Never had a Game Shark or Game Genie, but I'm sad cheats codes are no longer a thing. They would help for convenience sake in some cases like having all the characters unlocked in a fighting game for tournaments. I also saw on the PS Store that Capcom has a DLC option to unlock all the game modes and secret weapons in RE2 for $5. That shit would've been a cheat code back in the day.
In defense of modern Fighting Games. with DLC there are always a new character added to the roster every year. You can't just enter a cheat and that character who just been announced earlier this year will be instantly unlocked.
That's literally what it still is - a cheat code. Games still have them for developers to use, only they're locked away from general access much more effectively than before - with new checks in place to make sure only developers and testers get access, and new levels of tiered access that restrict certain abilities. That so-called "DLC" is essentially a developer/tester ID code you are paying for, which tells your game "hey I'm not actually a regular gamer I'm an x-tier developer, I need access to my x-tier developer account". So yeah, you're literally paying for a cheat code that changes your player identity from the game's perspective into that of a lower-tier tester/developer.
I remember using an Action Replay for Pokémon Pearl so I could experience the Darkrai, Shaymin and Arceus events myself since I could rarely ever attend to any events or even get the online distributions. (We didn't actually have wifi at home for a very long time) It was cool being able to see those events despite all of this.
Same here. Also for Ruby and the other advance titles. There was no way my parents would drive my 10 year old ass 600km to a fucking pokemon code event :D
My brother and i got an AR too as kids specifically for those events. That thing fcks with your game in some permanent ways tho... long after we stopped using it (our AR broke) i ran into a wild shiny Bulbasaur on Diamond... I probably still have it somewhere...
You know. I dont think arceus was even distributed in north america at all for the 4th gen games. So you and everyone else that did this were the only ones to actually have arceus in gen 4. I might be wrong though...
In 5th grade, I had internet and a printer. A combination which virtually none of my friends were lucky enough to have. I wasn't rich or anything, just had parents who weren't as short-sighted as the other parents. I discovered sites like CheatCC and started a mini enterprise where I'd print out a page of cheat codes and sell them for a dollar. Later on I expanded this business into burning CDs when we got a PC with a burner. Never got in trouble for this. All things considered I probably made $17 but still, I felt like a baller.
@@icarue993 luckily there are still some games that don't give in to that crap, like Monster Hunter, Persona, Fire Emblem or Witcher. And most (good) indies^^ But those are becoming rather niche...
@@Shakzor1 Monster Hunter World is FULL of cosmetic microtransactions, buy all of them wil lcost more than 130$ over the base cost of the game itself. They even make you pay to change the body of your character!
@@Shakzor1 Monster Hunter is great about free unlockable content! I played MH4U for the first time this past winter and couldn't believe how much awesome shit you could download for free.
I remember the Game Genie for SNES ... one of my favorite codes was for Super Mario World. The official code made Mario permanently invincible (via Super Star timer or something), but by tweaking the first parameter I made an alternate version that made Mario color cycle more slowly (as when the powerup wears off). It didn't actually provide any invincibility, nor did it change the stage music to the invincibility theme, but _that's why I liked it._
This video was beautiful, engaging, and just wonderful to watch all around. Thank you for making and sharing it with the world. My most vivid experience of using a gameshark was for Metal Gear Solid 2 where you had to enter the disc first, then game after. I broke the game because I used lethal guns on the guards that are supposed to be knocked out and then wake up and ...... never waking up. Two hours of cleaning a disc and restarting a PS2 for that lol.
I had an Action Replay 3 cartridge that plugged into the side of my Amiga, and it was amazing. You could use it for finding cheats and and stuff like the console versions, but you could also use it for debugging and stuff, and literally stepping through the low-level assembly code of games as they were running!
House rules is as old as the pyramids. "Cheating" implies that someone is hurt. House rules is a set of individuals preferring to play in another way. Either because of limited time due to family, preference or disabilities. Hand eye coordination decrease with age. Being able to add invincibility can open up a game to a wider audience. I see game modification as a positive.
Even the mention of Game Genie gives me flashbacks to days as a kid where we spent hours just inputting different codes into games and seeing what effect that had on how fun it was to play.
Great vid man. I remember as a kid when my best friend showed me his Gameshark for my favorite game at the time, Wind Waker. Was blown away by how you could fly and get infinite everything haha. Definitely also had a modded controller back when I was a teen and CoD was the coolest game around.
6:30 I remember my dad always tried to use the Game Genie to make it easier for me to play Gradius III. I was two years old at the time, and even then I didn't want to make it easier. Took me nineteen years to beat that game without cheats or savestates. We did use the Game Genie for Contra III though. There are parts of that game that are literally impossible to beat if you get bad RNG, and we only ever used it for those. The only time I ever really used my Gameshark was when I used to play Bionicle. Literally just the name of the game was Bionicle. And it didn't have a save feature, meaning every time you played the game you started on the first level as the same Matoran throwing his little disc. Needless to say I just used the Gameshark to skip ahead to where I was last time.
Useless achievements were not worth losing cheats over. That being said, it’s probably what got a lot of people into the modding scene for consoles. So it has evolved in a way, it’s just not as user-friendly or safe.
My favorite memory with my GameShark PS2 is finding the unused City of the Dead level in Twisted Metal: Head-On Extra Twisted Edition, as well as codes for Twisted Metal: Black that enable the unused Mini Junkyard level, and enables every multiplayer stage for single player use. I've loved those games for my entire childhood, and GameShark let me explore them in new and interesting ways.
