Cheating in video games

Cheating in a video game is a process whereby a player of a video game creates an advantage beyond the bounds of normal gameplay, usually to make the game easier.

Typical cheats include unfair advantages such as invulnerability ("God mode") or an infinite amount of some resource such as ammunition. Cheats may also create unusual or interesting effects which do not necessarily make the game easier to play, such as making enemies tougher, or giving characters (including enemies) different appearances, such as large heads. Cheats often take the form of 'secrets' placed by game developers, usually to reward dedicated players.

Cheats may be activated from within the game itself (a cheat code implemented by the original game developers); or created by third-party software (a game trainer) or hardware (a cheat cartridge).

History

Cheating in video games has existed for almost their entire history. The first cheat codes were put in place for play testing purposes. Playtesters had to rigorously test the mechanics of a game and introduced cheat codes to make this process easier. An early cheat code can be found in Manic Miner, where typing "6031769" (the phone number of the developer, Matthew Smith) enables the cheat mode.

Cheating on early home computers

Even on early gaming systems such as the ZX Spectrum, cheating was prevalent, even a necessity (such as in the case of Jet Set Willy). A variety of different methods were used.

In a computer game, all numerical values are stored 'as is' in memory. Gamers could literally reprogram a small part of the game before launching it. In the context of games for many 8-bit computers, it was a usual practice to load games into memory and, before launching them, modify specific memory addresses in order to cheat, getting an unlimited number of lives, immunity, invisibility, etc. Such modifications were performed through POKE sentences. The Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum also allowed players with the proper cartridges or Multiface add-on to freeze the running program, enter POKEs, and resume. Some games tried to detect the Multiface, and refused to load if it was present. The earliest models had no ability to "hide". Later revisions either included a switch, hid if you opened and closed the menu before loading the game, or automatically hid.

For instance, with "POKE 47196,201" in Knight Lore for the ZX Spectrum, immunity is achieved. Magazines such as CRASH regularly featured lists of such POKE instructions for games. In order to find them a hacker had to interpret the machine code and locate the critical point where the number of lives is decreased, impacts detected, etc. Sometimes the term POKE was used with this specific meaning.

Early cheating was largely exploited by technology-orientated players due to the difficulty of early cheats. However, a cheat industry quickly emerged as gaming systems evolved, through the packaging and selling of cheating as a product. Cheat-enablers such as cheat books, game guides, cheat cartridges helped form a cheat industry and cemented cheating as part of gaming culture. Cheating was not universally accepted in early gaming however. Gaming magazine Amiga Power took a very strong opinion on cheating, condemning cheaters. They took the stance that cheating was not part of their philosophy of fairness. They also applied this in reverse; games should not be allowed to cheat the player, either.

Cheating on modern home computers and consoles

Cheating is very popular in modern videogames, with several magazines dedicated to listing cheats and walkthroughs for consoles and computer systems. POKE cheats have disappeared and have been replaced by trainers and cheat codes. By and large, the majority of cheat codes on modern day systems are implemented not by gamers, but by game developers. The reasons for this are relatively clear:

• The establishment of a cheating culture has created expectancy from gamers for video games to contain cheats.
• Cheats in single player games increase a game's replay value for the gamer.
• Game developers understand that many people do not have the time to complete a video game on their own, and therefore cheats make a game more accessible and appealing to a casual gamer.
• An example of someone who doesn't have time to complete a video game on their own is a game reviewer working to a tight deadline. Cheat codes will enable the reviewer to experience more of the game content in the limited time available, and therefore (hopefully) produce a better review.
• With the rise in popularity of gaming, cheating using external software and hardware raises a number of copyright legal issues related to modifying game code.

Typical effects of cheats

Invulnerability

Main article: God mode

Invulnerability ("God mode") is a state wherein the player character is invulnerable to damage. A variation of this is "Buddha mode" where the player character gets damaged or hurt but cannot die (health stops decreasing when it reaches 1).

Invisibility

Invisibility in a video game causes enemies to not see the player character, in order to avoid being attacked by them, such as the "notarget" code in some first-person shooters.

