WEBVTT - A Brief History of Cheating in Video Games 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to tex Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:12.080 --> 0:00:14.840 A there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.920 --> 0:00:17.239 job and Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart 0:00:17.360 --> 0:00:20.720 Radio and I love all things tech. And for some 0:00:20.840 --> 0:00:24.159 of you, the following sequence will have at least some 0:00:24.400 --> 0:00:30.040 level of significance. Up, up, down, down, left, right, left right, 0:00:30.240 --> 0:00:34.319 b A, and maybe start. For those of you who 0:00:34.320 --> 0:00:38.600 have never heard of that, that is the famous Konami code, 0:00:38.960 --> 0:00:42.160 which was first used in a Nintendo Entertainment system part 0:00:42.520 --> 0:00:47.960 of the arcade game Gradius way back in n And 0:00:48.000 --> 0:00:50.440 what did that code do? Well, actually could do a 0:00:50.479 --> 0:00:53.640 few things. If you put it in during the title 0:00:53.760 --> 0:00:56.360 screen of the game, you would start the game with 0:00:56.440 --> 0:01:00.120 thirty lives during the game. If you paused it and 0:01:00.160 --> 0:01:03.520 you put that code in, you would receive extra missiles 0:01:03.600 --> 0:01:06.199 and a speed boost and some other goodies, but only 0:01:06.240 --> 0:01:10.080 once per level. It's arguably the most famous cheap code 0:01:10.160 --> 0:01:14.200 of all time, one that has appeared in multiple games, 0:01:14.319 --> 0:01:18.720 dozens of games, and also on other platforms not just games. 0:01:19.360 --> 0:01:22.800 And sometimes it's a cheap code, sometimes it's an easter egg. 0:01:23.080 --> 0:01:26.880 It goes well beyond Konami games. But why would Konami 0:01:27.240 --> 0:01:32.320 even include that code in the first place. Well, see kiddos. 0:01:32.360 --> 0:01:35.960 When video games were young, they were also vicious, Like 0:01:36.800 --> 0:01:41.160 early video games were mega difficult and unforgiving. There's been 0:01:41.160 --> 0:01:44.520 a resurgence of those kind of games recently, largely because 0:01:44.760 --> 0:01:46.840 the people who played them as kids are adults now 0:01:47.000 --> 0:01:49.920 and that's the kind of games they like to play. 0:01:50.200 --> 0:01:53.640 But some of those early titles lacks stuff like continues, 0:01:53.920 --> 0:01:56.840 so once you round lives, that was it. In fact, 0:01:56.840 --> 0:01:59.360 in the early consoles, there was no real way to 0:01:59.400 --> 0:02:03.160 save your progress at all. Some games would sometimes include 0:02:03.200 --> 0:02:06.200 a code at certain points of a game, and if 0:02:06.200 --> 0:02:08.480 you were to write down that code and then enter 0:02:08.560 --> 0:02:10.920 the code in a future play session, it would allow 0:02:10.960 --> 0:02:14.720 you to start from your finishing point. So that was 0:02:14.760 --> 0:02:18.000 sort of a workaround for the lack of a save function. 0:02:18.200 --> 0:02:21.079 Before you had stuff like memory cards and other ways 0:02:21.120 --> 0:02:25.079 of like onboard storage that you could use to to 0:02:25.200 --> 0:02:29.320 save games. But my point is these games were wicked hard, 0:02:29.600 --> 0:02:33.799 and they weren't just hard for consumers, you know, they 0:02:33.800 --> 0:02:37.160 were also hard for game developers. And sometimes you just 0:02:37.400 --> 0:02:40.480 need to test the game code to make sure everything's working. 0:02:40.880 --> 0:02:43.480 You want to check the graphics and the gameplay. You 0:02:43.560 --> 0:02:47.000 might need to see how transitions are working, and you 0:02:47.040 --> 0:02:49.000 want to make you know sure that the stuff is 0:02:49.040 --> 0:02:51.919 behaving the way you want it to. And this can 0:02:51.960 --> 0:02:54.360 be really slow going if you know, it's a bullet 0:02:54.440 --> 0:02:57.680 hell style arcade game and it's so hard you can't 0:02:57.720 --> 0:02:59.760 even get very far to test things, even though you're 0:02:59.800 --> 0:03:03.480 the one have made it. So this programmer named Kazuhisa 0:03:03.720 --> 0:03:07.600 Hashimoto decided to include a code that would give him 0:03:07.639 --> 0:03:10.280 some boosts so that he could continue to play this 0:03:10.320 --> 0:03:13.200 game he was working on. He said the arcade version 0:03:13.560 --> 0:03:15.440 was so difficult he could never play through it, and 0:03:15.480 --> 0:03:17.919 he was in charge of creating the port, so it's 0:03:17.960 --> 0:03:21.280 possible the code would have remained more or less unknown. 