I remember using the Action replay on my og Xbox to softmod the console and install Linux and other media tools, and that played a big role in getting me into software development. As a lead software engineer today, I wish more devices and tools like this could still exist in gaming - it might just be a bridge to STEM fields for a new generation of gamers. That, and gamerscores don't really serve the purposes that they originally intended (such as converting to a usable value in storefronts, or offering really any true perks). Most cheats in games disable the achievements, as well.
Cheating in Pokemon is my favorite game to cheat. It really helps you get past all the boring parts of the game and lets hop straight into competitive online battling where everybody is only using the best of the best.
I loved using action replay and gameshark codes to do all sorts of stuff like access debug modes or play as unplayable characters, all sorts of good stuff. Can also confirm that it got me into learning about computers and programming. I spent a long time using the memory editor functions of cheat modules for the PSP to create my own cheat codes and do stuff like edit soldiers in MGS Portable Ops. I learned a lot from hacking PSP and early mobile games through both save editing and memory editing. I still have fond memories of decompiling an iOS game's binary and using a hex editor to change the machine language code to make a cheat in an old mobile game. The whole experience taught me a lot about different aspects of programming, like different ways developers store variables in memory and load/unload information at specific points. A shame it's kinda fallen by the wayside nowadays. On PC you've got a thriving scene that uses cheat engine to do much the same, but on console it's fairly limited to the Switch homebrew scene and the one save editing service on PS4 that is server based to hide whatever exploit they use.
I would argue that my Action Replay for my N64 is probably one of my most beloved possessions I would spend so much time messing around with the codes I would get in my monthly N64 magazine.. Hell, it was THE reason I wanted that magazine every month in the first place. The other content was just a bonus. Of course I used it to cheat in a lot of games but I will say that I found it way more interesting to crack open games and see what hidden stuff lied beneath the surface. I remember the article that really sold me on the device was in said N64 magazine where they told you how to get through the locked doors in the multiplayer maps of Goldeneye so you could explore the whole level. That was just mind blowing to me. Moon Jump codes were always a great and fun tool to see what hidden content you could find out of bounds too. It was also how I got through the Furnace Fun Quiz in Banjo Kazooie back in the day. As a kid that spoke zero English at the time, that quiz part was pretty much an impossible road block otherwise. Worst part was when you had to enter a REALLY long code and it didn't work.. Then you had to painstakingly go through every line to see if you had made a typo somewhere.
Excellent video. Some of my fondest memories of gaming as a kid include the AR for GameCube, visiting debug levels and using height adjustment tools in OoT to explore outside of maps and sequence break. I'd be interested in a future video about the lack of cheat devices for the original Xbox other than hacked save games, I'm guessing there was something different in how it handled data compared to GC/ps2?
I remember back in the days of the 90's of hearing bout the gamesharks and genies at school. I have only heard of them but sadly never saw one in person. Plus i loved playing my games as they came anyway. :) only game i ever cheated was the sims with the unlimited money cheat to build my sims a large mansion lol
The cheat devices were not exactly illegal to console manufacturers in old times, more specifically Nintendo just because of "fair play and player enjoyment", but to prevent the players to see everything the game had to offer in a rental weekend. Most japanese games were made harder in its American versions and Nintendo already tried many times to ban rental with no luck. They played the "copyright infringment" trick but it was well known (in the ads of Game Genie) how the accessory could give infinite lives and such, they were not dumb to think it could drastically change the game like a mod could.
What you do in a single player game has no effect on another person. It does not cheapen what they do or 'rip them off' in any way, nor is it 'unfair' to those other people.
@@floppyearfriend Wrong. What he did in a game, in a single player, does not affect you in any way, shape, or form. Otherwise it's just unfair that you have the skills to do it on your own, so you need to stop doing that otherwise you're ruining it for others. You see how stupid that sounds, just like your reasoning. Also, it sounds as if you're jealous that the other person knew how to code so you call it unfair because you can't do it or didn't think about it. One last thing, your comment makes you seem as if you're the type of person who bases their self worth and value on other people and their accomplishments. That if others do something that you've also done, it somehow diminishes your self worth/value of what you've done.
Those FFXI scenes givin me flashbacks lol. had a friend on there be one of the first users of something called "All Seeing Eye" which was a hack basically that let you see things and objects that would be normally invisible.
I had an action replay for the DS, and as a stupid 11-year-old who didn’t fully understand the importance of having a Priest class character, it was the only reason I could beat DQIX the first time around. I still have it, but it doesn’t fit in the 3DS, so I can’t use it anymore.
Regarding the Nintendo/Galoob court case, that actually ties in with some more broad reaching legal decisions on copyright. Basically ANY copy of software/data needed for normal operation of software/computer is immune to copyright suites, assuming of course said copy is temporary. Without those rulings, all sorts of things we take advantage of with today's tech would be (legally) impossible, including as one example this youtube video (when you stream a video, what is really going on is transmitting a copy of the video over the network, which then gets held in memory and discarded after you have finished watching it)
My first real experience with cheat devices was on the Playstation and Gameboy, but my best experiences were on the GCN (the "Freeloader" that came with Action Replay discs was my first experience playing imported games; kind of a big deal since a lot of games didn't make it to the UK/EU because of the translation requirements).
Just have it that turning cheats on disables getting achievements and online modes unless they are customized, and that it last until it resets the game.
I remember buying those cheat manuals from the schoolastic book fairs in elementary and middle school and using those on my PS2! Also had a GameShark about a year before I got a 360 but I loved the vehicle unlocks for San Andreas!