No-Clip

Main article: Noclip mode

No-Clip disables collision detection so the player character can pass through walls or objects, imparting a rather ethereal quality to playing the game.

Flying

Usually allows the player to levitate or fly. This ability sometimes includes the No-Clip feature though this does vary in different games.

Infinite resources

An infinite amount of some resource such as ammunition, lives, or money. Some cheat codes allow the user to increase the amount of such resources to the maximum amount the player is permitted to carry, but without giving them infinite amounts (Quake Engine can give 999 ammo, for example); however generally the code may be repeated at any time, in some cases, even while using the resource, essentially giving unlimited amounts of the resource, e.g. being able to keep reloading while shooting, giving the close equivalent of unlimited ammo.

Addition to weapons or inventory items

There are ways of editing a game save file to add certain useful items to your inventory or give your player more weapons. Some cheats give very powerful and the most powerful weapons, items, objects, or characters. Save files can also be edited to place the player character in a different area in the game.

Unlockable items and characters

Some cheats can unlock hidden items or unused content in the game. In Fighting Games it is common for characters to be unlockable.

Unusual effects

Cheats may create unusual or interesting effects which don't necessarily make the game easier to play. For example, one cheat in Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis makes dinosaurs appear 'undead'. In other games, a cheat may make the game harder to play; for instance one could give the enemy special abilities, add a harder difficulty, make neutral bystanders attack the player or give the player a disadvantage such as low health points or cause instant death. In a few games the player is humorously penalized if they use cheat codes originally for another game; for example, using cheat codes from Doom in Descent would result in a sarcastic message from the programmers on screen. Similar effects also occurred if codes from Descent were attempted to be used in its sequels. The game Heretic played on Doom's codes gives the complete opposite of the desired effect (instant death instead of invulnerability; stripping weapons instead of providing them, etc). Other unusual cheats found regularly in games include "big-head mode", switching weapons for other objects, and codes to change the colours of characters.

Some games allow the player to enter a code to change what the character is wearing or to change the character itself, but not enhance the progress of the game. For example, most of the Grand Theft Auto games allow the player to enter a code to make the character change into an NPC. Another unusual cheat code in the Grand Theft Auto games is the ability to make the people of the town start rioting, or hold weapons.

Easter eggs are a related feature, although such hidden content has no impact on gameplay.

Oni has some of these unusual codes, namely

• bighead: inflates everyone's head.
• minime: makes the player so small that is is essentially impossible to be hit in close combat.
• godzilla: makes the player larger, thus increasing the target profile.
• shapeshifter: if the player presses F8, he/she will transform into other characters from the map.

Inability to attain high scores/achievements

In games having attainable achievements and/or high score records, cheats by nature allow the player to attain the achievements too easily or unrealistic scores which a non-cheating player cannot obtain. To prevent this, a few PC games like Half-Life 2: Episode 2 and Xbox games do not record the player's achievements whenever cheat mode is activated. Developer commentary can also have the same effect as activating a node renders the player invulnerable to damage. Also, when the game is saved with cheats activated, the game will record that info in the save file, causing subsequent reloads from that save file to reactivate cheat mode. Some games will even admonish the player for using cheats either during the game or at the end of the level; Portal will display "CHEATED!" above the panel showing how well the player did upon completing a chamber in Challenge mode with cheats activated.

Cheating Methods

Cheat code

Main article: Cheat code

Cheat codes are cheats that may be activated from within the game itself. Most common entry points are in a developer console, a code entry dialog, at title screens, or in-game. Cheat codes are often sequences of button presses or textual commands, depending on the input device. Unlike other cheating methods, cheat codes are implemented by the game developers themselves, often as a tool to playtest certain aspects of the game without difficulty. For example, the Konami Code was built in the game Gradius gave the player a full set of powerups because the developer, Kazuhisa Hashimoto, thought the game was too hard to play during testing. Some games allow cheat codes to be unlocked when a player has enough of some kind of points or money. Examples of this are the unlockable secrets in Jak 2 and Jak 3 that modify the player character's appearance, etc.

Modification of game code

Activation may take the approach of modifying existing game code. In the case of Jet Set Willy on the ZX Spectrum computer, a popular cheat involved replacing a Z80 instruction DEC (HL) in the program (which was responsible for decrementing the number of lives by one) with a NOP.

