Image: reddit.com · Video still: Resurrecting freeware from 2000 with Claude Code and REA
Smash-your-screen freeware stress.exe from 2000 recreated
Claude Code with Opus 5.5 produced a faithful port of the old stress.exe using its original graphics, animations and sound, as a macOS app and a web version.
Credits
Earliest dated source:
The full story
The maker remembered stress.exe, a freeware program that let you smash your screen with hammers, a chain-saw, a flame-thrower and termites. After reading about Reverse Engineer Anything, they tried it with Claude Opus 5.5.
Within 30 minutes they had a faithful port using the original graphics, animations and stereo sound effects. After about two hours it was available as a downloadable .dmg for macOS and as a web app styled like a Windows XP desktop. The post credits the original author, Miroslav Němeček.
How it was done
Tools
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Sources
From a short post by the maker, so the details are as they tell them.
- Reddit: Resurrecting freeware from 2000 with Claude Code and REAReddit poster: UcodiaPosted
The maker's post on r/ClaudeCode.
If it disappears: archived copy of Reddit: Resurrecting freeware from 2000 with Claude Code and REA (opens in a new tab)
- The project: rea.tools
Linked in the post.