A retired tennis pro built and launched Tennis Tycoon entirely with Claude Code
Retired professional tennis player Iain Atkinson has used Claude Code to build and launch Tennis Tycoon, a tennis club management simulation, without any prior coding experience. The project joins a growing list of games developed with Claude Code by non-programmers, including Deniz Sancar’s football drafting game 38-0-0 and Josh Pavey’s 38-0.
Atkinson deliberately chose to develop a management simulation rather than an action tennis game, citing the difficulty action titles face in authentically capturing tennis physics and movement. Instead, he modeled Tennis Tycoon after classic management sims like Championship Manager, SimCity, and Civilization—games he played while growing up.
The game’s depth draws from Atkinson’s professional tennis background, incorporating authentic details about a playing career including constant international travel, managing injuries abroad, and securing coaching support. This domain expertise allows the game to capture aspects of professional tennis that outsiders might overlook.
Atkinson’s project exemplifies the democratization of game development through AI-assisted tools. With Claude Code removing technical barriers to entry, subject-matter experts can now develop games without formal programming knowledge. His success demonstrates that domain expertise combined with AI-powered development tools can produce compelling gaming experiences, potentially shifting how games are created by allowing specialists in various fields to bring their unique perspectives to game development.