What ever happened to cheat codes?

[marvelvscapcom2]

Hello everyone



The day is Nov 11th 2006. You just turned off your fifth playthrough of buelevard of broken dreams by green day, you either have a trapper keeper with rockstar stickers or a secret Avril Lavagine crush you hide from your syblings, but either way you come home to a windows xp lap top and go onto cheat planet where you find all the codes for GTA san andreas, maybe you are doing demoliton derby in saints row the original.  Or the beautiful light of a green PS2 power button being the only thing you see during dark load screens as this wasn't just a game in your childhood but your childhood as a game.  Overpowered jets? boom.  Left down up right.  The konami code? infinite lives?  What happened to it all?  And why do you feel game companies have done away with single player campaign cheat codes? So long as they are kept off of online servers, I don't see how it effects anything but adding an epic fun factor to games





Imagine

Unlimited Health In Bioshock Definitive Edition

Michael Desanta gets to be Lance Vance with a call back skin

Infinite Red Shells in Mario Kart 8

As gamers many of us grew up with the tips and tricks magazines but now a days you have to find some modder on PC to make your dreams reality.  Not only did devs back in the 2000s do it themselves, they did it coded into the actual game and not as DLC.  Cheat codes were mostly always novelty for me. But a nostalgia bone in me really misses that novelty.  Does anyone else have theories as to why last gen and current gen games seem to never have cheat codes? And do you miss them?

Thank you for sharing

[oldgamerz]

I was not aware that they went anywhere Marvel, but I know that is something to else you can do with a single video game, sometimes cheats add, completely new video games within the game itself, DLC mods and other things that used to be unlocked by cheating on the PS2 like on true crimes Streets Of LA, you can play as other character skins by entering a cheat code instead of needing to download any DLC, makes no scenes that cheat codes went away. If they did

I am a retro gamer because games back when had so much to do big head modes, and other unlockable with a secrets button press

not even all cheat codes and game modes for many retro games have even been discovered yet

[sworddude]

As gamers many of us grew up with the tips and tricks magazines but now a days you have to find some modder on PC to make your dreams reality.  Not only did devs back in the 2000s do it themselves, they did it coded into the actual game and not as DLC.  Cheat codes were mostly always novelty for me. But a nostalgia bone in me really misses that novelty.  Does anyone else have theories as to why last gen and current gen games seem to never have cheat codes? And do you miss them?

Thank you for sharing

you just answered you own question, plus with mods you don't only have simple cheats you can literally make different games out of them.

The options is there, plus on average allot of games are really easy these days so I'd imagine cheats to actually beat the game aren't needed anymore. compared to nes snes era

[bigbossman]

There are cheat codes & then there are game hacks. Cheat codes were cool in that it gave you an advantage that you couldn't normally.

With game hacking, yes, you can do the infinite health, lives, etc. but you can do so much more. I like being able to find things hidden in the game that you couldn't find through normal playing or through a simple cheat code.

For example:
- Did you know that in the SNES game Natsume Championship Wrestling that there are leftover characters that you can play as from the Japanese version of the game? Using a player modifier code for the Pro Action Replay you can access Giant Baba, The Patriot, Mitsuharu Misawa, & Tsuyoshi Kikuchi. Through normal playing you can't play as them, nor can you unlock them as the localized, North American version used fictitious wrestlers.

- Did you know that in Fight Night Round 2 that the Nintendo Gamecube version contained an unlockable character Little Mac (from the Punch-Out series)? System exclusive unlockables are nothing new. However, when the PS2 version was produced, Little Mac was never removed from the final cut. You can't unlock him, but using a Code Breaker & a player modifier code, you can play as him. Although, he doesn't look like Little Mac from the Mike Tyson's Punch-Out. He bears more a of a resemblance to the main character from Super Punch-Out.

- Did you know that in the PS1 version Command & Conquer: Red Alert Retaliation you can produce an army of civilians & Albert Einsteins? You can even produce what is call a "Phase Transport" which is similar to the APC, but is undetectable to enemies (until it attacks), plus it can hold one person. Using the Gameshark made that possible.

One of the other things I liked especially with the PS1 & PS2 era of game hacking was being able to use "Joker Codes". For those not familiar with the term, they are used to turn a particular effect on or off with the press of a button (or combination of buttons). Its especially useful if a certain code causes the game to crash at certain points. I made the best use of Joker Codes when I played the WWF / WWE Smackdown games for the PS2. I liked using them along with rule modifier codes. These would let you create various match types that weren't possible through normally selecting it. Such as a submission only triple threat match.

