On 8/22/06, Mike Zink <zuwiki / gmail.com> wrote:
> The game engine will be
> stored locally on the players computer. During distribution, I will use
> Ruby2Exe or similar so that players won't be able to tamper with files.

> Now the important part. The premise of the game is hacking. Real hackers
> (at least in this virtual world I'm creating) make their own tools.

I love Ruby -- but if you distribute a Ruby program as part of your
hacking game -- I cannot imagine what you could do to stop a
reasonably capable hacker from having a field day with your code.
Actually this is true of most any client side game code, but
particularly true of most dynamic languages and certainly of Ruby.

If you really want to use Ruby (and who could blame you), you might
want to consider a custom embedded version of the Ruby interpreter
that will only load signed code to lock down parts of the system -- of
course you will have to have a trap door to run their code (which you
cannot sign without embedding your key). There are still ways around
this, but you can raise the bar considerably.

Good luck
pth