There are others where youarehacking, but it takes a different form to what you might expect.
The best hacking games on PC
15.
Some are bare-knuckle specialists, others can disguise themselves, and yet more have extra hacking powers.
And then you’re able to float away on the nearest delivery drone without anyone being the wiser.
The game gives you minimal direction, so exploration and experimentation are key to solving puzzles.
And even if you fall foul of a big nasty, you kind of can’t die.
If one host is destroyed, you might keep jumping to other hosts.
It’s an original, weird, and smart game that technically qualifies as hacking.
Disclosure: RPS contributorXalavier Nelson Jr.was narrative designer on Hypnospace Outlaw.
Minecraft
I’m sorry.
I tried to think of a good reasonnotto include Minecraft on the list.
It’s a survival game.
It’s about punching trees.
It has infected millions of innocent children.
Song Of Farca
What does one do if one is under house arrest for being a hacker?
Why, do more hacking, of course!
The story plays out sort of like a police procedural by way ofBlack Mirror.
You take on a new case, interview the client, and run searches on everyone and thing involved.
At the same time, there’s a larger story about consequences, crime, and the future.
Exapunks
Exapunks is another of Zachtronics programming games.
Chat rooms, zines, pizza deliveries, cybernetic plagues that turn your flesh into circuit board.
It’s all there, an accurate portrayal of the decade.
The puzzling is similar to other games from the studio, most notablyShenzhen I/O.
You clack away at your keyboard, using keywords and commands to create a little screed of magical electricity.
you’re able to hack a bank’s ATM machine and make it spit money into the street.
you might hack a videogame console and share home-brewed games with other hackers in the real world.
you’re free to hack y0uR oWn ArM.
It’s a good videogame.
The developers interviewed some hackers to research the story of the game, designerZach Barth told Alex Wiltshire.
“It turns out that hackers are assholes,” he said.
Gunpoint
Pneumatic trousers have never been so inviting.
InGunpoint, your shady spy protagonist has to break into guarded buildings and steal data for his private clients.
You are essentially a clandestine electrician with trousers that allow you to bound over buildings.
It isn’t all messing with wires though.
Gunpoint retains a love of wacky violence.
I think this is called ‘social engineering’.
Midnight Protocol
Midnight Protocol is a turned based strategy game that takes place on the battlefield of computer networks.
Midnight Protocol is played entirely with your keyboard.
The choice you make also affect your reputation as a grey, white or black hat hacker.
It all starts off simple enough, but pretty soon you’re juggling networks of nodes pushing double figures.
As games to make you feel like a proper hacker go, this one is way up there.
Hackmud
Hackmud is a terrible, wonderful place.
You exist as an AI bot inside a connected future-world.
Unfortunately, there areothers.
If this happens, you are for the scrap heap, little bot.
Time to start again.
In MMO terms, it’s akin toEVE Online.
The stakes are high, the difficulty curve is obscene, and the universe is full of scam artists.
I know, becauseI’ve been one of them.
For these reasons, Hackmud isn’t for everyone.
Shenzhen I/O
In many ways, it’s the spiritual successor toTIS-100.
But this time there are components to worry about.
You move chips and switches and gizmos around on a circuit board.
In more ways than one, you’re trying not to get your wires crossed.
Here, you’re a team of thieves.
Hacking games sometimes neglect the details of the real world, becoming ensconced in a single screen.
Quadrilateral Cowboy reminds you that the computer is just a means to effect change in reality.
It’s also gota brilliant cat.
Blendo made the game’s codeopen sourceshortly after release
4.
That’s how Duskers feels.
You control a squad of drones as you look for salvage among the stars.
You need scrap and fuel to keep your ship going.
But not Misfits Attic.
For this job, you will rely almost entirely on a command-line terminal.
It’s a move that fits perfectly with the game’s atmosphere and art style.
Then key in more commands to open doors.
This would be terrible news.
Your robotic helpers are so fragile they may as well be made of phone screens.
A lot of hacking games are about panicking and typing fast under pressure.
But Duskers is about being meticulous.
Use motion scanners and sensors to detect harmful bioforms.
Flush aliens out of the ship by remotely opening airlocks, or luring them towards turrets.
It’s made more tense by the roguelike structure and the FTL-like fuel consumption.
Uplink
This is the game that often comes to mind when someone says “hacking sim”.
Playing under your own alias on a computer-within-a-computer, you join an agency of hackers-for-hire.
You soon begin breaking into networks to alter records, steal data and delete unwanted files.
Along the way you discover more programs and upgrade your rig to break into stronger, scarier systems.
You also have to bounce your connection all around the world through multiple IP addresses.
No such oral in Uplink though.
It’s a little dated now, so you’ll want to play with theUplink makeover modinstalled.
Certainly, the next game on this list may never have existed without it.
Hacknet
Hacknet was slightly overlooked.
But don’t worry about him because he’s dead.
Bonus immersion if you listen to theWipeOut soundtrackwhile you do it.
You begin to use the terminal in earnest, the Linux-style commands becoming second nature.
Not to mention an entirely separate storyline for the more criminally minded.
Like I say, the idea itself owes a lot to Uplink.
But it’s the execution that makes Hacknet great.
But persevere and you’ll find one of the smartest games you’ll ever play.
At this point, Heart.Break() flips.
You go around exploring the code of everything you could get your hands on.
You start to play and mess with everyday objects in ways that help you tocheatthe game.
Small things like this are just the start.
Want to hack a door so that it takes you halfway across the city?
Want to transfer your body over the internet to the city’s central finance computer?
it’s possible for you to do that.
And I do not regret a single line of code.
