Game 388: Hack 1.01

Andries Brouwer's Hack expands on Fenlason's original and forms the basis of what would eventually become Nethack, and I've decided to open my 1985 playlist with Hack 1.01, skipping over version 1.0 (Brouwer's preliminary release, not to be confused with Fenlason's version) as its source code appears to be incompletely preserved and no PC version exists.

Ported to MS-DOS by Don Kneller around May 1985, the readme file claims to be a complete conversion of the Unix version 1.0.1 with the exception of engravings, which were removed because of memory constraints. A few unidentified features from 1.0.2 are also retroactively implemented. Niceties like color and IBMgraphics found in hack121, the version of Fenlason's Hack I played earlier, aren't supported here, but I have greater confidence in this port's authenticity this time around.

I am playing with DOSBox configured to emulate a Tandy for its CGA-compatible 80-column mode, but without any distracting snow that I see when emulating an actual CGA card. As with the Roguelikes I played before, I'm going to go into this as blindly as possible, and play fairly until I win (ha!) or get bored with playing fair. They say the best way to approach Nethack is to dive right in and get used to dying.

Differences from Fenlason's version are immediately apparent. The starting shop is gone, class selection is in its place, and for my first run I tried playing a tourist.

Another of Brouwer's additions - a pet dog.

Tourists start with lots of gold, lots of food, and some healing potions, but have mediocre stats and are armed only with a camera and some darts. And I started off right next to a hobgoblin, who already landed a hit before I could make my first move!

For my first move, I tried blinding it with my camera. This worked, but before I could make a second, I was struck by a blind, angry hobgoblin.

No fair, but I tried again.

Tourists aren't the strongest.

This time I easily killed the acid blob in the starting room by chucking darts at it while the dog attacked up close. It left a corpse, which I left alone, being too heavy to carry without dropping stuff.

Some observations I made while exploring the first level:

• The dog tends to get in your way a lot. It's easy to accidentally attack it when you're just trying to get around! But it will move out of your way if you wait a turn or two.
  
• Pushable rocks may be found in the corridors, which operate by Sokoban-like rules. Sokoban wouldn't be available outside Japan until 1987, but Zork had a similar puzzle room earlier.
• Some corridors are so narrow that you can't squeeze through if your inventory is too full.
• Sometimes after querying a monster type, you may request more info, and get a lore dump!
  
  
• The dog will wander off and fight monsters. You'll get a message about noises in the distance when this happens.
  
• The dog will eat dead monsters of certain types.

 

Before long, though, I got waylaid by a gnome, and unable to fight back effectively or run away, I died again.

Next I tried a "speleologist" who started with two potions - one of object detection, one of gain level, some food, a 'large box' which seemed to be a refrigerator, and studded leather armor but no weapon. I did better against the level 1 monsters than my tourists had, though this might have had more to do with the level gain than the classes' better stats, and I managed to locate two potions of enhance armor and a battle axe. I also found a magic wand which turned my dog invisible, and while seeing jackals and goblins get mauled and eaten by an invisible dog was funny, it also caused me to keep attacking the unseen dog by accident. But this all came to an end in a corridor corner, where a hobgoblin trapped me while I rested from a fight against giant rats.

I tried a fighter. Armed with a two-handed sword, ring mail, and decent strength, my first kill was my own dog, who I accidentally one-shotted while walking through a corridor! I killed a hobgoblin in a room at some expense to my own health, and then a kobold right behind it finished me off.

The knight is bedecked with enchanted ringmail, a helmet, gloves, and wields a sword and shield with a spear in reserve, but has strangely low strength, less than even the tourist's. This character survived longer than anyone yet, his armor offering decent protection against the beasts on the upper levels, but there were misadventures. A piece of armor that I tried wearing turned out to be cursed and unremovable. An evil eye paralyzed me for a rather long time, forcing me to sit back helplessly to the point of near starvation while I watched my dog zoom around the room protecting me from the spawning enemies. A fortune cookie found in a room offered cryptic advice when eaten, something to do with enlightened corridors. When I took the stairs to dungeon level 2, my dog did not follow, and when I returned, it had gone feral and attacked! Retreating, a homonculus with a sleep-inducing bite attack killed me.

The cave man has an enchanted mace, enchanted bow, leather armor, and impressive strength. But he didn't last, as a bad scroll ruined my armor and soon after that a hobgoblin killed me from full strength.

Finally, the wizard class is oddly strong and begins with quite a bit of magic paraphernalia, none of it identified. Two wands, three rings, two potions (healing and blindness), and three scrolls (teleportation, amnesia, enchant armor). One wand turned out to be damaging and the other for digging, but I had no means of identifying the rings. Exploring level 1, I stepped onto a trapdoor and was dumped down to level 2, where I found a supremely annoying item store. Supremely annoying because a gas trap placed right at the door ensured I could not enter or leave without falling asleep, there didn't seem to be any way to recognize what any of the items were without picking them up first, and no way to find out the price except by offering to pay, which automatically pays if you have enough gold for the bill. Before very long, my damaging wand ran out of charges, and nearly defenseless, a hobgoblin killed me.

And then I realized I could have used my wand of digging to rob the store (or could I?)

So far I'm not really enjoying this. With Fenlason's Hack, I learned stuff and saw new and weird things with each attempt, but here, I feel like I'm not given many options, and more often than not I'm just getting killed by overpowered monsters and wondering what I was supposed to do otherwise.

In some ways this version also feels less advanced than hack121, which calls its authenticity into some question. Hack121, for instance, let you query all of the visible objects in the room, which I can't imagine going shopping without using, but this version doesn't. There's also no torches or lanterns, which were so important in Fenlason's design - could those have been added later, or did Brouwer just remove them?

If anyone has tips on how to best survive and navigate Hack's early game, I'd appreciate it. I don't want to get too deep into spoilers (or savescumming) just yet. I know a lot of the information and strategy out there pertains more to Nethack than Hack, especially this early, early version of it, but perhaps some of it is applicable here.