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There are shockingly few games that deal with being a computer hacker, such as Activision’s old Hacker and more recently, Uplink: Hacker Elite. Machine Code Games has released their own title, Hackers of 2073, which can be best described as a souped-up Minesweeper with logic puzzles thrown in.

The gamer plays by piloting an Asteroids-style spaceship avatar around a Minesweeper field. Like Minesweeper, spaces are numbered from 0 on up depending on the number of “bombs” (Proximity Intrusion Measures, et al) adjacent to them. Striking a bomb weakens the ship; rather than blowing up, the field is reset when the player strikes too many. Since the game is timed, this is problematic.

The player tries to recover data nodes on the Minesweeper field to gain clues to passwords to gain access to new areas. The data comes in the form of logic puzzles, ranging from simple rebus puzzles to Mastermind match games to circuit solving puzzles. The variety of puzzles are wide enough to sustain interest during the entire game.

The look of the game is fitting for its theme: gridwork, circuitry, and abstract shapes. If there’s a quibble with the game, it’s that its a little obscure in its tutorial, and sometimes it’s unclear what is going on. Nevertheless, it’s a fresh puzzle game that adds something new to the logic puzzle genre. The game is available for PC and Mac, and a demo can be downloaded at the official site here.