Nethack 3.4.1 Released

fatquack writes "Almost a day ago the DevTeam wrote: The NetHack DevTeam is pleased to announce the release of NetHack 3.4.1. NetHack 3.4 is an enhancement to the dungeon exploration game NetHack. It is a distant descendent of Rogue and Hack, and a direct descendent of NetHack 3.3. Get your copy at nethack.org now! (and it fixes the boulder/landmine bug)."

Comments

Nethack rules!

[Anonymous Coward]

I started playing this game a week ago again and now it got an update .. haven't noticed any boulder / landmine bugs though.

But anyway, I can't think of any other game that I have played on and off over the period of 10 years.

solving the dungeon

[twadzilla]

Funny, I just finished a fun programming assignment here at umich on a limited version of nethack--help Hugo find the stairs!

A good plan?

[Jugalator]

1. Bring Nethack to today when it comes to graphics and sound.
2. ...?
3. Profit!

Right now, *all* graphic ports of Nethack look like a tile based game of the early 90's, which isn't a huge improvement from the ASCII art. When will this game be brought a decade forward in multimedia quality? What I'd like to see is something along the lines of the graphics found in Diablo or Baldur's Gate. And skip this tile based system. Then I'll see if I'm interested. I'm sure a ton of work and polish has went into this game and appreciate RPG's like Baldur's Gate, so I'm no Action RPG freak, but the graphics is simply not immersive enough for me yet. :-(

If these "demands" of mine need Nethack to be some commercial product, so be it. I haven't got a problem with that. If Nethack is as good as I've heard, it could turn out to be a killer game.

Re:A good plan?

[Homburg]

Well, to be honest, your examples reflect precisely what I dislike about NetHack, its arbitariness. How do you learn any of this stuff other than trial and error? Diablo has at least occassional attempts to produce a gameworld that makes sense, rather than just being a random and incomprehensible series of 'hacks'.

Baldur's Gate or Deus Ex are, to my mind, much more immersive than either NetHack or Diablo, not primarily because of the graphics, but because it's possible to do well in these games by thinking like a participant in the game world, rather than as an external player of the game. Much of the best recent Interactive Fiction is immersive for similar reasons, and obviously in the case of IF, the immersiveness isn't to do with the graphics. Adam Cadre's I-0 is a good example.

I'm aware that some people like the NetHack style of gameplay, but frankly, they're wrong. More to the point, though, I do think the NetHack style, whether good or bad, is distinctly old-fashioned. Merely improving the graphics won't make the game more appealing to those who want a more modern style of gameplay, which seemed to be the suggestion being made by the guy I was originally replying to.

Oh, BTW:

GENOCIDE! Woot!

I can't help but think that's going to be quoted out-of-context against you, one of these days.

Actually, Falconseye is a significant improvement

[expro]

The game stands on it's own, but the added graphics don't need to be anywhere near perfect to make the game immensely more usable by non-techies. My six-year-old has played it again and again, and loves it, which never would have happened with the text-only version.

only if you play the ascii version

[Xtifr]

And I admit, it's nice that the ascii version still works, but the graphic tiles (added in, what, 1992?) make it even nicer, IMO. (Although not quite as safe to play at work, I admit.)

But be careful -- the PHB may not have a clue what all that odd text on your screen really means, but the technical manager probably played it in college himself, and will know at a glance what you're doing. The game has been around for nearly two decades, and in that time, a lot of people you might not expect have probably run across it here or there.

Also, if you're running it on a shared machine, you might want to rename the binary. Any sysadmin who sees "nethack" in a process list will either a) know you're playing games on company time, or b) assume the machine is under attack and panic. Either option may result in effects you may not enjoy.... :)

Re:Nethack Question

[Des Herriott]

Not sure why that got modded as Funny, I'm guessing it was a serious question... not sure if there are any recordings, but there are a few sites where you can connect and watch games in progress (or just connect and play a game yourself).

Try this index.

Even better...

[Des Herriott]

Try this site.

Re:Am I the only geek who HATES Nethack?

[doubleyewdee]

I always have to remind myself that this game isn't technically about having fun in the sense most roleplaying games define "fun". This is more like Diablo for people with some parts of the brains still active.