Modification of game source code

There are some open source games such as BZFlag that have their source code freely available. A player could take this code and rewrite it so it either includes cheats or applies a cheat to the game automatically.

Trainers

Game trainers are programs made to modify behaviour of a computer game, usually using addresses and values, in order to allow cheating. It can "freeze" a memory address disallowing the game from lowering or changing the information stored at that memory address e.g. health meter. It simply manipulates the data at the memory addresses specified to suit the needs of the person cheating at the game. These methods of cheating are often less reliable than cheat codes included into a game by its creators; certain programming styles or quirks of internal game logic, different release versions of a game, or even using the same game at different times or on different hardware, may result in different memory usage and hence the trainer program might have no effect, or stop the game from running altogether.

In the 1980s and 1990s, trainers were generally integrated straight into the actual game by cracking groups. When the game was first started, the trainer loaded first, asking the player if he/she wished to cheat. Then the code would proceed to the actual game. In the cracker group release lists and intros, trained games were marked with one or more plus signs after them, one for each option in the trainer, for example: "the Mega Krew presents: Ms. Astro Chicken++". Modern trainers append their titles with a single + and a number, as many have several functions. The number used represents the number of modifications the trainer has available. Examples include "Final Fantasy VII - Ultima Edition +50 Trainer" or "Halo +15 Trainer", which would have 50 or 15 different effects respectively.

Modern trainers also come as separately downloadable programs; instead of modifying the game's programming directly, values stored in memory are changed.

There are also universal trainers, such as ArtMoney or GameWiz32, that users can use to modify customized values in their games.

Hardware

Game Genie cartridge for the Mega Drive/Genesis.

Main article: Cheat cartridge

A cheat cartridge is attached to an interface port on a home computer or console. It allows a user to modify the game code either before or during its execution. An early example is the Multiface for the ZX Spectrum, and almost every format since has had a cheat cartridge created for it; such as Datel's range of Action Replay devices. Another popular example of this is Game Genie for NES, Super Nintendo, Game Boy, and Game Gear game consoles. Modern disc-based cheat hardware include GameShark and Code Breaker which modify game code from a large database of cheats.

Emulation

Some emulators such as VisualBoyAdvance, Nestopia, Snes9x, and Project64 allow players to modify game code as the game is running to cheat. Some even emulate cheating hardware such as Game Genie. Emulators such as MAME take this a step further, by introducing menus specifically for cheating on a particular game. One huge advantage of emulators over unaugmented authentic hardware is that they are often able to save the state of the entire emulated machine at any point, effectively allowing saving at any point in a game even where no facility for saving and restoring progress is provided by the game itself; additional hardware "instant replay" devices for some consoles also allow such behaviour.

Saved game editors

Programs exist that offer the facility to change attributes held within a game's save profile. It can allow someone to uncover secrets, discover things cut from games and modify characters. For example, on the game Elite, utilities exist that allow the number of in-game credits to be modified, or additional equipment to be acquired. Hex editors were formerly quite a popular means of editing saved game files (e.g. to give the player a large sum of money in strategy games such as Dune II). However, with the rise of dedicated game-editing utilities, hex editing as a means of cheating in games has become comparatively unpopular.

Strategy guides

Main article: Strategy guide

Strategy guides are instruction books that contain hints or complete solutions to specific video games. The exact meaning of a "strategy guide" these days is very vague, as most could be easily ranked as "walkthroughs" or "hint collections". Some people consider using a strategy guide a form of cheating. This usually applies to adventure or role-playing games where a puzzle may need to be solved. Strategy guides reveal the answers to puzzles and give hints on how to pass certain scenes in a game. Some guides even include a list of cheat codes for the game.

Cheating in online games

Main article: Cheating in online games

Cheating exists in many multiplayer online computer games. While there have always been cheat codes and other ways to make single player games easier, developers often attempt to prevent it in multiplayer games. With the release of the first popular internet multiplayer games cheating took on new dimensions. Previously it was rather easy to see if the other players cheated, as most games were played on local networks or consoles. The Internet changed that by increasing the popularity of multiplayer games, giving the players anonymity, and giving people an avenue to communicate cheats.

