Can a Game About Medical Negligence Be Justified as a Software Engineering Project?

You haven’t necessarily made a bad choice. A game is still software, and the project can be evaluated through its engineering work: requirements, system architecture, gameplay systems, implementation, testing, performance, maintainability, and user evaluation. The important thing is to make those aspects explicit instead of presenting it only as a story or artistic experience.

You shouldn’t add AI just because it is fashionable unless your course genuinely requires it. If AI is mandatory, it could support something relevant, such as adapting the investigation to player behavior or analyzing play-test data, but that should serve the research question rather than distract from it. Otherwise, strong software engineering without AI is still completely valid.

Frame the thesis around the technical and research problem, not simply “I made a game.” Explain how you designed the interactive storytelling system, how environmental clues are represented and delivered, how you tested usability and player understanding, and how you will measure whether players grasp the consequences of medical negligence. A clear methodology and measurable evaluation will make the project much easier to defend.

Games involve plenty of conventional engineering: modular systems, state management, save data, input handling, rendering, audio, tools, testing, and possibly networking or external services. Ask your supervisor what specific project criteria are missing and revise your proposal around those criteria. The domain is not the problem; an unclear technical scope and evaluation plan would be.