I wish Game Genie, Pro Action Replay, Codebreaker, & Gameshark were still physically produced for the current generation systems.

[burningdoom]

As gamers many of us grew up with the tips and tricks magazines but now a days you have to find some modder on PC to make your dreams reality.  Not only did devs back in the 2000s do it themselves, they did it coded into the actual game and not as DLC.  Cheat codes were mostly always novelty for me. But a nostalgia bone in me really misses that novelty.  Does anyone else have theories as to why last gen and current gen games seem to never have cheat codes? And do you miss them?

Thank you for sharing

you just answered you own question, plus with mods you don't only have simple cheats you can literally make different games out of them.

The options is there, plus on average allot of games are really easy these days so I'd imagine cheats to actually beat the game aren't needed anymore. compared to nes snes era

Anyone could use cheat codes. 6-year old kids could use cheat codes. You didn't have to have a jailbreak program or have to know coding to access them. It takes some skills to hack whereas cheat codes were for everyone.

[oldgamerz]

My vary first usage of cheat codes was was with Ultimate doom on PC by typing in IDDQD on the keyboard your game character gets golden eyes and is can then never be killed, it was amazing the first time I used them, at that time 1995 or 1996 or so there was a high schooler in the neighborhood who gave us the codes from out of his gamer magazine it was I learned them from a friend who know someone who knew the codes, Doom was my game but me and my friend would always play on my PC taking turns and even having sleepovers with just a PC.

If anybody in the neighborhood in elementary school wanted to play a violent video game they would pile on over my house at the time and play on my computer since I was the only kid in the whole neighborhood with a PC, heck sometimes I would have 4 or more friends at my home playing on a single PC playing Sims, Roller Coaster Tycoon, Duke Nukem 3D, Doom and a lot of other single player games, looking back I don't know why everyone enjoyed taking turns on a PC while other kids had 2-4 player ready consoles

[sworddude]

As gamers many of us grew up with the tips and tricks magazines but now a days you have to find some modder on PC to make your dreams reality.  Not only did devs back in the 2000s do it themselves, they did it coded into the actual game and not as DLC.  Cheat codes were mostly always novelty for me. But a nostalgia bone in me really misses that novelty.  Does anyone else have theories as to why last gen and current gen games seem to never have cheat codes? And do you miss them?

Thank you for sharing

you just answered you own question, plus with mods you don't only have simple cheats you can literally make different games out of them.

The options is there, plus on average allot of games are really easy these days so I'd imagine cheats to actually beat the game aren't needed anymore. compared to nes snes era

Anyone could use cheat codes. 6-year old kids could use cheat codes. You didn't have to have a jailbreak program or have to know coding to access them. It takes some skills to hack whereas cheat codes were for everyone.

I think game developers don't see a need for cheat codes these days. Games have become really accesible to all. back in the day for allot of games people never saw the ending. While cheat codes are easy to use they ain't essential for allot of people compared to back in the day.

At the very most you get a few bonus items when you insert some codes, but actual cheat codes are a blast from the past. If you really need some cheats it's still there in the form of mods but not as easy as it used to be sure. Different era.

[oldgamerz]

Anyone could use cheat codes. 6-year old kids could use cheat codes. You didn't have to have a jailbreak program or have to know coding to access them. It takes some skills to hack whereas cheat codes were for everyone.

not true for some games, Duke Nukem Zero Hour requires you enter a button combo on a controller one and access the cheat menu on controller 2, then set values with the 2nd controller. It was quite complicated and I don't think a 6-year old could do it, it was hard for me to figure out at 16

https://www.cheatcc.com/n64/duken_zh.html

[burningdoom]

Anyone could use cheat codes. 6-year old kids could use cheat codes. You didn't have to have a jailbreak program or have to know coding to access them. It takes some skills to hack whereas cheat codes were for everyone.

not true for some games, Duke Nukem Zero Hour requires you enter a button combo on a controller one and access the cheat menu on controller 2, then set values with the 2nd controller. It was quite complicated and I don't think a 6-year old could do it, it was hard for me to figure out at 16

https://www.cheatcc.com/n64/duken_zh.html

I could use the 2nd controller for cheats when I was a kid. Used it for instant saves on Legend of Zelda or extra lives in SCAT. That's not the same at all as needing computer skills to mod.