0:03:21.800 --> 0:03:23.840 I mean, back in those days, the average person didn't 0:03:23.880 --> 0:03:26.600 have access to the Internet, and there was no such 0:03:26.600 --> 0:03:29.040 thing as the World Wide Web at that point. In fact, 0:03:29.080 --> 0:03:32.120 most gamers would just get their information from hard print 0:03:32.200 --> 0:03:36.640 magazines like Tips and Tricks or Nintendo Power. So while 0:03:36.760 --> 0:03:39.840 some curious folks would likely have uncovered the code one 0:03:39.840 --> 0:03:43.280 way or another, it was possible that word wouldn't have 0:03:43.320 --> 0:03:46.840 really spread very much. But Konami also included the same 0:03:46.880 --> 0:03:50.480 code in another game. This one called Contra. This was 0:03:50.520 --> 0:03:54.960 in Contra was a big hit in America, but it 0:03:55.000 --> 0:03:57.480 didn't take long for word to spread that the code 0:03:57.640 --> 0:04:02.200 that first appeared in Gradius is also in contract. Soon 0:04:02.320 --> 0:04:05.320 folks share the information in various ways, like word of 0:04:05.360 --> 0:04:07.720 mouth or in one of those video game magazines. Will 0:04:07.720 --> 0:04:10.480 come back to that in a second, and the Konami 0:04:10.520 --> 0:04:13.400 code was well on its way to becoming one of 0:04:13.400 --> 0:04:17.080 the pillars of gaming in its own way. So I 0:04:17.160 --> 0:04:20.640 thought I would do an episode about cheats and video games, 0:04:21.040 --> 0:04:23.159 and some of the examples I'll mention are things that 0:04:23.279 --> 0:04:26.680 developers built into their own games, either as like an 0:04:26.720 --> 0:04:29.680 easter egg or sometimes like Hashimoto, as a way for 0:04:29.760 --> 0:04:33.960 allowing developers to test certain game aspects without having to 0:04:34.000 --> 0:04:36.560 worry about, you know, a ghost gobbling them up, or 0:04:36.600 --> 0:04:39.480 a space marine stomping their brains in or whatever. I 0:04:39.520 --> 0:04:42.599 also want to touch on, you know, the black market 0:04:42.680 --> 0:04:46.320 industry of game hacks. These are tools that give players 0:04:46.400 --> 0:04:51.200 unfair advantages in games, mostly you know, multiplayer competitive games. 0:04:51.240 --> 0:04:54.479 We're gonna focus on that more in the following episode 0:04:54.720 --> 0:04:58.440 or Wednesday's episode. I should say, I'm sure any gamers 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:01.479 out there have encountered sort of thing at one point 0:05:01.640 --> 0:05:04.240 or another. If they play multiplayer games, I'm sure you've 0:05:04.240 --> 0:05:07.359 had an experience where you've encountered a cheater. I know 0:05:07.480 --> 0:05:10.000 I have. I remember playing a game of pub G 0:05:10.480 --> 0:05:13.960 where I was in a car going very fast and 0:05:14.480 --> 0:05:18.520 got sniped with one bullet to the head by a player, 0:05:18.600 --> 0:05:20.479 And when I watched the death cam, I saw that 0:05:20.640 --> 0:05:23.200 they weren't even in line of sight with my car, 0:05:23.279 --> 0:05:27.400 and I thought, huh, that seems suss And then considering that, 0:05:27.400 --> 0:05:29.840 that player then went on to like headshot three other 0:05:30.480 --> 0:05:33.840 you know, players in the same moment told me they 0:05:33.839 --> 0:05:36.279 were cheating. But I hope none of you have actually 0:05:36.279 --> 0:05:38.360 made use of those kinds of cheats, because, let's face it, 0:05:38.440 --> 0:05:41.040 that kind of cheating is totally lame. If you're relying 0:05:41.040 --> 0:05:42.840 on code to give you an edge on other players, 0:05:43.040 --> 0:05:44.800 well it's not really you that's putting in the work, 0:05:44.880 --> 0:05:47.000 is it. But again, we'll get