Back in the fairly early days of Pokémon Red/Blue, I attended a Swedish Championships event for the games. As I recall, some kid was really sad about getting knocked out immediately and to cheer him up I plugged in my GameShark and caught a Mew for him. This was months before any official Mew distribution in our region. So... word spread pretty quickly, and I ended up selling a bunch of Mews to people for about a buck each. Probably could have made a lot of money if I'd had the foresight to stock up on Mews before the event.
It’s a shame that cheating in games is exclusively used in online PvP multiplayer games, which means it doesn’t give it a good reputation anymore. And now AAA developers are charging you if you want to cheat in their games and can even outright ban you if you use a free alternative. I’m talking to you Ubisoft.
I had no idea that it was essentially the creation of Achievements (made possible thanks to the invention of the Internet) that killed off cheat devices and made the whole idea of using cheats turn from something fun and harmless into something unacceptable and hated. I guess it makes sense though - the Internet caused a fundamental shift in the Gaming Universe as a whole, turning it from something you just did by yourself or with a small handful of friends in your physical house, into something you could do with other people from all over the world. It was essentially a major extension of the Arcades where you'd go to compete with complete strangers over the High Score on the Leaderboards - and using cheats with an Arcade machine would have been frowned upon just the same as cheating in online games are today ... including resulting in bans from playing again if you were caught (only you'd be physically banned from entering the Arcade at all which would be like a ban from a single Steam game resulting in you no longer being able to access Steam and ANY of your other games full stop). I guess you could look at Modding in single-player games and Sandbox modes in games as a sort of spiritual emulation of those cheat devices and codes ... giving you back much of those abilities without actually affecting online play at all - and without risk of a ban... so it's not ALL bad news.
The DATEL devices existed for NES before the game genie and were even available during the game sharks life. However they were a much smaller company so they escaped nintendos notice. They were harder to find in stores but apparently sold well via mail order adverts in magazines.
I miss the old cheat devices. Gave many games more life and plenty more fun to those of us that wanted to mess around/do something different. I'm often for giving the player more control on their game. A vast majority of us want to play all games organically, yet especially after. Why not add some twists and turns. Sure staves off burnout like no other, even moreso than NG+
As do I, but with Xbox and Playstation having games with online modes, there was no way they could continue to be released, especially when achievements and trophies were added, as well as the fact that if a player got banned using a cheat device like a Codebreaker or Action Replay online, chances are the company who made said cheat device could end up in a lawsuit by the player, or even face legal action from Microsoft and Sony for making such devices.
Also interesting are some of the older PC games where you could open up the actual game files and edit the values yourself. Jurassic Park Operation Genesis for example had a limit to how many dinosaurs it allowed you to have on the map. With my modern PC that limit was no longer needed so I cranked that sucker way up. Then scrolling through I found other values like starting money and even the numbers assigned to each dinosaur model.
I remember finding out about these when I was a kid in middle school, a friend of mind had Pokémon Emerald with all of these rare items and multiple copies legendary Pokémon. They showed me their cheat device and since I always wanted one back then
My favorite cheats were those of Age of Empires. Mostly because they were completely new assets and new mechanics. Usually stuff that was completely stupid or out of place. Like laser soldiers in a medieval game or a skeleton in a sports car with a bazooka.
I remember when I won KH2 I put the GameShark in the system and start doing some CRAZY SHIT with everything, and basically redoing a lot of stuff, even some power fantasy like having the Final Form unlimited from the start
I remember using Code breaker for PS2. Codes so that EVERY char had 8 accessory slows instead of the 2 to 4 and then loading them with the best acc. Best was X-Ploder for Dreamcast. Skies of Arcadia there were codes to learn all magic, equip the best gear. Phantasy Star Online for DC, there was a code to equip ANY armor even if you weren't supposed to be able too.
I think the last console to use a cheat device was the 3DS, but it only worked on physical game carts that saved to the cart. There weren't many that saved to the sd card with a physical copy, but they did exist. An example is Monster Hunter Generations. If you wanted to cheat in a digitally downloaded game, you had to hack the system, which threatened to brick the console if you weren't careful.
Liber Lux well yes its tru that they sued game genie and all that and almost ruined it but they did with a good reason. What I DONT really understand is why they sue fangames. Like ASMR (the super metroid remake). The creator said various times and at the beggining of the game it says “everything belongs to nintendo. Go check the virtual console if you want to get the original game” and all that. I know it takes more than that to get permission to do this kinda thing but still. That remake was fucking incredible, everything about it was just incredible and it took 10 FUCKING YEARS TO DEVELOP. A DECADE. ...actually I think it was less than a decade BUT IT TOOK A LONG ASS TIME. And nintendo just comes along and sues him as if the game was just some shitty prototype that took 2 days to create. That guy dodnt make the game for money m, he made it out of pure passion- that remake was BY A FAN, FOR THE FANS. (The game is still downloadable and playable but what the fuck is your problem nintendo?). The point is, while they did do all that shit, theyre still like one of the most consistent companies in terms of the good quality of their games. I mean I think Nintendo has very little controversy compared to the other game companies. You know with EA, and Epic games and sony and microsoft (sony and microsoft are cool too but they have a bit of controversy sometimes) And with that I conclude my Ted talk why the fuck is this so long
It's interesting to be reminded cheats died down due to game designers not wanting it to be unfair when now they let you skip massive portions of games/ time you spend in them if you give the companies a couple bucks...
My opinion is as long as it's outside of a competive enviroment (such as online battles in pokemon or pvp in dark souls) it is fine and results of said cheating like perfect iv pokemon should stay outside of it like how cheating should prevent achivements like how using mods on console skyrim allows one to enjoy the game just with no achivements.