I can't really agree there. I've played nethack. I've retrieved the amulet. I feel I've "beaten" it for my intents and purposes (please, god, don't flame me about this). I also basically got this far because I stubbornly refused to be beaten down by the game.

I can see the Diablo comparison. They're both hack and slash games. The thing Diablo does not do to you, though, is leave you stranded and basically screwed at the beginning of the game. It doesn't, through lack of balance, force you to continually cycle through characters because the game gave you bad breaks.

The thing is, as a player of both games, I think Diablo is a hell of a lot more fun. Diablo is like nethack with balance. I think, in fact, that people who like to kick back and do some hacking for a while, are much better served by Diablo. Wasting time trying to beat (yeah yeah) nethack was probably a very poor decision on my part. It was a very smart decision on my part to never touch it again.

What I'm saying is, if all you want to do is hack and find treasure and use it on your quest to hack, Diablo is probably going to be more enjoyable. It's easier to get in to, much more friendly and intuitive, and much less likely to leave you in a completely unsalvageable game.

If, on the other hand, you enjoy the randomness of being potentially screwed in every other game you play, well, go nuts with nethack. Some people seem to really enjoy this. That's fine, but it's sure not for me, and I don't think it is for most people. Including those of us with "some parts of the brain still active."

And please, don't tell me about how you can always "work through" problems in nethack. I know, I've played it enough to know the tricks. What you fail to see is that often "working through" will just leave you screwed down the road, even if your immediate problem is solved. I honestly don't find that challenging, I find it irritating.

A game with really excellent balance *will* allow you to screw yourself, but it won't force you to abandon a game you've put hours (or days!) into. It will provide means by which to salvage your game. Even if it means hard work on your part, you'll still be able to do it. Plus, the game won't screw you through ridiculous arbitrary randomness. Sure, you can get yourself killed if you're careless, or stick your neck out too far, but you don't die from "starvation" well into the game because you can't get a bite, or you get poison meat, and your deity decides it's his day off, or whatever. That's just arbitrary and irritating. It isn't fun.

Re:Am I the only geek who HATES Nethack?

[juuri]

If, on the other hand, you enjoy the randomness of being potentially screwed in every other game you play, well, go nuts with nethack.

This is why, when people ask, I say "nethack is more of a life simulator".

Re:Am I the only geek who HATES Nethack?

[foxtrot]

I can see the Diablo comparison. They're both hack and slash games. The thing Diablo does not do to you, though, is leave you stranded and basically screwed at the beginning of the game.

This is actually one of the beauties of Nethack. If you play, for example, a Wizard, the early game is tough. Really tough. You can't melee, if you use spells too much you starve, you're just screwed at the beginning.

If you play, say, a caveman, you're pretty well off at the beginning-- you can melee anything you meet, and eat most of it once it's dead.

If you survived as a Wizard, the endgame is much easier. Give ol' Rodney the finger and he doesn't bother you so much.

If you played a caveman, the endgame is notably tougher. Your lack of spell-fu means you're pretty much forced to melee everything you meet, which gets old after a while.

Each character is balanced, and has a tougher or easier time in the beginning, middle, and end of the game.

-JDF

Re:Am I the only geek who HATES Nethack?

[namespan]

The thing that really gets me is monsters that attack faster than you can, because they can outrun you and attack you and there's nothing you can do. (Or is there?)

If you have the misfortune to run into an air elemental, leacrotta, or even rothe before you're prepared, about the only thing you can do is use the E-word (Elbereth) or some other repeatable method to try and scare them away repeatedly. It's a bit tedious, but it can work. I've used it to keep a crowd of 8 orcs, 2 rothes, a mean kitten, and an iguana off of an inexperienced healer's back -- and eventually chop them all up.

Otherwise:

(1) Get speed intrinsic (wand of speed monster, some corpses). Get speed boots if at all possible (right after magic resistance).

(2) Wand of Teleport. Best, because you can use it on you, or on the monster.

(3) Scroll of teleportation.

(4) Wand of digging. Fast escape through the floor.

And of course, a good AC and good weapon. But everybody wants that.