to that in the 0:05:47.120 --> 0:05:51.680 next episode. Really, honestly, the history of cheat codes predates 0:05:51.960 --> 0:05:54.560 the famed Konami code. I figured I had to start 0:05:54.600 --> 0:05:58.440 there because it's the best known cheat code of all time. 0:05:58.480 --> 0:06:02.960 I think before codes were really that accessible. However, players 0:06:03.000 --> 0:06:05.520 have to put a little more work into cheat in 0:06:05.600 --> 0:06:09.279 a video game, a computer game specifically. Now keep in 0:06:09.360 --> 0:06:13.400 mind when personal computers were relatively new, they were largely 0:06:13.440 --> 0:06:18.719 the domain of hobbyists and hackers and amateur programmers. And remember, 0:06:18.760 --> 0:06:22.120 the hacker in this sense is a more broad term 0:06:22.200 --> 0:06:26.360 than how it typically is used by the media. Hollywood 0:06:26.440 --> 0:06:29.440 version of a hacker is someone who specializes in infiltrating 0:06:29.480 --> 0:06:32.919 secure systems and then messes around with stuff or steals 0:06:33.000 --> 0:06:35.800 data or whatever. You know, someone who's hacking into the 0:06:35.839 --> 0:06:39.159 Pentagon or something. But that's just one type of hacker. 0:06:39.440 --> 0:06:42.560 The more broad definition of hacker is someone who is 0:06:42.640 --> 0:06:47.000 interested in learning how systems work, typically computer systems, and 0:06:47.040 --> 0:06:49.680 then finding interesting things that they can do within that 0:06:49.760 --> 0:06:53.280 system that perhaps were never intended by the people who 0:06:53.360 --> 0:06:55.719 built the system in the first place. Like you might 0:06:55.720 --> 0:06:58.400 discover that if you were to look at the code 0:06:58.560 --> 0:07:01.760 underlying a program and changed a few values, you can 0:07:01.839 --> 0:07:05.599 make the program and do entirely different stuff, or you 0:07:05.680 --> 0:07:07.719 might just break everything and have to go back to 0:07:07.760 --> 0:07:11.120 the original code. While on the old days of computer games, 0:07:11.440 --> 0:07:14.720 hackers would use the good old peak and poke method, 0:07:15.280 --> 0:07:19.040 now peak refers to getting a look at computer code 0:07:19.160 --> 0:07:22.120 stored in a computer's memory. Now, remember, back in the 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:25.560 early days, we're not talking about computers that had like 0:07:25.600 --> 0:07:29.400 hard drives and stuff. They were typically reading media from 0:07:29.560 --> 0:07:32.400 some form of storage, right, They were reading it from 0:07:32.440 --> 0:07:35.600 a disk or a cassette or something like that, and 0:07:35.640 --> 0:07:38.640 it would load information into the computer's memory and then 0:07:38.680 --> 0:07:42.040 execute instructions upon the information. So if you were able 0:07:42.080 --> 0:07:45.320 to look at the information that's in the computer's memory, 0:07:45.720 --> 0:07:47.760 and if you're really able to look at it carefully, 0:07:47.840 --> 0:07:51.080 you might be able to suss what is doing what. 0:07:51.280 --> 0:07:54.840 You might be able to say, oh, when I shoot 0:07:54.920 --> 0:07:58.960 my gun, this one value changes, so that value has 0:07:59.000 --> 0:08:01.480 something to do with me shooting my gun in the game. 0:08:01.960 --> 0:08:06.720 Poke refers to changing those values within the code in 0:08:06.840 --> 0:08:10.680 the computer's memory before you load the game in, So 0:08:10.920 --> 0:08:14.360 you're poking or prodding the code in order to see 0:08:14.400 --> 0:08:17.920 what happens. So let's use a theoretical example. Let's say 0:08:17.920 --> 0:08:21.240 you're playing an old computer role playing game, something that 0:08:21.280 --> 0:08:24.960 clearly drew inspiration from Dungeons and Dragons and and other 0:08:25.160 --> 0:08:28.520 pencil and paper RPGs. There were tons of these in 0:08:28.560 --> 0:08:31.200 the early days, Like I remember games like Bard's Tail 0:08:31.480 --> 0:08:35.559 and Wizardry and countless others. Part of these games revolve 0:08:35.600 --> 0:08:40.360 around creating a character, and each character has ability points 