$19.99EXAPUNKS Hack networks with tiny robots
Write little programs that slip into networks, do the job and get out, one puzzle at a time.
Is EXAPUNKS worth it?
EXAPUNKS is worth it if…
- you like puzzles where the answer is a plan and the plan is code
- you enjoyed Opus Magnum or SHENZHEN I/O and want one with a story
- you have some programming experience and want a playful place to use it
- you want a game with no time pressure that waits patiently while you think
- you like retro pixel art, chiptune-adjacent soundtracks and dry 90s humor
Screenshots
Programming robots that do your dirty work
Every job starts with a network laid out on screen and a goal: steal the files, wreck the data, get out clean. You write short programs for your EXAs, tiny agents that crawl the network, pick up and drop files, talk to each other over channels, replicate themselves and, when needed, terminate rival EXAs. The debugging is visual: you watch your little robots wander the grid in real time, so when one explodes because it ran into a wall of your own making, you can see exactly where the code went wrong. There are no limits on how long your code can be, so a messy solution that works is always good enough to keep going. Later, the real game begins: trimming cycles and lines of code until a solution feels tight.
Zines, dial-up and a story worth following
The tutorials come as TRASH WORLD NEWS, an underground hacker magazine you can actually print out, written like hobbyists talking to hobbyists. Between jobs, an AI employer chats with you about technology and ethics, and a community of fellow hackers trades tips and small talk while everyone scrabbles for work. The pixel art, the soundtrack and the voice acting give the whole thing a laid-back 90s mood: you never leave your apartment, and somehow that is the point. The jobs themselves are the fun part. You skim research from a university, drain bank ATMs, rewrite a TV station's script, mess with highway signs, and eventually hack devices inside your own body. The humor lands, and the story is more interesting than a game about typing code has any right to be.
Questions before you hack?
How hard does it get?
The early levels hold your hand just long enough, and the main story stays demanding but fair. The back half is where it bites: some puzzles look impossible at first, and the bonus levels are genuinely brutal. The good news is that nothing is timed. You can put a puzzle down for a week and come back, and the solution often arrives while you are eating or falling asleep.
Is there anything to do after the story?
Plenty. Every level tracks your cycles, lines of code and activity, so a finished solution is really a starting point for optimization, with leaderboards to compare against friends. You can battle your programs directly against other people's, build your own networks to hack and share them, and there are extras tucked away: a card game and an arcade game, if you hack the servers they live on.
What is the catch?
The whole game, manuals included, is in English, and it assumes you are willing to read carefully and think like an engineer. If typing commands and staring at a grid while your brain chews on a problem sounds like homework rather than fun, this is not your game. If it sounds like a good evening, it very much is.