I remember when my brother got an N64 Game Shark for his birthday and the first thing we did was cheat the hell out of Ocarina of Time. I distinctly remember the music for the PS2 Action Replay and the barebones interface of the GameCube Action Replay. We also had an Xbox Action Replay but I used it once for a save state. I kinda miss cheat codes and Game Sharks. I feel like, at least in a single player game, you should be able to cheat however you want. Just disable achievements when cheating is detected and let the player go wild. Save the anticheat for multiplayer games.
You cheated not only the game, but yourself. You didn't grow. You didn't improve. You took a shortcut and gained nothing. You experienced a hollow victory. Nothing was risked and nothing was gained. It's sad that you don't know the difference.
I've been hacking my games with these cheating devices since the ending days of the NES. I LOVE IT! I do play the game legitimately, especially when playing with friends, but I do the hacking mostly just for fun of hacking. When used sparingly, it can REALLY help reduce the grind time or get that ONE LAST FRICKIN' PIECE that I just can't seem to get.
6:13 - My SNES Game Genie never worked for Super Metroid, I remember wanting to play around with the hyper beam through the whole game but never could. I remember raging at the original US release of DMC3 because of how hard the last boss was, I wanted to cry because my GameShark didn't work on it (it did work on Shinobi, which was also had a balls out fucking hard last boss) I remember back in the day when the Game Shark Code Creator's Club website got hacked and porn was plastered all over it...
And yet cheat codes are still around. Hardly any game has it. But I know of 2, shovel knight that uses it for many things such as having your character change colors every time you jump or replacing the most commonly used words with Butt. (Shovel and knight) and crash team racing nitro fueled. It disables your ability to get things if you use any cheats. With one exception, And that one is unlocking a specific character that can only be unlocked with a cheat code, penta penguin.
7:38 actually, sega didnt really welcome the game genie with open arms. galoob threatened sega to let them sell the game genie for genesis or sue them like nintendo. and sega did not want to be a part of that so they approved it and gave it the official seal of quality to boot.
I bought an action replay for 3ds Just to hack Pokemon to make my team perfects ivs, evs, hiden abilitys and shynis, but I spent most of the time cloning these pokemons and distributing it online for free and receving margikaps and caterpis, i feel like robin rood :3
A way to fix it would've been to, idk, license those cheat devices or make them digital, and turn off the achievements on that game until you stop using the cheat device.
Ah searching for game shark codes on the net, then copying it to Word. Using Emulator on a laptop, and when you get a samsung phone, playing ds games on it with cheats pre-loaded. Ah the fun times...
That would be cool if you were right, but some of the info are wrong, for exemple it's not the cartridge who store the values altered by the action replay, it's the memory. That's just an exemple.
I still have beef with the GameStop employee who wouldn’t let me buy an action replay and warned my mom about getting one for me when I was like 8. I mean I get it, giving an 8yr old an action replay for Pokémon isn’t such a good idea cause it can fuck with the game but I wasn’t a dumb 8yr old when it came to that shit. Props to him for looking out for me but like come on 😭
I really liked Cheat Devices. Debug menus or playing the game in a special way was a motivation to play a game again that was already finished.
"You're infringing our copyright!"
"hehe stretchy mario"
Never had a Game Shark or Game Genie, but I'm sad cheats codes are no longer a thing. They would help for convenience sake in some cases like having all the characters unlocked in a fighting game for tournaments. I also saw on the PS Store that Capcom has a DLC option to unlock all the game modes and secret weapons in RE2 for $5. That shit would've been a cheat code back in the day.
In defense of modern Fighting Games. with DLC there are always a new character added to the roster every year. You can't just enter a cheat and that character who just been announced earlier this year will be instantly unlocked.
That's literally what it still is - a cheat code. Games still have them for developers to use, only they're locked away from general access much more effectively than before - with new checks in place to make sure only developers and testers get access, and new levels of tiered access that restrict certain abilities. That so-called "DLC" is essentially a developer/tester ID code you are paying for, which tells your game "hey I'm not actually a regular gamer I'm an x-tier developer, I need access to my x-tier developer account". So yeah, you're literally paying for a cheat code that changes your player identity from the game's perspective into that of a lower-tier tester/developer.
its not totally true cheat code still exist, cheat engine exist, sure only on pc
Xploder still exist and back when capcom were up to it, you could use an Xploder decide to access the on disc DLC.
ngl whenever I find out about the cheats in a game it just turns into gmod until i crash the game
I remember using an Action Replay for Pokémon Pearl so I could experience the Darkrai, Shaymin and Arceus events myself since I could rarely ever attend to any events or even get the online distributions. (We didn't actually have wifi at home for a very long time) It was cool being able to see those events despite all of this.
@YllwMonky456 I mean this can all be done without a cheating device in D/P with the void glitch (can't remember if Arceus can be done though)
Same here. Also for Ruby and the other advance titles. There was no way my parents would drive my 10 year old ass 600km to a fucking pokemon code event :D
My brother and i got an AR too as kids specifically for those events.
That thing fcks with your game in some permanent ways tho... long after we stopped using it (our AR broke) i ran into a wild shiny Bulbasaur on Diamond... I probably still have it somewhere...
You know. I dont think arceus was even distributed in north america at all for the 4th gen games. So you and everyone else that did this were the only ones to actually have arceus in gen 4. I might be wrong though...
Diamond for me. My cousin showed me how to do it and my mind exploded so hard. It broke, and I think I still have that thing somewhere.