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:45.559 or attributes that have a number that describes how their magnitude. Right, 0:08:45.920 --> 0:08:49.680 So if you were doing classic Dungeons and Dragons, you 0:08:49.679 --> 0:08:53.480 would have an ability like strength, and it could range 0:08:53.679 --> 0:08:56.839 from three to eighteen because you would in the old days, 0:08:56.920 --> 0:08:59.600 rolled three six sided dice, So the lowest you could 0:08:59.600 --> 0:09:01.280 get would be three. The highest you can get with 0:09:01.360 --> 0:09:04.800 you an eighteen, and the average human would be somewhere 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:08.080 in the ten to eleven range. So if your computer 0:09:08.200 --> 0:09:11.680 generated character has a strength of six, because that's the 0:09:12.240 --> 0:09:15.840 quote unquote random number that the computer generated for that score, 0:09:16.480 --> 0:09:18.520 that would mean that that character would be a little 0:09:18.520 --> 0:09:21.240 bit on the weak side, and that would affect what 0:09:21.320 --> 0:09:24.120 kind of class you could play, or how much damage 0:09:24.120 --> 0:09:26.719 you would do with a melee weapon, or how much 0:09:26.760 --> 0:09:29.480 your character might carry that kind of thing. However, let's 0:09:29.480 --> 0:09:32.480 say you peak at the code in computer memory and 0:09:32.559 --> 0:09:36.000 you suss out which bit represents the ability scores, and 0:09:36.000 --> 0:09:38.320 then you go in and change a few values, and 0:09:38.360 --> 0:09:40.760 you reload the game, and now you see that your 0:09:40.800 --> 0:09:44.559 previously feeble character has been buffed out to eighteen strength 0:09:45.080 --> 0:09:47.920 or heck, you know, some games actually didn't have limitters 0:09:47.920 --> 0:09:50.719 on them, like within the game you could only get 0:09:50.800 --> 0:09:53.960 up to eighteen, but if you went in and set 0:09:54.000 --> 0:09:58.280 the strength higher, then you would effectively have that as 0:09:58.320 --> 0:10:00.439 your strength. So while you could not at it through 0:10:00.480 --> 0:10:04.400 the regular character generation, by manipulating the code, you can 0:10:04.480 --> 0:10:07.800 give your character like strength and suddenly they would be 0:10:07.880 --> 0:10:13.720 way more powerful than any other, you know, regularly created character. 0:10:14.160 --> 0:10:17.120 I mean you could, uh just you know, you create 0:10:17.160 --> 0:10:19.199 an entire party of characters this way, and you can 0:10:19.240 --> 0:10:21.840 max out all their stats if you wanted to and 0:10:21.920 --> 0:10:24.560 just roll over anyone who's in your way. Now, that 0:10:24.600 --> 0:10:27.960 could get old pretty quickly because there's very little challenge 0:10:28.080 --> 0:10:30.520 in the game left. But on a meta level, you 0:10:30.559 --> 0:10:33.480 would be learning more about how game designers were building 0:10:33.480 --> 0:10:37.240 out their games and designating the variables that determine how 0:10:37.360 --> 0:10:40.959 the game works. So there was another level going on 0:10:41.040 --> 0:10:44.280 in here. But anyway, the peak and poke method wasn't 0:10:44.320 --> 0:10:48.600 exactly super accessible. Most folks didn't own a computer back 0:10:48.600 --> 0:10:51.000 in the early nineteen eighties, and the people who did 0:10:51.000 --> 0:10:54.200 own a computer, a lot of them weren't necessarily savvy 0:10:54.360 --> 0:10:57.560 enough to get their hands dirty with altering code in 0:10:57.640 --> 0:11:01.360 computer memory. I certainly did. Like I that was a 0:11:01.400 --> 0:11:03.720 step further than what I was comfortable doing when I 0:11:03.760 --> 0:11:06.520 was a kid, And some computer systems made this a 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:08.960 bit more tricky to pull off than others. But you 0:11:08.960 --> 0:11:11.599 could think of that as sort of the predecessors to 0:11:11.800 --> 0:11:15.000 computer game hacks. But then we get into the mid 0:11:15.080 --> 0:11:19.480 nineteen eighties and then Nintendo Entertainment System. Earlier consoles like 