What is Game Hacking?
Game hacking is the process of modifying a game's behavior to produce unintended effects. This can range from simple cosmetic changes to deep manipulation of game logic, physics, or scoring. Game hacking is used for fun, research, proof-of-concept security work, or in some cases, malicious purposes. As a cybersecurity engineer, understanding how games can be reverse-engineered helps you explore app vulnerabilities, code integrity, and tampering prevention techniques all valuable in real-world application security.
Why Hack 2048 Game
2048 is a simple puzzle game that makes it a perfect target for modding. It uses plain scoring logic which can be easily modified. For this hack, the goal was to change the way the score increased. Instead of only going up when tiles merged, the score should go up by double or quadruple even when nothing meaningful happens. This is a good example of logic tampering. It shows how you can bend a system to behave your way without crashing it.
Setting It All Up on Corellium
Device used: Android VM on Corellium
Game: 2048
Target: Change the score logic
Tools:
Deep Dive: Technical