Gameplay: Give Hacking Depth

[MooK]

If you have ever read a novel or played a game set in a cyberpunk universe, you understand just how expansive the concept of hacking, or cracking can be.

Planetside is a cyberpunk game and I believe that to fully explore the world of hacking and cracking, Planetside should take some notes from it's fellow inhabitants of the cyberpunk genre.

The REK - Planetside's Deck

The REK is Planetside's version of the deck. A deck is an electronics kit used primarily to interface humans with computers, to either hack, crack or delve into cyberspace. For Planetside, the REK provided an interface to intrude upon and gain access to the various enemy electronic aspects of the game. It was simple, required very little interaction, but added a very important aspect of the game.

In Planetside 2, it's my idea that the REK needs to be fleshed out, in the same way weapons and skills are being expanded upon. The REK, like a deck, should be customizable, upgradeable and unique to the person. The REK would have three major components:

Offensive, defensive and support options available to the hacker or cracker.
The speed in which they can complete a hack or crack.
The stealth alloted to them while hacking or cracking.

This appears to be a balanced system, in which you must sacrifice one or two aspects to increase another. For instance:

Are you a run and gunner? Maybe you would prefer to sacrifice stealth, support and defensive options for speed and offensive damage.

Are you an infiltrator? Maybe you would prefer to sacrifice speed and support to increase your stealth and available offensive and defensive options.

Are you a support troop? Maybe you couldn't care less for the rest, you just want to protect your own. Maybe you want to impore the greatest electronic defenses and supportive tools available.

REKs are biometric, and the minute the owner is no longer in control, it locks itself tightly.

[From an artistic perspective, this would be a fantastic way to increase the detail of the various electronics components, allowing them to reflect the core cyberpunk theme.]

Offense, Defense and Support

In the cyberpunk genre, there are offensive, defensive and supportive characteristics of hacking and cracking. As we know it today, hacking a control console to initiate a change of ownership would be considered an offensive tactic, whereas boosting a pain field (oh how I hate those pain fields, terrible!) would be defensive.

From an offensive stand point, there are numerous tools to bring the opposing empire resistance, or to gain access to an opposing empires systems. From password cracking to decryption, infecting system files, rewriting security configurations and electronically damaging components--the possibilities are limited only by imagination. Examples:

You could electronically overload an equipment terminal's components, causing it to break or even explode, giving your empire the edge it needs to move forward. Maybe there's a nearby base you intend to cripple, by modifying a vehicle terminal and uploading corrupted schematics while rewriting security configurations to bypass standard checks and balances.

Offensively, an individual would need to gain physical access to the system, gain appropriate clearance, and then go from there. The balance mentioned above would force players to make tactical decisions about how they want to customize their equipment.

Defensively, players would need to insure that their systems or actions maintained some level of protection against the enemy. This would obviously apply to defending a system owned by a certain faction, but it would also have roots in defending ongoing intrusions into enemy systems. Therefore to be prepared in the event someone tries to hack your base, or tries to challenge your basehack, you need to consider how powerful your particular software needs to be, and what you need to give up to maintain that. Maybe you need more complex encryption, or maybe stronger ICE.

The cyberpunk genre puts a lot of weight into ICE, or Intrusion Countermeasure Electronics. I believe Planetside 2 should employ the exact same concept. ICE is measured based upon it's color designation; green, white, blue, red, black, etc. The stronger the ICE, the more powerful it is in defending, and the more options it provides to it's user or empire. All ICE would have the capability to defend, but the stronger ICE may even go so far as to fight back! Why shut down the hacker when you can have the terminal blow up in his face?

I believe that besides defense and offense, support holds a major role as well. Hacking one's own system to increase it's effectiveness in areas outside of electronic defense and offense, could be extremely important in the ongoing war. For instance, being able to reduce spawn time or vehicle/weapon acquisition time, increasing base repair ability, or hacking the power systems to use energy more efficiently, are all possibilities to help your faction succeed. You could even reroute power to prioritize, like cutting the lights, vehicle terminals or turrets to allow for more power to sustain the spawn tubes.

The Minigame

The minigame is a major component, and it's very hard to add in something that appeals to everyone. Planetside has no minigame--everything is automated. And to be honest, I wouldn't be unhappy if that were left alone. However, I believe there's a lot of room for potential. Bioshock did a terrible job at implementing their minigame, whereas Dystopia did an excellent job implementing theirs. I believe that Neocron, though I never played it, also did a pretty decent job with theirs. A simple minigame is okay, but I want something complex. I want to treat it with respect.

Terminal. Through the REK, the user would do the following:
* Identify what security systems are in place (ICE, IDS, Firewalls, protected content, etc.)
* Make use of existing tools to bypass these systems (Definition lists, brute force, etc.)
* Infect these systems to hinder the base core programming or capture the base (Override systems, introduce virus/trojan/worm/etc.)
* Secure your intrusions in the event the enemy is able to reverse your attempts (ICE.)

Like I said earlier, the current implementation of the "virus" system is not acceptable. Don't even consider bringing it back in it's current form.

Now, I understand that some people don't want to go through the hassle of having to type everything out in a terminal--so do what Dystopia did, make it automated. Let there be two sides of the same coin, for those who want to play it out--let their skill and tools determine their ability. For those who don't? Let the system go at it's own pace; it may be slower, but it has less of a chance to fail through human error.

I think I need to hit up some Shadowrun and Uplink, heh.