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:24.040 the at Ty had games that had exploits built into them, 0:11:24.160 --> 0:11:27.360 or sometimes they were just errors that developers had made 0:11:27.360 --> 0:11:30.559 and players found them and found they could exploit them. 0:11:30.600 --> 0:11:33.719 But it was the Konami code that really established the 0:11:33.800 --> 0:11:36.200 video game cheat. I would say it's not that it 0:11:36.240 --> 0:11:38.360 was the first one, but it was the one that 0:11:38.480 --> 0:11:41.959 kind of set the bar. And again, early on, this 0:11:42.040 --> 0:11:44.360 was something that game developers would include so that they 0:11:44.360 --> 0:11:47.480 could continue to test and build out a game without 0:11:47.480 --> 0:11:50.840 having to worry about being pixel perfect with their jumps 0:11:50.880 --> 0:11:54.000 and whatnot. The only reason they made it into the 0:11:54.000 --> 0:11:57.160 final product is that by the time these developers were 0:11:57.160 --> 0:11:59.720 done building a game, they just kind of wanted to 0:11:59.720 --> 0:12:03.000 ship it. Sometimes they just had to hit a deadline, 0:12:03.320 --> 0:12:05.600 and you don't want to take the time and trouble 0:12:05.679 --> 0:12:08.280 to go in and remove code that you inserted to 0:12:08.320 --> 0:12:11.280 make it easier to navigate through the game. For one thing, 0:12:11.600 --> 0:12:14.040 you might break something just by removing that code, and 0:12:14.040 --> 0:12:16.960 then you're, you know, back to square one. And I'm 0:12:16.960 --> 0:12:18.800 sure a lot of developers thought, who the heck is 0:12:18.800 --> 0:12:22.320 going to stumble across this seemingly random sequence anyway, No 0:12:22.360 --> 0:12:25.760 one's gonna just randomly do be A B A, you 0:12:25.760 --> 0:12:29.640 know whatever, whatever. Except there was one step in this 0:12:29.720 --> 0:12:33.079 process of bringing a game to market for the Nintendo 0:12:33.200 --> 0:12:38.280 Entertainment system that guaranteed people will learn about these tricks. See, 0:12:38.840 --> 0:12:42.120 Nintendo decided to do something that Atari did not do 0:12:42.760 --> 0:12:45.960 back in the pre video game crash days. So before, 0:12:46.040 --> 0:12:50.520 n Atari tried to be the only source for games 0:12:50.679 --> 0:12:56.120 for the Atari console, but disenchanted developers who wanted more credit, 0:12:56.720 --> 0:12:59.920 not to mention a share of revenue generated by games, 0:13:00.600 --> 0:13:04.360 they left Atari to found their own studios, Activision being 0:13:04.440 --> 0:13:08.200 a famous one. You know. Back then, if you programmed 0:13:08.240 --> 0:13:11.360 a game and it was a smash hit, you essentially 0:13:11.400 --> 0:13:13.760 got paid pretty much the same as if the title 0:13:13.800 --> 0:13:16.160 had turned out to be a dud. Atari didn't give 0:13:16.240 --> 0:13:20.440 like royalties to people even if their game sold millions 0:13:20.440 --> 0:13:23.520 of copies, or really, we should say tens of thousands 0:13:23.520 --> 0:13:26.160 of copies. It wasn't quite in the millions range for 0:13:26.200 --> 0:13:28.960 the most part, except with the exception of a few titles. 0:13:29.000 --> 0:13:33.040 So influential developers at Atari decided they would leave and 0:13:33.080 --> 0:13:38.120 create new programmer centric business model companies like Activision, at 0:13:38.160 --> 0:13:42.440 least the original Activision anyway. Atari tried to fight that, 0:13:42.520 --> 0:13:45.640 but they lost, and third party developers had the legal 0:13:45.760 --> 0:13:49.559 right to create titles for Atari consoles. But this also 0:13:49.600 --> 0:13:52.560 meant that a bunch of sketchy companies began churning out 0:13:52.679 --> 0:13:55.840 junk titles for the Atari twenty s DRED and the 0:13:55.880 --> 0:13:59.960 console's reputation suffered as a consequence. Now, whether those junk 0:14:00.120 --> 0:14:03.960 titles actively contributed to the video game Crash of three 0:14:04.320 --> 0:14:07.680 really depends upon whom you ask, but it definitely didn't 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:12.439 help Attari's reputation. When Nintendo entered the market with the NES, 0:14:12.480 --> 0:14:16.080 one of the decisions the company made was to require developers, 0:14:16.240 --> 0:14:21.280 including internal Nintendo developers, to submit games to a certification 0:14:21.360 --> 0:14:25.000 process to make sure that the games, you know, worked. 