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NetHack

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NetHack is a roguelike computer game originally released in 1987. It is an evolution of an earlier game called Hack (1985) which was itself an evolution of Rogue (1980). The "net" element references that its development has been coordinated through the Internet, which was notable at the time; it is not a multiplayer game. (The NetBSD operating system and the Netpbm package carry "net" in their names for a similar reason.) The "hack" element refers to a genre of role-playing games known as hack and slash for their focus on combat.

NetHack is one of the oldest computer games still being actively developed, with new features and bug fixes regularly being added by a loose group of volunteer developers, commonly called the DevTeam.

The player takes the part of a dungeon-delving hero in search of the Amulet of Yendor. The dungeon spans over 50 levels, most of which are randomly created. The dungeon contains monsters, weaponry, magical items, hidden doors and much more.

NetHack is traditionally played using text mode graphics where the dungeon's features, its inhabitants, as well as items are represented by single characters. There are also several graphical user interfaces available for the game.

Contents
[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Game

Before playing the game, the player is asked to name their character and then select a race, class, gender, and alignment for his or her character, or allow the game to create a random character. There are traditional character roles such as knight, wizard, and rogue, but there are also unusual ones, including archeologist, tourist, caveman, valkyrie and samurai. The player's character's class and alignment dictate which god the player serves in the game; by pleasing his or her god, the player may receive aid and gifts.

After the player's character is created, the task is then introduced:

"After the Creation, the cruel god Moloch rebelled against the authority of Marduk the Creator. Moloch stole from Marduk the most powerful of all the artifacts of the gods, the Amulet of Yendor, and he hid it in the dark cavities of Gehennom, the Under World, where he now lurks, and bides his time."

To win the game, the player must find and sacrifice the Amulet of Yendor to their deity. The Amulet is found at the lowest level of the dungeon. Successful completion of this main task rewards the player with the gift of immortality (the player is said to ascend), and the player attains the status of demigod(dess). In addition to the main quest to find and sacrifice the Amulet, a number of sub-quests must be completed along the way, including one class-specific quest.

The player's character is initially accompanied by a pet animal, typically a kitten or little dog, although Knights begin with a pony. The player can name his or her pet, and can tame more pets along the way - domestic animals can be tamed by feeding them, and other monsters can sometimes be tamed by magic. Pets are very useful, not only for assisting the player in combat, but also for detecting cursed items and stealing from shops.

The game is wide in scope: hundreds of unique items, situations, monsters, and personages provide opportunities for interaction with the gameworld. Some interactions are rare and occasionally amusing; however, most prove quite painful or even deadly:

"You fall into a pit! You land on a set of sharp iron spikes! --More--
The spikes were poisoned! The poison was deadly... --More--

Do you want your possessions identified?"
The prompt "Do you want your possessions identified?" (abbreviated as DYWYPI) is given by default at the end of any game, allowing the player to learn any unknown properties of the items found during the game.
Enlarge
The prompt "Do you want your possessions identified?" (abbreviated as DYWYPI) is given by default at the end of any game, allowing the player to learn any unknown properties of the items found during the game.

This is referred to as YAAD or YASD, meaning Yet Another Annoying Death or Yet Another Stupid Death.

Sporadically, the game saves the level on which a character has died, and then integrates that level into a later dungeon, complete with the ex-player's possessions, ghost and killer(s). This is done via 'bones files', which are saved on the computer hosting the game. A player using a publically-hosted copy of the game can thus encounter the remains of many other players. Players can also swap bones files via programs like [Hearse].

It is often said that "the DevTeam thinks of everything" (abbreviated as TDTTOE). Anything the player can think of for their character to do, the DevTeam will probably have thought of a plausible response.

For example, attempting to dip a potion into itself would produce: 

That is a potion bottle, not a Klein bottle!
A similar message is given when one attempts to put a bag inside itself: 
That would be an interesting topological exercise.
Or, being burdened while going down the stairs would produce: 
You fall down the stairs.
Bugs, funny messages, stories, experiences, and ideas for the next version are discussed on the Usenet newsgroup [news:rec.games.roguelike.nethack rec.games.roguelike.nethack] (abbreviated RGRN).

Items and tools

NetHack features a variety of items: armour to protect the player; scrolls and spellbooks to cast; potions to quaff; and an assortment of tools such as keys and lamps.

Although the majority of items are beneficial to the player, their use is unknown until the player finds out about them. For example: an amulet may be an amulet of life saving, but it may be shown by the game as just "an octagonal amulet" if the player character does not know what it is. After it is identified, all octagonal amulets will be shown as "amulets of life saving". The descriptions for every item are randomised each game; e.g. the octagonal amulet may be an amulet of life saving in one game and an amulet of strangulation in the next.

Blessings and curses

A player's inventory, early in the game.
Enlarge
A player's inventory, early in the game.

