alt Hacker News9 year old me got my first "hacking" experience out of this game. With the shareware version, you could not select the ultra tank that could shoot 3 bullets for a human, but you COULD if it were the computer player.
The "hack": -start a game with a normal tank VS ultra computer player as p2. -save the game (as a file). -open the game file. -read the ASCII text and just flip which player has which text.
Now, I had my ultra tank.
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This reminds me of something similar I did as a teenager in the 90s. Also some shareware game, can't remember exactly what it was about (I think a submarine game?). The shareware version only gave access to the first map. After digging around the files I found that it included all the maps and simply renaming map n to map 1's file name allowed you to play it
Mine was on a similar game, GORILLA.BAS. I would edit the banana code for a much bigger explosion. Lots of fun back in computer class!
It would be a nice thread on here, to see what people's first hacks were, especially from that era when people were usually just alone and stumbling on these things.
Mine was similar but it was the original C&C. Found this sketchy-ass save game editor/mod editor, proceeded to give the little Nod buggies the laser from the obelisk of light to trivialize the single player campaign.
That feeling of being the leetest of leet haxors just from editing some ini settings was pretty glorious.
L33T!
I "hacked" Cap'n Hector in Escape Velocity.
The game was shareware and he'd show up to ask you to pay the fee. After the trial period he'd start lobbing missiles at you. There was a basic editor you could open to adjust all the ship stats and weapons, so while you couldn't turn him friendly you could at least de-claw him.
I remember thinking it was weird how "easy" it was to work around, but it's hard to imagine the studio would care much: a pre-internet 14 year who loved the game that much is probably more useful as an ambassador than a paying customer.