0:14:25.760 --> 0:14:28.560 They didn't have to be a masterpiece. I'm not saying 0:14:28.600 --> 0:14:30.720 that every game that came out for the NES was 0:14:31.200 --> 0:14:34.040 a show stopper. There were plenty of bad games on 0:14:34.080 --> 0:14:37.120 the NES, but they had to at least work properly. 0:14:37.120 --> 0:14:41.160 They had to pass, you know, at least a cursory inspection. 0:14:41.840 --> 0:14:44.920 Part of that submission process meant the developers also had 0:14:44.960 --> 0:14:48.240 to reveal any codes that they had built in that 0:14:48.240 --> 0:14:51.520 would allow for different features in their game, even if 0:14:51.560 --> 0:14:53.920 those codes were only put there for the purposes of 0:14:53.920 --> 0:14:56.240 building out the game in the first place. So again, 0:14:56.600 --> 0:14:59.240 let's say that you've created a game that has you 0:14:59.280 --> 0:15:02.200 know when he levels in it, and for the purposes 0:15:02.200 --> 0:15:04.960 of developing the game, you have a code that lets 0:15:05.000 --> 0:15:08.920 you skip levels. Well, you would have to disclose the 0:15:08.920 --> 0:15:12.440 information when you submitted the game to Nintendo certification process 0:15:12.680 --> 0:15:16.040 to let them know this exists there. Now, it doesn't 0:15:16.080 --> 0:15:18.920 matter that it existed there just for development. As long 0:15:18.960 --> 0:15:20.960 as it's in the game, you had to disclose it. 0:15:21.640 --> 0:15:24.960 And part of this process also meant that Nintendo Power 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:30.040 the magazine, would get access to that information. This was 0:15:30.080 --> 0:15:33.840 partly to help reviewers get through particularly difficult sections of 0:15:33.880 --> 0:15:36.760 games so that they could write a thorough review of 0:15:36.760 --> 0:15:39.440 a game as a whole. Like the reviewer might only 0:15:39.480 --> 0:15:41.600 have a few days with a game maybe just a 0:15:41.680 --> 0:15:43.960 day or two, and they need to be able to 0:15:43.960 --> 0:15:47.280 write a comprehensive review, but they might not have the 0:15:47.280 --> 0:15:49.320 ability to play the game all the way through, so 0:15:49.560 --> 0:15:52.760 they might make use of these codes. The only catch 0:15:52.840 --> 0:15:56.240 was that the magazine was to hold off on publishing 0:15:56.480 --> 0:15:59.880 those codes, at least for a few episode issues, rather 0:16:00.320 --> 0:16:03.480 after reviewing the game, so they couldn't just say, Hey, 0:16:03.520 --> 0:16:05.440 the game's great, and here's how you get god mode 0:16:05.440 --> 0:16:08.520 on it. But then once a few issues had passed, 0:16:08.920 --> 0:16:11.560 they could publish the cheap codes and they would make 0:16:11.600 --> 0:16:14.320 the pages of the magazine, and gamers would learn about 0:16:14.320 --> 0:16:17.720 the codes either by reading about them or as was 0:16:17.880 --> 0:16:21.920 pretty common on playgrounds in the nineteen eighties, through scuttle. 0:16:22.040 --> 0:16:26.320 But I'll explain more about cheat codes after we take 0:16:26.880 --> 0:16:38.840 this quick break. Okay, So magazines like Nintendo Power start 0:16:38.920 --> 0:16:41.440 to publish cheak codes, and once people learned about the 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:43.800 Konami code, it became a way for developers to kind 0:16:43.840 --> 0:16:48.040 of play with gamers. So in some games like Castlevania, 0:16:48.360 --> 0:16:51.520 the Konami code would unlock tons of extra lives. I 0:16:51.520 --> 0:16:54.720 think you got fifty lives when you used it, which 0:16:54.760 --> 0:16:57.920 was really useful because that was a very challenging platform 0:16:58.000 --> 0:17:01.600 or otherwise. In other cases, like an early teenage Mustant 0:17:01.640 --> 0:17:04.040 Ninja Turtles game, if you put in the Konami code, 0:17:04.040 --> 0:17:06.120 it would unlock a feature in which the characters made 0:17:06.200 --> 0:17:10.760 weird noises when they moved around. So it wasn't always advantageous. 