Capitalism Tycoon
by Marvellous Nwachukwu
A terminal-based retail business sim written in Rust.
I started learning Rust with the guessing-game tutorial like everyone does. Got bored. Wanted to build something with more state, more decisions, more failure modes. Capitalism Tycoon is the result.
I started learning Rust with the guessing-game tutorial like everyone does. Got bored. Wanted to build something with more state, more decisions, more failure modes. Capitalism Tycoon is the result.
The game
You start with $1,000 and one store. Fifty customers walk in on day one. Buy products wholesale, set retail prices, pay $100/day rent, try not to go bankrupt.
The mechanics
- Price elasticity. Higher prices, fewer sales. Find the sweet spot.
- Staff. Each employee bumps customer traffic by 20%. Salaries eat into margin.
- Expansion. Buy more stores when cash flow allows.
- Sales variance and category demand modifiers. The optimal play isn't always obvious.
Why Rust
I wanted ownership to bite. The first version had every store, employee, and product flying around as references; the borrow checker did its job. Restructuring around clear ownership (Game owns Stores, Stores own Inventory) untangled it and made the code easier to extend.
What's next
A manufacturing system. Raw materials, factories, recipes, finished goods. Once that lands the game stops being pure retail and starts being a tiny supply chain. Half-built; ships when it's playable.
Source: https://github.com/MarvelNwachukwu/Capitalism-Tycoon
Source: https://github.com/MarvelNwachukwu/Capitalism-Tycoon