If you blink, you might just miss me.

Dammit, I told you not to blink. Now I’ll just have to hang around longer. (grumble grumble)

Yes, it’s me, Miss Jennifer Miller taking a break from the life an opera singing graduate student to bring you the skinny on a slick little game from those geniuses overseas. In Uplink you take on the role of a private citizen who joins an organization that specializes in computer subterfuge, made famous of course in that little movie called Hackers with Johnny Lee Miller (no relation but he can be my husband any day) and Angelina Jolie. Over the course of the game, you earn your stripes (and quite a bit of cash) by completing missions to steal and/or delete information from rival companies and discredit certain individuals, among many other things. It’s a fun way to make you feel pretty important . . . super hero-like even.

Pop Quiz hotshot:

You’ve got 53 seconds to steal sensitive research material from a world-renowned biotechnology firm and then to remove all trace of your theft. What do you do? WHAT DO YOU DO?

Uplink uses a graphically minimal, OS style interface to completely immerse the player in the universe of computer terrorism. Shaded in monotones of dark blue and gray, the gateway program (as called by the game) begins with you registering yourself with a unique handle and password. This is great for those who use a community terminal so many games can be run on one machine. I ended up registering three different handles to get different experiences of playing the game. Once you have “logged-on” as a member of the Uplink community, you have the option to take the OS tutorial that will run you through the fairly complicated, non-intuitive interface. Uplink’s developers purposely did not include a manual to add to the immersion of the game. This both helps and hurts. While yes, it helps to make the experience feel more real, less gamey, I found the tutorial to be hard to work with. While working through it with my first handle, I came to a place where I was doing steps ahead of the tutorial program, causing it to stop responding to my actions. This forced me to create a new handle and start again. Of course, you say, I could have done without the tutorial and gone straight into the game itself, which gives you that option. Let’s just say that it’s to your advantage to take the time and work through this program.

The main challenge in starting the game is learning to navigate all its many controls. In a part of the computer world where Microsoft is akin to brussel sprouts, Uplink’s developers sure designed this thing to look like Windows - hacker style. There a came a point in one of my missions where I had windows layered upon windows in order to get everything completed before I was traced. It was confusing and clunky at times, but I suppose this adds to the excitement (frustration) of completing missions.

Mission Impossible

Speaking of missions, let’s touch on those. Once you’ve gone through the tutorial, you will then be able to log onto the Uplink community server to look for jobs on their bulletin board. Starting out, you can only look at jobs such as “delete files from competitor’s server” or “copy files from competitor’s server.” As you complete these missions successfully, you’ll get a higher rank and be given access to more difficult missions, involving changing someone’s grades from college, and discrediting someone your employer doesn’t much care for.

Oh, but that is not all grasshopper. In order to complete these missions, you will need to have the best hardware and software utilities that money can buy. Uplink will start you out with a modest budget, and as you complete missions, you’ll be sent more cash to upgrade your utilities and your gateway. However, if you go into a mission without the necessary software or an older version or the password breaker, tracer tracker, etc. your success may be in jeopardy. So make sure you’re on top of things in terms of your resources.

It’s all in the timing

Add to this an element that we adventure purists cringe at, the dreaded timed-puzzle factor, and you might run away from this game screaming your little girly scream. However, this game is all about getting things done before your 53 seconds of fame are up. If you can’t get in, copy the file, and get out before they find you, the game’s up and you start all over from scratch, this time with a police record. This will flag you so other corporations may not be willing to hire you to complete missions for them. So be quick and be careful!

Uplink runs in real time, so if you have a piece of hardware installed and the techs tell you it will take one day, it will take exactly 24 hours before you can expect to be able to use it. However, unlike real life, there is a fast forward feature included so you can move to the next day in just a few seconds. I need one of those for finals week, grrrrrr.

Rave in my room!

One of Uplink’s most interesting features is the music. Behind your actions, there is a steady soundtrack of electronica and techno music. It’s a real shame that I left my kick-ass speakers at home because I could have easily booted up Uplink and had a party in my room. Fortunately, for those who don’t enjoy such things, there is an option to shut off DJ Uplink if you’d rather blast Dolly Parton while committing Internet espionage.

Overall, I enjoyed Uplink and its foray into creating a realistic environment where you are in control of how the game plays out. It reminded me at times of the ill-fated online game Majestic where you became the central figure in a huge government conspiracy that involved you surfing the internet and calling people in order to move onward. I think if EA had incorporated more of what Uplink is after, with high-bandwidth terrorism and dealing less with the pathetic characters at the heart of its story, perhaps Majestic would still be with us today. And I would be shorter ten bucks every month.

If you’d like to order Uplink it can be found for worldwide order at Play.com or through the Introversion website.

Heading out to study 19th century French art song. Hope to be back this summer!

Final Grade: B-

If you enjoyed Uplink, then may I recommend the following:

Read: Neuromancer by William Gibson
Watch: Hackers or The Net
Play: Webmaster from Viva Media (good luck finding it!)

System Requirements:

• PII 233 or equivalent
• 32 MB RAM
• 1 MB VRAM
• 30 MB disk space
• Mouse
• Sound card