For the course Business Innovation Fundamentals at the University of St. Gallen, I had to create a simple smart manufacturing company. The course is part of the core curriculum of the MBI and is meant to serve as an introduction to programming in Java. Here is a quick overview over the task and the proposed solution. It's nothing too crazy, but it's been a lot of fun and served as a nice introduction into both Java and game-development in general.
Our task was to create a simple system that would allow for the user to order products (no UI necessary). These products should then be "produced" (taking a certain amount of time and resources). In case of a shortage of resources, the system should be able to inform the user and/or reorder new resources. Furthermore, the user should get a confirmation for their order.
The user can move their character (3) by using AWSD and interact with NPCs (e.g. 6) or objects using space. The two main objects to interact with are the customer PC (1) and the manager PC (2).
On the customer PC the user can go through a menu with dynamically created options and order their products.
Once the order is created, the user is sent a confirmation with the pick-up time for their items. In case of a shortage of resources, the pick-up time is delayed and the system reorders new resources.
On the manager PC the user can see the current status of the manufacturing process and the remaining time (step/total) for each ordered product.
Furthermore, the user can check the current amount of resources available. And if a there were any re-orders.
Currently, the user can order chairs and sofas. Once all production steps are done, the items can be seen on the assembly line.
One thing that was particularly fun was to create a simple database to store the recipes for the products, the initial stock, etc. For that purpose, I created a simple, somewhat SQL inspired language that can read and write to a text file (./db.csv).
Since I've never done any game-development before, I decided that I would write my own (rather simple) engine, so I'd get a better feeling for how that all works.