"Addictive, unique game for the masses."

Uplink has been out for about a year, and is now released in the US. It's a great game, with a great and original concept, that serves a few purposes. On one level, it's a video game. An interesting diversion. On another level, though, it's a ward. At some point, all gamers, usually in the early teens, want to become hackers. It's a provocative life, and it's capitalized upon by movies that make it even more attractive. However, hacking is illegal. This game is quite realistic, and is almost like hacking without the consequences. But anyway, let's hit the cliche review part.

GRAPHICS
Well, this game is a computer simulatorish dealy. It isn't really graphic intensive cause, well, it isn't SUPPOSED to be. I mean, the graphics aren't bad or anything, but they aren't all full 3dish and such. It's meant to replicate the graphical user interface for on operating system. Heh. Yeah.

MECHANICS
Well, uh, it's mostly click and type. It's a computer simulatorish dealy, so it doesn't really need heavy controls or anything. But it does work very well, no discrepancies, considering, well, you're typing and clicking.

GAMEPLAY
Immersive and addictive, to say the least. It's really, really, really addictive. Being a 1337 h4x0r is fun to the max. It's really addictive. It's 2010 in the game, and you decide to work for a company called, coincidentally, Uplink. You are basically a mercenary hacker. Not really a plot, you just kinda hack and get money and stuff. It's really fun, though, as missions can go from really easy to disgustingly hard. You need to spend money to upgrade your computer and software to be able to get into more protected systems, bypass firewalls, crack passwords, etc.

SOUND
The music is pretty bad. It's like post-MIDI bleep bloop ''Computer-Drama'' electronic type stuff. Not really techno. But, you can turn it off. The sounds are just little click noises and such.

FEATURES
What's there to say? You're a hacker, and it's an awesome game. It's really fun, addictive, original. Good game, buy it. You can also download a pretty good demo on the website, http://introversion.co.uk. The demo is restricting, yeah, but it gives you a great, great peek into the game.

OVERALL
Great game. I highly recommend it to anyone. It is simply fun, and at the same time, challenging. It makes you think.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 06/18/03, Updated 06/18/03