Like many other roguelike games, all items in NetHack are either "blessed", "cursed", or "uncursed". The majority of items are found uncursed, but the "b/c/u" (blessed/cursed/uncursed) status of an item is unknown until it is identified or detected through other means.

The status of an item can be revealed in a few ways. One method is to use the item, but this can be risky. Instead, many players prefer to wait to identify any items by using a scroll of identify, or at least check for curses by placing items on an altar before trying them.

A blessing makes the item more powerful. A blessed potion of healing would heal the player more than an ordinary uncursed potion would. Blessed weapons deal extra damage to undead creatures and demons.

Cursed items, on the other hand, cause ill or unintended effects. A cursed piece of armor may make the player more vulnerable to attacks, and can not be removed. A cursed scroll may just not work as well as expected (a cursed scroll of magic mapping that only maps a random selection of locations on a level) or do the opposite effect entirely (a cursed scroll of genocide creates the monsters that the player wished to kill). A potion of gain level would normally increase the experience level of the character by one, but when cursed will cause the character to gain a dungeon level—by rising up through the ceiling.

Some cursed items may have side-effects that may be beneficial to the player. Even using a cursed scroll of genocide can be beneficial if the player is aware the scroll is cursed.

Voluntary conducts

While NetHack is very difficult, veteran players often attempt "conducts", which are voluntary restrictions on their behavior tracked by the game, to increase the difficulty further. Examples include:

Some conducts are not tracked by the game, but remain popular, such as speedrunning, making it through the dungeon within a set number of turns, and chastity, or not using incubi or succubi to gain experience. Other challenges include not using items, such as wearing no armor.

Spoiler files

Players over the years have compiled extensive documentation for every aspect of the game, from instructions on exactly how to navigate certain obstacles, to detailed formulae explaining the probability of in-game events. Gleaning spoiler information from the source code is known as source-diving. The documents are collectively known as spoilers.

Opinions vary on the use of spoilers. NetHack is widely considered one of the hardest games of all time, due to its intentional lack of a facility to reload a saved game after making a mistake. Even with complete access to all spoilers, the game still poses a considerable challenge. Many people have played for years without ascending. Some consult spoilers extensively during the game, others only consult common information, and others choose not to read spoilers and will learn as they play.

Graphics

Though one was added later, NetHack was created originally without a graphical user interface. The objects are displayed as letters on the screen:

center

Key:

Below the map is the status line. First there is the hero's name and professional ranking, the latter being based on the hero's experience. St stands for strength, Dx for dexterity, Co for constitution, In for intelligence, Wi for wisdom, Ch for charisma, and the player's alignment is Neutral.

The next line shows the dungeon level the hero is currently on (increasing when the player goes deeper), money, hit points, magical power, armor class, and experience level. The hero's hunger status, ranging from Satiated down to Fainting is shown on the far right, if it is anything other than normal.

This screenshot shows NetHack for Windows, one of the many graphical interfaces that have been developed for NetHack. The tiled X11 interface for 'nix machines is similar in appearance. The hero can be seen on the right-hand side engaged in combat with a Goblin.
Enlarge
This screenshot shows NetHack for Windows, one of the many graphical interfaces that have been developed for NetHack. The tiled X11 interface for 'nix machines is similar in appearance. The hero can be seen on the right-hand side engaged in combat with a Goblin.

Tiles mode

Apart from the original text mode, there are interfaces that replace text mode screen representations with images, or tiles, to represent the objects in the game - this is known as "tiles mode". Graphic interfaces include those using X11 tiled and the similar Windows graphical interface, the Qt toolkit, and the GNOME libraries. There are also enhanced graphical interfaces such as the isometric SDL-based Falcon's Eye/Vulture's Eye and also the OpenGL based noegnud.

Notable (non-player) characters

Notable creatures

Development

NetHack, as stated above, is developed by the DevTeam. They don't publicly discuss versions in progress, and they release new versions without any notice. However, a listing of fixed bugs (though not patches for those bugs) is available on their webpage. Often, unofficial patches will be released by others between versions.

Other versions & interfaces

Cultural references

NetHack's long life has led to a wide acceptance into computer culture, with constant references being made to it in the social circles, on the internet, in other games, and online comics, such as User Friendly.

When hallucinating, monsters will appear to be creatures drawn from other mythos, fictional universes or pop culture: this leads to humorous discoveries of references to such disparate sources as The Lord of the Rings, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Star Trek, Star Wars, BattleTech, Discworld, Zork, and even Pokémon.

Numerous references to NetHack can be found in the online satirical RPG Kingdom of Loathing.

A reference to NetHack can be found in an E-mail accessible on an employee’s personal computer in the headquarters of the fictional company VersaLife in the video game Deus Ex.

External links

Public servers

Several public servers have been set up to allow people to telnet to a host and begin playing NetHack:

 

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All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.

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