In 5th grade, I had internet and a printer. A combination which virtually none of my friends were lucky enough to have. I wasn't rich or anything, just had parents who weren't as short-sighted as the other parents. I discovered sites like CheatCC and started a mini enterprise where I'd print out a page of cheat codes and sell them for a dollar. Later on I expanded this business into burning CDs when we got a PC with a burner. Never got in trouble for this. All things considered I probably made $17 but still, I felt like a baller.
And now you have AAA publishers selling you cheats and banning your singleplayer game for doing it without paying
Yeah, charging you to unlock everything in the game off the bat is some bullshit.
@@s-wo8781 or exp boost, weapon unlocks. Remember when skins unlocks where available through playing rather than purchasing. Good times.
@@icarue993 luckily there are still some games that don't give in to that crap, like Monster Hunter, Persona, Fire Emblem or Witcher. And most (good) indies^^ But those are becoming rather niche...
@@Shakzor1 Monster Hunter World is FULL of cosmetic microtransactions, buy all of them wil lcost more than 130$ over the base cost of the game itself. They even make you pay to change the body of your character!
@@Shakzor1 Monster Hunter is great about free unlockable content! I played MH4U for the first time this past winter and couldn't believe how much awesome shit you could download for free.
I still use them through emulators. Still so much fun.
I remember the Game Genie for SNES ... one of my favorite codes was for Super Mario World. The official code made Mario permanently invincible (via Super Star timer or something), but by tweaking the first parameter I made an alternate version that made Mario color cycle more slowly (as when the powerup wears off). It didn't actually provide any invincibility, nor did it change the stage music to the invincibility theme, but _that's why I liked it._
This video was beautiful, engaging, and just wonderful to watch all around. Thank you for making and sharing it with the world.
My most vivid experience of using a gameshark was for Metal Gear Solid 2 where you had to enter the disc first, then game after.
I broke the game because I used lethal guns on the guards that are supposed to be knocked out and then wake up and ...... never waking up.
Two hours of cleaning a disc and restarting a PS2 for that lol.
7:42 Based Sega once again does what Nintendon't
Cheat, yes.
I had an Action Replay 3 cartridge that plugged into the side of my Amiga, and it was amazing. You could use it for finding cheats and and stuff like the console versions, but you could also use it for debugging and stuff, and literally stepping through the low-level assembly code of games as they were running!
House rules is as old as the pyramids.
"Cheating" implies that someone is hurt.
House rules is a set of individuals preferring to play in another way.
Either because of limited time due to family, preference or disabilities.
Hand eye coordination decrease with age.
Being able to add invincibility can open up a game to a wider audience.
I see game modification as a positive.
Please don't start the whole Sekiro debacle again
Even the mention of Game Genie gives me flashbacks to days as a kid where we spent hours just inputting different codes into games and seeing what effect that had on how fun it was to play.
Great vid man. I remember as a kid when my best friend showed me his Gameshark for my favorite game at the time, Wind Waker. Was blown away by how you could fly and get infinite everything haha. Definitely also had a modded controller back when I was a teen and CoD was the coolest game around.
6:30 I remember my dad always tried to use the Game Genie to make it easier for me to play Gradius III. I was two years old at the time, and even then I didn't want to make it easier. Took me nineteen years to beat that game without cheats or savestates.
We did use the Game Genie for Contra III though. There are parts of that game that are literally impossible to beat if you get bad RNG, and we only ever used it for those.
The only time I ever really used my Gameshark was when I used to play Bionicle. Literally just the name of the game was Bionicle. And it didn't have a save feature, meaning every time you played the game you started on the first level as the same Matoran throwing his little disc. Needless to say I just used the Gameshark to skip ahead to where I was last time.
Yeah I'm sure you vividly remember something from when you were two years old.
i cant believe gamers chose jpegs and immersion breaking pop-ups over giant heads and wire frame modes
Useless achievements were not worth losing cheats over. That being said, it’s probably what got a lot of people into the modding scene for consoles. So it has evolved in a way, it’s just not as user-friendly or safe.
Can confirm. This was around the time the Wii Homebrew Channel first appeared
getting the gameshark for the ps2 was awesome. felt like getting access to a whole new way to play video games
My favorite memory with my GameShark PS2 is finding the unused City of the Dead level in Twisted Metal: Head-On Extra Twisted Edition, as well as codes for Twisted Metal: Black that enable the unused Mini Junkyard level, and enables every multiplayer stage for single player use. I've loved those games for my entire childhood, and GameShark let me explore them in new and interesting ways.
I remember using the Action replay on my og Xbox to softmod the console and install Linux and other media tools, and that played a big role in getting me into software development. As a lead software engineer today, I wish more devices and tools like this could still exist in gaming - it might just be a bridge to STEM fields for a new generation of gamers. That, and gamerscores don't really serve the purposes that they originally intended (such as converting to a usable value in storefronts, or offering really any true perks). Most cheats in games disable the achievements, as well.
Cheating in Pokemon is my favorite game to cheat. It really helps you get past all the boring parts of the game and lets hop straight into competitive online battling where everybody is only using the best of the best.
You sir, are gaming
I loved using action replay and gameshark codes to do all sorts of stuff like access debug modes or play as unplayable characters, all sorts of good stuff.
Can also confirm that it got me into learning about computers and programming. I spent a long time using the memory editor functions of cheat modules for the PSP to create my own cheat codes and do stuff like edit soldiers in MGS Portable Ops. I learned a lot from hacking PSP and early mobile games through both save editing and memory editing. I still have fond memories of decompiling an iOS game's binary and using a hex editor to change the machine language code to make a cheat in an old mobile game. The whole experience taught me a lot about different aspects of programming, like different ways developers store variables in memory and load/unload information at specific points.
