Note About Bugs:

We've been busy behind the scenes at Hack Wars, fixing some nasty bugs -- Which is why you might not have seen us as much as usual lately (also I think Alex and Stephen, the other two developers are dead). We seem to be back at a fairly stable build again. Another note, don't think that we're ignoring your suggestions, we've just been run off our feet recently... which brings us to an important note...

Script Updates:

Yes! you can now use functions in your scripts simply put this on the first line of your script:
#define functions

The first two Hack Wars Content Packs are now live and available for purchase in the Shop. You can access the Shop by logging in to your Hack Wars account and then clicking "Shop" at the top of the page. There are two Content Packs available at this time; the File IO Pack and the Domain Name Pack. Both are available for the reasonable price of $5. All purchases provide directly to the upkeep and costs of our servers and help us spend more time improving the game.

You can find out the details of each of the new content packs by reading Ben's post on the new features. Thanks for your support and keep and eye out for new updates and features in the coming weeks.

I realized the other day, it being the first of the month, that the pesky people hosting our game occasionally request money from us -- how impolite. This having been said, we are rolling out our first two pay features with this update. Don't panic, this does not herald in a new two-tier system for Hack Wars, we are going to continue updating the game for everyone, our pay features reflect neat little add ons for those who are willing to help out our cause.

Do to some inappropriate behavior of some players in game, an update to the terms-of-service policy has been made the new clause reads:

Offensive messages sent between players via chat, or in-game messages, will not be tolerated. Accounts caught participating in this behavior will be suspended or banned. This is not to say that you cannot send joke messages between players, but: avoid racial slurs, sexist comments, swearing, or otherwise offensive language. Also, if your harassment of a specific player is deemed to be excessive, a warning may be issued.

Update:

Player Sigmund Fraud is hoping that people will help out with a Hack Wars Wiki project that he has been working on. He would love to get some other players contributing to content.

The Site Is: http://www.electronicwar.net

Nothing helps our ego here at Hack Wars like seeing some fan sites being made. Check out:

optikpulse.com: They have an alternate forums, and lots of useful information.

Restart your browser and/or Clear Your Java Cache

We've made some updates to the file browser based on user input. You can now switch between the list view and icon view. We have also added in a few more functions to make things a bit more interesting, and added our helper functions we added into the challenge API -- so you can use them for challenges.

For the programmers out there, I've added in a couple new interesting functions into the API. I'll harass Stephen and get him to update the manuals with them shortly, but here's a sneak peek.

Global Variables:

In all your scripts you can now set and maintain global variables, using the functions: setGlobal(int index,variable data), and getGlobal(int index). Where data can be a string, int, float, or boolean. There are ten globals available to you (0-9).

Here's an example of a poll I made for my website using them:

Four months ago a few friends and I launched a game, a fun game, a game called Hack Wars.

Hardware Upgrades have Arrived!

Under System->Administration->Equipment-Manager, you can now see all the hardware that you have installed on your computer. From here you can equip the AGP and PCI cards that will now be dropped by NPCs. These cards offer additional effects, sometimes good, and sometimes bad -- rare hardware can make your computer much more powerful, so make sure you check out some of the other networks.