0:17:10.760 --> 0:17:13.280 Sometimes it was just a funny little joke. So the 0:17:13.359 --> 0:17:16.320 Konami code wasn't just a developer tool now. It was 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:19.040 a fun surprise for gamers who took the trouble to 0:17:19.200 --> 0:17:21.720 learn and use the code in the first place. It 0:17:21.760 --> 0:17:25.320 would also go on to inspire future generations of game developers. 0:17:25.560 --> 0:17:28.480 They're still games coming out today that pay tribute to 0:17:28.520 --> 0:17:31.399 the Konami Code, though it's pretty rare for the code 0:17:31.520 --> 0:17:35.320 or the equivalent of that code to actually unlock, you know, 0:17:35.520 --> 0:17:38.400 game cheats. You're more likely to unlock an Easter Egg 0:17:38.520 --> 0:17:41.440 or maybe even a reprimand sometimes putting in the cheat 0:17:41.480 --> 0:17:44.520 code gets you a message from the game saying, uh, 0:17:45.119 --> 0:17:47.080 but it's you know, it's a tougue in cheek, Hey, 0:17:47.119 --> 0:17:49.760 I see what you're doing their kind of thing. For example, 0:17:50.400 --> 0:17:55.520 in the recent and reportedly terrible remastered Grant Theft Auto 0:17:55.720 --> 0:18:00.159 the Trilogy, the Definitive Edition, which is supposed to be 0:18:00.240 --> 0:18:03.480 a remastered version of Grand Theft Auto Three, Grand Theft Auto, 0:18:03.560 --> 0:18:07.960 Vice City, and Grand Theft Auto San Andreas, but has 0:18:07.960 --> 0:18:10.520 turned out, at least according to most reviews I've read, 0:18:10.560 --> 0:18:14.520 to be awful. Anyway, the Konami code on that one 0:18:14.560 --> 0:18:18.639 apparently turns everyone's heads larger, so it activates big head mode, 0:18:19.040 --> 0:18:22.200 something that was made famous in games like NBA Jam 0:18:22.240 --> 0:18:25.280 and based on how some of the quote unquote remastered 0:18:25.359 --> 0:18:28.680 characters look, that sounds like it could be pretty horrifying. 0:18:29.280 --> 0:18:31.119 By the way. I do plan on doing a series 0:18:31.119 --> 0:18:34.040 of episodes a little bit later on about the history 0:18:34.080 --> 0:18:36.680 of the g t A series because it's really bummed 0:18:36.720 --> 0:18:38.680 to see how the g t A Trilogy came out 0:18:39.240 --> 0:18:41.720 because Vice City was one of my favorite games back 0:18:41.800 --> 0:18:44.480 in the day, even though I also recognize it as 0:18:44.480 --> 0:18:49.600 a very flawed game. Anyway, I mentioned earlier the peak 0:18:49.680 --> 0:18:52.880 and poke method of cheating. That was something you could 0:18:52.920 --> 0:18:55.239 do on computers, but it wasn't so simple to do 0:18:55.359 --> 0:18:59.080 on consoles. See, this was the time of video game 0:18:59.240 --> 0:19:03.760 cartridges and the games were physically programmed. They were hardwired 0:19:03.880 --> 0:19:08.639 in read only memory format. That's wrong, which means you 0:19:08.680 --> 0:19:11.359 can't make changes to it. You can only read information 0:19:11.440 --> 0:19:14.760 from it. And they were hard coded onto circuit boards 0:19:14.840 --> 0:19:18.320 that were housed inside plastic cartridges. So when you plugged 0:19:18.320 --> 0:19:22.040 the cartridge into a console, the circuit board has little 0:19:22.080 --> 0:19:26.040 contacts on it that would come into connection with elements 0:19:26.080 --> 0:19:29.240 inside the console and it would complete a circuit. And 0:19:29.640 --> 0:19:34.240 thus the the console could consult the video game cartridge 0:19:34.280 --> 0:19:38.000 and pull the relevant information needed for any particular part 0:19:38.040 --> 0:19:40.240 of the game, and you play your game as the 0:19:40.240 --> 0:19:43.480 console would load stuff into the console's memory. But there 0:19:43.520 --> 0:19:46.439 was no easy way to interact with that system beyond 0:19:46.560 --> 0:19:49.520 just playing stuff in a straightforward way. One company that 0:19:49.520 --> 0:19:52.680 tackled that problem early early on was a company called 0:19:53.080 --> 0:19:56.880 Detail based in the UK. The company created a piece 0:19:56.920 --> 0:20:00.240 of hardware called the Action Replay now the O General. 