A shame it's kinda fallen by the wayside nowadays. On PC you've got a thriving scene that uses cheat engine to do much the same, but on console it's fairly limited to the Switch homebrew scene and the one save editing service on PS4 that is server based to hide whatever exploit they use.
I would argue that my Action Replay for my N64 is probably one of my most beloved possessions
I would spend so much time messing around with the codes I would get in my monthly N64 magazine.. Hell, it was THE reason I wanted that magazine every month in the first place. The other content was just a bonus.
Of course I used it to cheat in a lot of games but I will say that I found it way more interesting to crack open games and see what hidden stuff lied beneath the surface.
I remember the article that really sold me on the device was in said N64 magazine where they told you how to get through the locked doors in the multiplayer maps of Goldeneye so you could explore the whole level.
That was just mind blowing to me.
Moon Jump codes were always a great and fun tool to see what hidden content you could find out of bounds too.
It was also how I got through the Furnace Fun Quiz in Banjo Kazooie back in the day. As a kid that spoke zero English at the time, that quiz part was pretty much an impossible road block otherwise.
Worst part was when you had to enter a REALLY long code and it didn't work.. Then you had to painstakingly go through every line to see if you had made a typo somewhere.
Excellent video. Some of my fondest memories of gaming as a kid include the AR for GameCube, visiting debug levels and using height adjustment tools in OoT to explore outside of maps and sequence break. I'd be interested in a future video about the lack of cheat devices for the original Xbox other than hacked save games, I'm guessing there was something different in how it handled data compared to GC/ps2?
There was an Action Replay Wii, but I think the Action Replay DS/DSi was the last console cheat device that was popular.
Everyone and their cousin had an Action Replay for the DS when I was in elementary school. It was *the* thing.
What a cool lesson, so that's how those magical devices work with only a sentance entered. Thanks!
I remember back in the days of the 90's of hearing bout the gamesharks and genies at school. I have only heard of them but sadly never saw one in person. Plus i loved playing my games as they came anyway. :) only game i ever cheated was the sims with the unlimited money cheat to build my sims a large mansion lol
The cheat devices were not exactly illegal to console manufacturers in old times, more specifically Nintendo just because of "fair play and player enjoyment", but to prevent the players to see everything the game had to offer in a rental weekend. Most japanese games were made harder in its American versions and Nintendo already tried many times to ban rental with no luck. They played the "copyright infringment" trick but it was well known (in the ads of Game Genie) how the accessory could give infinite lives and such, they were not dumb to think it could drastically change the game like a mod could.
What you do in a single player game has no effect on another person. It does not cheapen what they do or 'rip them off' in any way, nor is it 'unfair' to those other people.
it is unfair when you spend weeks or months getting platinum in a game only to find out some dude got it in 3 seconds by writing some lines of code
@@floppyearfriend Wrong. What he did in a game, in a single player, does not affect you in any way, shape, or form.
Otherwise it's just unfair that you have the skills to do it on your own, so you need to stop doing that otherwise you're ruining it for others. You see how stupid that sounds, just like your reasoning.
Also, it sounds as if you're jealous that the other person knew how to code so you call it unfair because you can't do it or didn't think about it.
One last thing, your comment makes you seem as if you're the type of person who bases their self worth and value on other people and their accomplishments. That if others do something that you've also done, it somehow diminishes your self worth/value of what you've done.
@@floppyearfriend Good job, you've lost and you've just proven it.
@Aaron Not as stupid as yours since you're getting single player and multi-player mixed up. Try again.
"far too complex to find every glitch" more like impossible
I still have my GameShark for DS, ah memories. Great video!
Those FFXI scenes givin me flashbacks lol. had a friend on there be one of the first users of something called "All Seeing Eye" which was a hack basically that let you see things and objects that would be normally invisible.
I had an action replay for the DS, and as a stupid 11-year-old who didn’t fully understand the importance of having a Priest class character, it was the only reason I could beat DQIX the first time around. I still have it, but it doesn’t fit in the 3DS, so I can’t use it anymore.
Man my game shark 64 pro changed my tiny life. I remember narrowing down sketchy codes in 007 TWINE
Regarding the Nintendo/Galoob court case, that actually ties in with some more broad reaching legal decisions on copyright. Basically ANY copy of software/data needed for normal operation of software/computer is immune to copyright suites, assuming of course said copy is temporary. Without those rulings, all sorts of things we take advantage of with today's tech would be (legally) impossible, including as one example this youtube video (when you stream a video, what is really going on is transmitting a copy of the video over the network, which then gets held in memory and discarded after you have finished watching it)
just realised we're almost at 100k oh boy
Oh cool I didn't even realize it
I remember having a blast with Action Replay on the PS2 and making Final Fantasy X characters use each other's weapons.
My first real experience with cheat devices was on the Playstation and Gameboy, but my best experiences were on the GCN (the "Freeloader" that came with Action Replay discs was my first experience playing imported games; kind of a big deal since a lot of games didn't make it to the UK/EU because of the translation requirements).
Just have it that turning cheats on disables getting achievements and online modes unless they are customized, and that it last until it resets the game.
i still own a Action Replay DS, and i do remember programming some codes for it myself mainly for Pokemon games
I have mainly memories unlocking semi-online content in ds games.
I remember buying those cheat manuals from the schoolastic book fairs in elementary and middle school and using those on my PS2! Also had a GameShark about a year before I got a 360 but I loved the vehicle unlocks for San Andreas!
Back in the fairly early days of Pokémon Red/Blue, I attended a Swedish Championships event for the games. As I recall, some kid was really sad about getting knocked out immediately and to cheer him up I plugged in my GameShark and caught a Mew for him. This was months before any official Mew distribution in our region.
