Video Games and Cheat Codes

One thing that I have noticed about video games is that they normally do have a way for the player to cheat. For consoles, this could be punching in a key combination and for PCs, it could be by entering a cheat code in a chat window or being able to modify the game. Other ways of cheating come from flaws in the original programming itself that a player can exploit (aka a glitch).

The first video game I ever owned was Pokemon Yellow for the Gameboy Colour. Mine was a special gameboy that had pokemon on the cover. Although I do not still own it outside of a VBA/VBC emulator, I have managed to exploit a lot of the glitches that was in the original game. Some examples include the Mew glitch, and Missingno.

Most- if not all - cheat codes can be easily found online. Websites such as gamefaqs provide a page that gives a player access to the cheat codes. I have found that cheat codes come in numerous different categories:

Key Combination
This type of cheat is common to a lot of console games. This type of cheat requires you to punch in a certain order of keys on the game controller in order for the cheat to be activated. This cheat, I find, is becoming more common. It is also used on handheld consoles too such as the Nintendo DS. An example of it would be Lego Star Wars where on the beginning menu you can punch in cheat codes in order to increase your money or unlock stuff.

Glitches

Everyone who has played the original Pokemon games knows what a glitch is! In video games, glitches are when there is a flaw in the programming that allows for something to happen that should not. People who still play Pokemon Blue/Red/Yellow probably have done this to get Mew, gone through the Viridian City/Cinnabar Island routine to get Missingno, and all other things in order to exploit the glitches of Pokemon Blue, Red and Yellow.

I think this is probably one of the first RPG to be for a handheld console. Therefore those games were tempermental and was full of glitches and crashed a lot. I should know- I played all three in the Pokémon Blue/Red series. Numerous websites are devoted to these glitches, it is not even funny! I think people still play those games for the sole purpose of exploiting glitches!! Can't say I blame them because they do save people the time of getting 99 of a certain item or going to a Nintendo thing to catch Mew.

Because of that, I will not give anyone instructions on how to get the glitch! I am sure they can find it easily. However, from the online encyclopedia that knows everything I did find the cause for it on the Pokémon Wiki:

Missingno is the Glitch Pokémon that appears after viewing the Old Man's tutorial in Viridian City on how to catch Pokémon, then immediately Flying to Cinnabar Island and Surfing along the right hand side of the island, near the Gym, until one is encountered.
When you talk to the old man in Viridian City, the game needs to change the player's name to "OLD MAN" so that it will display the "OLD MAN" sprite instead of the original character. Because of this, the programmers needed a place to store the player's information and name while the "OLD MAN" data replaced it, so they decided to store it in the area where wild Pokémon information is. This was done because of the lack of memory on an original Game Boy. This normally wouldn't cause any glitches because the correct data for wild Pokémon available is written to this area in memory whenever the player travels to an area where it is possible to catch wild Pokémon.
Cinnabar Island's coast has no data for indicating which wild Pokémon are available because no pokemon can be caught in the general area. The same is true for both Viridian City and Cinnabar Island itself. The game uses whatever data was already in the nearby area, or whatever area the player was in last, when determining which wild Pokémon are encountered and what their levels are. This is seen when exiting the Safari Zone and flying directly to a place with no available pokemon memory such as Cinnibar Island. When this is done, Safari Zone Pokemon can be encountered along the right side of the island because Cinnibar Island is using the Safari Zone's available Pokémon data.
Normally this memory space ,found on the side of Cinnibar Island, would hold the data of the last area visited where wild Pokémon were catchable and their level data. But since the player's last visited area had no Pokémon and instead the player's temporarily stored name (Viridian City), this leaves the game placing in the temporarily stored data in the available Pokémon data's place. This is what causes Missingno's. availability.
The name of the player has much to do with the level and appearance of MissingNo.. As stated earlier, MissingNo. appears due to a lack of Pokemon data in Cinnibar and the use of the player's info (which has been stored in the pokemon info data in Viridian City) inserted into this empty space. The type of Pokémon or MissingNo. the player encounters is determined by the characters used in the 3rd, 5th, and 7th characters of the player's name. The level of the Pokémon or MissingNo. is based on the 2nd, 4th, and 6th characters.

Few! Talk about an explanation, huh? Yeah I've exploited these glitches before and there are numerous others on all the Pokémon games. You think Nintendo would have weeded glitches out by now! But no, missingno and its variances will always be to Pokémon as...huh, actually I do not think Missingno has an equivalent yet! Btw, Missingno is not the only glitch. There is LM4, 'M, A, a, Chiisai-u, PokéWTrainer, _4, Charizard M' and h POKé for Pokémon Red/Blue. For Pokémon Yellow there is Missingno, 3TrainterPoké, ♀, X-x, Q, 7g, Glitchy Charizard, and 44 Hy.

Game Modifications

This form of cheating is probably most common to computer games, and the occasional X-Box game. Game modifications allow the player to get at the programming of a game, for PCs it is usally XML files, in order to change things about the game. One game that I play and enjoy to modify is Star Wars: Empire at War and its expansion Star Wars: Empire At War Forces of Corruption.

A positive thing about Game Modifications (Mods) are that they areone of the most sneakiest and evil ways of cheating. This is because you can do whatever you want with the XML files. For example, in Empire at War I prefer playing the Empire as my faction. So, if I want to modify the game I would make it in such a way that the Empire would win such as making my troops immortal, make the intervals between their special abilitites shorter and stuff. Like, I was able t give myself two Darth Vaders and two special AT-ATs in the game from modifiying the XML files. I am posting a picture as evidence.

The problem with modifications is that if they are done wrong they do screw up the game. Therefore, they are limitted at first to people experienced with computer programming and not released to the general public until someone is willing to educate, like RC1162 on GameFAQs.

GameSharks and Other Cheating Devices

Well, if glitching your way through to becoming a Pokémon Master won't work there is always your trusty GameShark! GameSharks have to be bought separately, unless you use VBA, of course, but they are the next best thing to game modifications.

Gamesharks can allow you to do anything on a game console. They are available for all kinds of games and can either make a video game harder or easier with the entering of a code. Other than Pokémon, I am not familiar with the codes for other games. Although, since I am starting to broaden my hand-held horizon beyond Pokémon, I am sure I'll find a few!

Conclusion

I prefer to play the game without cheats a couple of times first. That way I am completely familiar with it and I will know what would be nice about the game if it had this or that. For example, I always want the Mewtwo Gameshark Code when I play my VBA games because what is the point of capturing Mewtwo at level 70 after you have beaten the game? Like, what good is a reward if I can't use it?

But I do not agree with people going crazy with cheats! Atleast catching a Mewtwo with a gameshark does not damage my game like flying to Cinnabar in search of Missingno! Just like I would much rather play Empire at War where my AT-AT can die then using a cheat and not get to play it all. Therefore, discretion should be used when using cheats because a game without challenge is no fun.

So, to all my fellow gamers out there, use cheats if you wish. But you should probably beat the game first and enjoy the challenge while it lasts. Then, by all means, go get Missingno and his other glitch pokemon brothers. Punch in the key combinations for Grand Theft Auto and ride around in an army tank. Program your XML files to give your Civilization in Sid Meier's game the best, undefeatable army in the game and this list could go on. But, just don't go crazy or do anything stupid that messes up you game!!!

Happy gaming.