selected for the Games Forged in Germany Fest. To celebrate the occasion, JOY OF PROGRAMMING is 30% off and the Demo for my upcoming card-building rogu
Patch 1.0.2
- improved objective description in CaesarCypher and CraneLift levels - fix in level Triangulation that caused commands to be counted multiple times - fixed "key not found" error in "Fibonacci" and "E
Hotfix 1.0.1
Hotfix 1.0.1 addresses issues with the "Three Sorter" level some players have been experiencing. version 1.0.1 - hotfix in ThreeSorter level where sometimes RFID tags were not scanned - hotfix in Gold
JOY OF PROGRAMMING 1.0
After one exciting year in Early Access, I am very pleased (and a little proud) to announce the 1.0 release of JOY OF PROGRAMMING and the conclusion of its Early Access phase. This does not mean 1.0 w
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Screenshots
Official Steam store screenshots — click any shot to enlarge.
Facts & details
From the Steam store record, snapshot 2026-05-14.
| Genres | Indie, Simulation, Strategy |
| Player tags | Programming · Automation · Logic · Puzzle · Education · Robots · Science · Coding · Simulation · Physics · Hacking · Immersive Sim (SteamSpy community voting) |
| Features | Single-player · Steam Achievements · Steam Workshop · Steam Cloud · Stats · Steam Leaderboards · Includes level editor · Remote Play Together |
| Languages | English, French, German, Spanish - Spain, Russian, Simplified Chinese |
| Achievements | 46 |
| Estimated owners | 20,000 – 50,000 (SteamSpy) |
Minimum system requirements (PC)
Minimum: Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system OS: Windows 10/11, x64 only Processor: Core i5 8400, Ryzen 5 2600 Memory: 8 GB RAM Graphics: GTX 1070 DirectX: Version 12 Storage: 12 GB available space Additional Notes: SSD recommended