So... word spread pretty quickly, and I ended up selling a bunch of Mews to people for about a buck each. Probably could have made a lot of money if I'd had the foresight to stock up on Mews before the event.
It’s a shame that cheating in games is exclusively used in online PvP multiplayer games, which means it doesn’t give it a good reputation anymore. And now AAA developers are charging you if you want to cheat in their games and can even outright ban you if you use a free alternative. I’m talking to you Ubisoft.
Great Vid Man! I learned tons of stuff!
I will always associate cheat devices with Pokémon. I absolutely loved using my GameShark with Pokémon Red.
I had no idea that it was essentially the creation of Achievements (made possible thanks to the invention of the Internet) that killed off cheat devices and made the whole idea of using cheats turn from something fun and harmless into something unacceptable and hated. I guess it makes sense though - the Internet caused a fundamental shift in the Gaming Universe as a whole, turning it from something you just did by yourself or with a small handful of friends in your physical house, into something you could do with other people from all over the world. It was essentially a major extension of the Arcades where you'd go to compete with complete strangers over the High Score on the Leaderboards - and using cheats with an Arcade machine would have been frowned upon just the same as cheating in online games are today ... including resulting in bans from playing again if you were caught (only you'd be physically banned from entering the Arcade at all which would be like a ban from a single Steam game resulting in you no longer being able to access Steam and ANY of your other games full stop). I guess you could look at Modding in single-player games and Sandbox modes in games as a sort of spiritual emulation of those cheat devices and codes ... giving you back much of those abilities without actually affecting online play at all - and without risk of a ban... so it's not ALL bad news.
I remember using a Game Genie to visit the 1999 map for Chrono Trigger. Good times.
The DATEL devices existed for NES before the game genie and were even available during the game sharks life. However they were a much smaller company so they escaped nintendos notice. They were harder to find in stores but apparently sold well via mail order adverts in magazines.
Gameshark was the best to use for the Resident Evil games. I had a blast with it.
I miss the old cheat devices. Gave many games more life and plenty more fun to those of us that wanted to mess around/do something different. I'm often for giving the player more control on their game. A vast majority of us want to play all games organically, yet especially after. Why not add some twists and turns. Sure staves off burnout like no other, even moreso than NG+
As do I, but with Xbox and Playstation having games with online modes, there was no way they could continue to be released, especially when achievements and trophies were added, as well as the fact that if a player got banned using a cheat device like a Codebreaker or Action Replay online, chances are the company who made said cheat device could end up in a lawsuit by the player, or even face legal action from Microsoft and Sony for making such devices.
Also interesting are some of the older PC games where you could open up the actual game files and edit the values yourself.
Jurassic Park Operation Genesis for example had a limit to how many dinosaurs it allowed you to have on the map. With my modern PC that limit was no longer needed so I cranked that sucker way up. Then scrolling through I found other values like starting money and even the numbers assigned to each dinosaur model.
I remember finding out about these when I was a kid in middle school, a friend of mind had Pokémon Emerald with all of these rare items and multiple copies legendary Pokémon. They showed me their cheat device and since I always wanted one back then
What's that first Sonic song used in the video called? Starts at about 1:02
Wave Ocean
@@DesignDoc thanks pally
i use to walk to a game rental the popcorn free with game guys a nice ride
Still got my action replay max for PS2. Might need to give it a whirl sometime and make a mess of my old games.
Thanks for sharing!
My favorite cheats were those of Age of Empires. Mostly because they were completely new assets and new mechanics. Usually stuff that was completely stupid or out of place. Like laser soldiers in a medieval game or a skeleton in a sports car with a bazooka.
Huh, never knew Codemasters made the Game Genie! Nowadays Codemasters makes my favourite racing games ^^
When it comes to racing, you want to be ahead of everybody else.
I remember when I won KH2 I put the GameShark in the system and start doing some CRAZY SHIT with everything, and basically redoing a lot of stuff, even some power fantasy like having the Final Form unlimited from the start
I remember using Code breaker for PS2. Codes so that EVERY char had 8 accessory slows instead of the 2 to 4 and then loading them with the best acc.
Best was X-Ploder for Dreamcast. Skies of Arcadia there were codes to learn all magic, equip the best gear. Phantasy Star Online for DC, there was a code to equip ANY armor even if you weren't supposed to be able too.
I think the last console to use a cheat device was the 3DS, but it only worked on physical game carts that saved to the cart. There weren't many that saved to the sd card with a physical copy, but they did exist. An example is Monster Hunter Generations. If you wanted to cheat in a digitally downloaded game, you had to hack the system, which threatened to brick the console if you weren't careful.
Genuinely my channel on here, keep up the great work!
This is your alternate account?
In 96’ I used the Genie all-the-time specifically for infinite super missiles on Super Metroid.
for a game company, nintendo really hates fun huh
Liber Lux well yes its tru that they sued game genie and all that and almost ruined it but they did with a good reason. What I DONT really understand is why they sue fangames. Like ASMR (the super metroid remake). The creator said various times and at the beggining of the game it says “everything belongs to nintendo. Go check the virtual console if you want to get the original game” and all that. I know it takes more than that to get permission to do this kinda thing but still. That remake was fucking incredible, everything about it was just incredible and it took 10 FUCKING YEARS TO DEVELOP. A DECADE. ...actually I think it was less than a decade BUT IT TOOK A LONG ASS TIME. And nintendo just comes along and sues him as if the game was just some shitty prototype that took 2 days to create. That guy dodnt make the game for money m, he made it out of pure passion- that remake was BY A FAN, FOR THE FANS. (The game is still downloadable and playable but what the fuck is your problem nintendo?). The point is, while they did do all that shit, theyre still like one of the most consistent companies in terms of the good quality of their games. I mean I think Nintendo has very little controversy compared to the other game companies. You know with EA, and Epic games and sony and microsoft (sony and microsoft are cool too but they have a bit of controversy sometimes)
And with that I conclude my Ted talk why the fuck is this so long
It's interesting to be reminded cheats died down due to game designers not wanting it to be unfair when now they let you skip massive portions of games/ time you spend in them if you give the companies a couple bucks...