Aimbots

Main article: Aimbot

An aimbot, sometimes called "auto-aim", is software used in online multiplayer first-person shooter games that assists the player in aiming at the target. Since it gives the user an advantage over unaided players, it is considered a cheat.

Twinking

Main article: Twinking

Twinking is the practice of passing on valuable items not normally available at player's character's level. Such activity is often employed by "power levellers" in games such as EverQuest in order to quickly increase the rate at which experience points can be accumulated and therefore the corresponding progression within the game. However, in some cases, this may not necessarily be a cheat as it can be done without breaking any game rules, as in World of Warcraft, where high level players can easily mail money and equipment to their lower level characters. In Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 this is possible; if a lower-leveled player take another high-level player's gun after killing him/her it stays in the player's inventory, with the ability of using it the next match.

Macroing

Macroing is when a player uses a script called a macro, which automates player actions, to automatically find items or defeat enemies for the player's advantage. This is common in online multiplayer games such as RuneScape, Guild Wars, or World of Warcraft, despite being against the rules of the video game. Still, Guild Wars has its own macros system, although the commands are limited to less than 300 letters.

Sale of online currency

The prevalence of massively multiplayer online games (MMORPGs) such as EverQuest, Guild Wars, and Runescape has resulted in the trading of in-game currency for real world currency. This can lead to virtual economies. The rise of virtual economies has led to cheating where a gamer will cheat to gain large amounts of ingame money which the player will then trade for real cash. One common method of doing so is through macroing, where a player will write a script to automate an action which generates cash. The Terms of Service of most modern online games now specifically prohibit the transfer of accounts and/or sale of in-game items for 'real-world' money.

Prevention of cheating

Prevention of cheating in singleplayer games is practically non-existent, shown by the fact that most cheat codes are implemented by game developers themselves. However cheating on online games is common on public game servers and to this extent some online games, such as Battlefield 1942, include specific features to counter cheating exploits, by incorporating tools such as PunkBuster, nProtect GameGuard, or VAC (Valve Anti-Cheat). Prevention of cheating is an important feature on most modern online games. It is especially important during online gaming tournaments, where a cash prize will often be at stake.

Cheating on consoles

Since modifying a game's code is much harder on a console game than on a computer game, cheating on a console mainly appears in the form of cheat codes and cheat cartridges. Cheat codes in console games are usually activated in a slightly different manner than computer games, owing to the different forms of input (game controller vs. keyboard and mouse). Therefore, console cheat codes are usually activated by a certain combination of button presses on the game controller. Cheat cartridges are also popular on consoles. For example cheat cartridges (or CDs) were and are available for all the major sixth generation consoles.

Legality of cheating

Cheating in a game usually involves cheat codes, where the manufacturer has implemented a certain code that grants the player some advantage. However, some cheats involve the use of an external program, most commonly a trainer, and this raises a number of copyright related legal issues. These issues were brought up in the case Lewis Galoob Toys, Inc. v. Nintendo of America, Inc., where Nintendo unsuccessfully sued Lewis Galoob Toys stating that its cheating device, the Game Genie, created derivative works of games and violated copyright law.

Prevalence of cheating in video games

Cheating has taken place on almost every video game that has ever been created. A casual gamer, if stuck at a place in a video game, will often use a cheat code to get past it. The widespread nature of cheating is shown by the popularity of game guides, sites such as GameFAQs, cheat sections in almost all video game magazines, and published game guides such asa the ones from Nintendo Power.

Cheating is sometimes considered to be not simply a way to finish a game but a way "to get more out of the game, kind of like buying a special edition DVD where you get extra stuff."

Cheating as a fact of video games has been helped to gain acceptance by the open-ended nature of modern video games, such as Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, where cheating can often increase the user experience and increase how long a game is played. Conversely, cheating can also shorten the playtime of some games; a 'walk through walls' code effectively removes whatever barrier (such as a locked door or a long and difficult path) the game world contains, making bypassing the 'block' an almost trivial task.

See also

• Cheating
• POKEs as cheats
• Mod (computer gaming)