Maybe I shouldn't say this in a PC gaming outlet, but I had a great time after installing Malware

GamesPuzzleMaybe I shouldn’t say this in a PC gaming outlet, but I had a great time after installing MalwareWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

(Image credit: Odd Games)

A pop-up informs you that "You have been installed 1 malware!"

I don’t think our publisher’s cybersecurity courses have really taken root. In the past 30 minutes, I have installed upwards of 10 pieces of malware on my machine. The forecast is that I will install more. More free system speed optimisers. More fashion news updates. More desktop buddies. I need a thick, malicious blanket to keep my processor on its toes and some spice in my life.

I have been playing the demo forMalware, a boldly named piece of software I installed on the computer I do online banking on. Luckily, it’s actually a game. To be specific, it’s a puzzle game, in the same way that those file-hosting websites with eight different “DOWNLOAD!” buttons, all different colours, are puzzles.

(Image credit: Odd Games)

A fake installation wizard in the game Malware, with multiple tickboxes to install malicious additional programs.

On those sites, your goal is to find the one tiny bit of underlined text that is youractualdownload button, and in Malware, your goal is to navigate a series of installation wizards without installing the dirty payloads that come with them.

Its presentation is incredibly simple. You switch between your email inbox, where hapless rubes email you exe files that have hamstrung their PCs, and the exes themselves. Each one is an old-fashioned, Win98-style installation wizard. The first one is easy: Just untick the boxes asking if you want to install extra software.

The second is harder. Now some of the boxes ask if you want tonotinstall a dodgy program, so you have to go through and make sure to only untick the right ones. The next one throws up a pop-up you need to hit the “X” on, rather than “Okay,” and so on and so on, with increasingly esoteric complexity. Fail, and a chirpy popup informs you that “You have been installed X malware!"—the English is not quite perfect—where X equals every little trick you missed in the installer.

(Image credit: Odd Games)

An emailer asks you to figure out how to install a “Gnome Beauty” program in Malware.

It’s a tiny, simple thing—which is probably why it’s currently going for $2.40 (£2) onSteam—and its demo is only tinier and simpler. But it’s a cute, fun game, and reminds me of something I might once have pulled up on Newgrounds back in the heady days of 2006 or so. You know, when installers like this were more of a thing. Anyway, I can’t hang about. Apparently I have a meeting with the IT department.

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