Game Hacking Continued
Welcome back! I want to talk about some cool games I've been playing recently. I've been exploring some of the hacking simulator games that are out there. HackNet was the first one I tried, due to its resounding high reviews and exciting looking play style. While it does have some really neat features, like real Linux CLI commands and "tools" such nmap, I was frankly disappointed that it dosn't really instrument these tools or commands, but rather just gives players an extremely watered down version that limits their ability to explore these commands fully. That said, this game really didn't do it for me, I just kept thinking about real software exploitation. The next hacking simulator was h a c k m u d, and this game was freaking cool. This game dosn't use Linux commands as much, but rather it includes a fully functional JavaScript-like language and JSON-like object structure! h a c k m u d had nearly a four-hour intro, but once complete you are thrown in the main game which is a world of user created scripts and players hacking each other and NPCs. This game is infinitely more epic than HackNet, however I felt it quickly devolved into users constantly trying to phish each other in the general chat. After a bit of that, I had to get back to real hacking and applying that to more action packed games. That said, if your looking for a game-like atmosphere that reinforces information security skills then I highly recommend CTFs, such as Pico, Pros Vs Joes, or even CCDC.
I've also been writing a lot of bots recently, which are scripts I use to automate game thick clients to achieve more long term / tedious results. I've been writing my bots in AutoIT, which is excellent for simulating general user Windows GUI interactions. There a number of use cases here, but I tend to use this for scenarios where I need automate a long, repeatable processes in game, such as grinding or farming cash. Further, these are useful techniques for when there are a lot of server side integrity checks which ensure you are sending data that hasn't been manipulated from known good values. I really enjoy applying these bots to games like RuneScape Classic, which Alex and I are making a 'bots only' version of. I'll be releasing game bot template code in the future, so stay tuned!
Finally, a youtube link dump of some of the games I've been hacking recently! This is another periodic piece, as I have so much of this content building up I want to still get them in manageable chunks. Again, I do a lot of this local game hacking mostly for exploration. Hope you enjoy these as much as I do :)
I've also been writing a lot of bots recently, which are scripts I use to automate game thick clients to achieve more long term / tedious results. I've been writing my bots in AutoIT, which is excellent for simulating general user Windows GUI interactions. There a number of use cases here, but I tend to use this for scenarios where I need automate a long, repeatable processes in game, such as grinding or farming cash. Further, these are useful techniques for when there are a lot of server side integrity checks which ensure you are sending data that hasn't been manipulated from known good values. I really enjoy applying these bots to games like RuneScape Classic, which Alex and I are making a 'bots only' version of. I'll be releasing game bot template code in the future, so stay tuned!
Finally, a youtube link dump of some of the games I've been hacking recently! This is another periodic piece, as I have so much of this content building up I want to still get them in manageable chunks. Again, I do a lot of this local game hacking mostly for exploration. Hope you enjoy these as much as I do :)