0:20:00.359 --> 0:20:04.840 Action Replay Device worked on Commodore sixty four personal computers 0:20:04.840 --> 0:20:07.399 and you would plug this into a serial port in 0:20:07.400 --> 0:20:09.720 the Commodore sixty four and it would let you do 0:20:09.760 --> 0:20:13.520 stuff like freeze a program, like say a game, as 0:20:13.560 --> 0:20:16.159 it was running, and it would reveal the code that 0:20:16.280 --> 0:20:19.040 was in the computer's memory. That gave you a chance 0:20:19.080 --> 0:20:22.720 to peak and poke essentially, but it was pretty challenging 0:20:22.720 --> 0:20:25.120 for the average user to do this, and it also 0:20:25.200 --> 0:20:27.560 followed on the heels of older devices that would let 0:20:27.600 --> 0:20:31.080 you do stuff like bypass copy protection or alter code, 0:20:31.480 --> 0:20:34.000 again tools that were mostly useful for folks who had 0:20:34.000 --> 0:20:37.560 a bit of programming knowledge already, but it would spawn 0:20:37.680 --> 0:20:41.040 some heavy hitters in the years to come. Enter the 0:20:41.080 --> 0:20:44.760 Game Genie. This was a device that acted as a 0:20:44.800 --> 0:20:49.200 middleman between the game cartridge and the game console. So 0:20:49.400 --> 0:20:52.119 you would plug a cartridge into one end of the 0:20:52.200 --> 0:20:55.080 Genie and you would plug the Genie into a video 0:20:55.080 --> 0:20:58.000 game console. So there were different versions of the Game 0:20:58.040 --> 0:21:01.200 Genie for different consoles. So, for example, the Nintendo Entertainment 0:21:01.200 --> 0:21:04.800 System had a Game Genie version, and this would mean 0:21:05.160 --> 0:21:07.720 that if you've plugged this kind of thing into the 0:21:07.800 --> 0:21:11.600 Nintendo Entertainment System, the little door on the NES wouldn't 0:21:11.600 --> 0:21:13.560 be able to close, the cartridge would be sticking out. 0:21:13.600 --> 0:21:17.760 But it totally worked. The Genie came with a book 0:21:17.760 --> 0:21:20.680 of codes for various games, and the codes would allow 0:21:20.720 --> 0:21:23.280 a player to set values for stuff, similar to the 0:21:23.359 --> 0:21:26.000 poke approach with old computer games, but all the work 0:21:26.000 --> 0:21:29.160 had already been done for you, so when the console 0:21:29.200 --> 0:21:34.080 went looking for specific information. The Genie would intercept that 0:21:34.200 --> 0:21:39.080 request and replace whatever the intended value would be like 0:21:39.119 --> 0:21:42.479 if it actually came from the cartridge with a new value. So, 0:21:42.520 --> 0:21:45.439 for example, let's say you were playing punch Out on 0:21:45.480 --> 0:21:48.880 the NES and you really wanted to knock out Mr Sandman, 0:21:49.440 --> 0:21:52.360 but you never could nail the timing. Well, you could 0:21:52.480 --> 0:21:55.200 use game Genie to enter in certain codes that would 0:21:55.240 --> 0:21:58.160 mean you would never lose stamina when you were hit, 0:21:58.840 --> 0:22:01.200 or that you would take us damage when you were hit, 0:22:01.320 --> 0:22:03.800 or that you could knock down your opponent if you 0:22:03.880 --> 0:22:07.879 just land one punch. The game Genie would understand what 0:22:08.040 --> 0:22:12.040 information to return to the console based on whichever code 0:22:12.080 --> 0:22:15.760 you entered into the Game Genie, and the NES would say, oh, 0:22:15.840 --> 0:22:18.000 here's what I'm supposed to do, because it would be 0:22:18.000 --> 0:22:21.880 getting the information from the game Genie thinking that that 0:22:22.040 --> 0:22:25.000 information was coming from the cartridge itself. So it was 0:22:25.040 --> 0:22:28.560 a workaround. Now, how did the game Genie programmers even 0:22:28.600 --> 0:22:32.320 do this, Well, they probably use something like a debug 0:22:32.440 --> 0:22:36.160 kit and they ran cartridges through their debug kit. Deep 0:22:36.160 --> 0:22:39.880 bug kits are essentially special versions of consoles, in this 0:22:39.920 --> 0:22:42.679