Spread your Sims 2 Hack
One web site focusing on computer security, viruses and hacker prevention, SecurityFocus.com has brought to light something a bit new to the gaming community.
The simulated life game and wildly popular player community that is Sims 2 allows players to trade pre-built and furnished houses and families via online forums. The software includes the feature in fact, but some skilled coders are applying their skills to cheat at the game and then spread the hacked code around to unsuspecting players. Electronic Arts, makers of the game, aren’t too happy. Not necessarily that the hacks existed, but from the complaints of virgin users wondering why teenagers in the game were getting pregnant, or that other in game persona’s could have their physical needs surpressed, all of them magically, by drinking a single cup of coffee.
Those that created the modifications hadn’t intended for the hacks to spread, but like a virus, the miracle houses spread through EA’s own online forums to other users like wildfire. It was the hackers themselves that came up with a solution, an Anti-Sims-Virus so to speak, that identifies the modified code. The software can be found via seperate links and are not supported by EA, but work just like standard anti-virus software using a database of names and file checksums to identify the infected houses.
No comment so far from Electronic Arts.