My opinion is as long as it's outside of a competive enviroment (such as online battles in pokemon or pvp in dark souls) it is fine and results of said cheating like perfect iv pokemon should stay outside of it like how cheating should prevent achivements like how using mods on console skyrim allows one to enjoy the game just with no achivements.
11:37 MARBLE BLAST BABEY LETS GO!
even back then, sega supported when nintendon't
Oh snap that Star Tropics music
I remember when my brother got an N64 Game Shark for his birthday and the first thing we did was cheat the hell out of Ocarina of Time.
I distinctly remember the music for the PS2 Action Replay and the barebones interface of the GameCube Action Replay.
We also had an Xbox Action Replay but I used it once for a save state.
I kinda miss cheat codes and Game Sharks. I feel like, at least in a single player game, you should be able to cheat however you want. Just disable achievements when cheating is detected and let the player go wild. Save the anticheat for multiplayer games.
jumbo video had free popcorn
We need a Cheat Device for the Nintendo Switch RIGHT NOW!
You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
You didn't grow.
You didn't improve.
You took a shortcut and gained nothing.
You experienced a hollow victory.
Nothing was risked and nothing was gained.
It's sad that you don't know the difference.
I remember having action replay or xploder devices for just about every console. They were just.. A given. A standard tool in your arsenal.
Action Replay for special events in the pokemon games. Or an R4 card for small games that weren't worth the money OR games only released overseas
7:01 explain in one minute why Nintendo is cringe and Sega is based
I've been hacking my games with these cheating devices since the ending days of the NES. I LOVE IT! I do play the game legitimately, especially when playing with friends, but I do the hacking mostly just for fun of hacking. When used sparingly, it can REALLY help reduce the grind time or get that ONE LAST FRICKIN' PIECE that I just can't seem to get.
6:13 - My SNES Game Genie never worked for Super Metroid, I remember wanting to play around with the hyper beam through the whole game but never could. I remember raging at the original US release of DMC3 because of how hard the last boss was, I wanted to cry because my GameShark didn't work on it (it did work on Shinobi, which was also had a balls out fucking hard last boss)
I remember back in the day when the Game Shark Code Creator's Club website got hacked and porn was plastered all over it...
I still have a NES game genie from when my mom was a kid
You also have to pay extra for "time savers". Bypassing that would cause a problem for.. you know.. the customers
8:53 not to mention more insane and/or cursed!
CHEAT CODES SAVED MY LIFE. 😅
I remember playing Jedi Power Battles with a Game Shark because that game was hard *and* pretty broken without it. XD
And yet cheat codes are still around. Hardly any game has it. But I know of 2, shovel knight that uses it for many things such as having your character change colors every time you jump or replacing the most commonly used words with Butt. (Shovel and knight) and crash team racing nitro fueled. It disables your ability to get things if you use any cheats. With one exception, And that one is unlocking a specific character that can only be unlocked with a cheat code, penta penguin.
Yo is that footage from 8:02 from grayfruit's SM64 video? Exact same order of cheats
Yes it is.
Hey Design Doc!
Alex Pires Heyo
@@DesignDoc I wanted to congratulate you for your videos, you always deliver with the research and the clean visuals! Honestly, fantastic job!
7:38 actually, sega didnt really welcome the game genie with open arms. galoob threatened sega to let them sell the game genie for genesis or sue them like nintendo. and sega did not want to be a part of that so they approved it and gave it the official seal of quality to boot.
1:39 woah I know a guy named Justin Bailey, that was weird lol.
As a kid I loved my action replay, wish it didn’t break
I bought an action replay for 3ds Just to hack Pokemon to make my team perfects ivs, evs, hiden abilitys and shynis, but I spent most of the time cloning these pokemons and distributing it online for free and receving margikaps and caterpis, i feel like robin rood :3
Lmao I did the same thing
Y'all are saints 🙏
Are TAS codes and programs considered cheat engines?
A way to fix it would've been to, idk, license those cheat devices or make them digital, and turn off the achievements on that game until you stop using the cheat device.
Ah searching for game shark codes on the net, then copying it to Word. Using Emulator on a laptop, and when you get a samsung phone, playing ds games on it with cheats pre-loaded. Ah the fun times...
the game temple of Apshi was written in basic so we just hit break and then entered hp=99 for infinite life
what game is that at 6:25?
Game Genie? Gameshark?
Pfff, Action Replay is where it's at.
They should bring it back
That would be cool if you were right, but some of the info are wrong, for exemple it's not the cartridge who store the values altered by the action replay, it's the memory. That's just an exemple.
I still have beef with the GameStop employee who wouldn’t let me buy an action replay and warned my mom about getting one for me when I was like 8. I mean I get it, giving an 8yr old an action replay for Pokémon isn’t such a good idea cause it can fuck with the game but I wasn’t a dumb 8yr old when it came to that shit. Props to him for looking out for me but like come on 😭
FUCK achievements, I'll take cheat codes EVERY day.
I cheated on my wife like ProJared!