What are cheats in games? How and why did they appear: a way to deceive the game or something more? A view from the developers of games.

What are “cheats” in games? The history of cheat codes, types and influence on the gameplay

How and for what cheats appeared in games: in detail in a review article. A way to deceive the game or something more? The moral side of the issue, the convenience of play testing and the view from the developers of the games.

Why are cheats in games?

Cheats (from the English. “Cheat” – deceive) – are created by developers to ensure ease of testing, regardless of the genre of the game. Imagine the situation: you need to test the boss in location a, how would this happen without cheat codes: would the player uploaded the game and pass the whole game before this boss? And if this boss is final? Pass the whole game? In-in, cheats in games, especially at the development stage, the necessary thing!

Chit codes provide advantages in the gameplay using measures and methods that are beyond normal gameplay. They can make the game both easier and, conversely, complicate it. Codes can be activated in the game itself (cheat codes implemented by video game programmers themselves) is created using third-party software (game trainee) or hardware (for example, cheat cartridges).

Chits can allow the player to avoid unwanted game moments. For example, I really did not like the Auto-Simulator in Watchdogs, and in some missions the “persecution of the protagonist” of the protagonist by several opponents on cars was inevitable. On the one hand, it is clear-the gameplain of the hacker Aiden Pierce Pierce and the ability to hide (switch traffic lights, causing an accident, blowing up hatches, lifting spikes-frauds, and so on), but it did not go. The developers cannot make a checkmark in the menu “Don’t chase after me, it is stupid. But they can provide a cheat code or, as Ubisoft did, make a quick opportunity to get out of the persecution and hide. For this, it is enough to run on the train in Watchdogs and leave. And this turns off both police officers and eliminators. The official loophole, and everyone is happy! I, with my hostility to persecution, and the rest of the players who really like it.

Or, for example, cheat code Aspirine (Aspirin) from GTA Vice City, which restores full health. Have you noticed that now in games with the open world, health is restored automatically when you are not in the conflict zone? That is, in fresh games there is no Health-Bar’a at all or it appears when you fight, and when you are outside the conflict, health is instantly restored. It seems to me that this is due to the fact that the designers understood-players are not interested in following health.

Additional advantages are sometimes acquired thanks to the use of programmatic errors: this may be perceived or not perceived as a deception, based on whether the mistake is considered well -known.

The history of cheats in games

Game developers also gave cheat codes to reviewers, who would test the game and be able to use them if they wanted to. Older game titles had a lot of bug issues, and removing cheat codes could introduce even more bugs into the game.

However, in modern games there are fewer and fewer cheats, why? And here's the thing: the cheat code that is available in production development to playtesters and QA engineers turns into conditional compilation, like this:

And when a release build is being prepared that will “go to gold” (from the English gone gold – goes to print on blue ray / dvd discs), these codes will not be included in it.

Games in the past were simple enough that developers only needed a few codes to test all the game mechanics and levels. In early games like Doom or Quake, you can easily enter a cheat to go through walls (the famous cheat code clip) to overcome the impassable section of the level. Trying to do this in a modern game with a bunch of scripts and triggers that are integral to the gameplay can potentially break.

Therefore, a number of cheats in the final product are simply missing. On the other hand, the developers themselves add entertaining cheats designed to diversify the gameplay. For example, in the popular Grand Theft Auto game series, it is possible to make a car fly through the air, make it invulnerable, or get an entire arsenal of weapons at once to have fun destroying everything and everything.

Online cheating

And when multiplayer games came into fashion, in which gamers have to compete with real opponents, the users themselves took up cheating. In order to win a guaranteed victory, craftsmen from the people learned to change game files using special programs, cheated with transmitted data packets, etc. Agree, it’s very nice and easy to play a shooter like Counter-Strike or Call of Duty when cheating software highlights opponents behind the walls or helps to instantly aim the sight at the head of the enemy. Especially when victory in a tournament with solid prize money is at stake.

Network cheat code for Counter strike highlighting all players*

*for such highlighting, a shader is used (article What is a shader?), usually used to highlight active objects or allies.

If in single-player games cheating is usually not punished (the maximum is the inability to get some achievements on Steam and similar services), then in multiplayer they are fought. After all, the cheater completely discourages honest players from interest in the product. A lot of security programs are being released, such as VAC, PunkBuster and the like, that identify and block violators. In professional eSports, fans of games with cheats and codes are disqualified, fined, or even kicked out without the right to take part in professional leagues.And some Asian countries, in general, have introduced criminal penalties for developers of cheating software.

More about the types of cheating in video games

What types of cheats are there and, accordingly, ways to bypass the normal behavior of the game or deceive it? An example classification looks like this:

• Cheat codes are the most common cheats in games,
• Bots are a way of scripting player actions,
• Easter eggs – various easter eggs left by the developers,
• Trainers – utilities for editing data in the game's memory on the fly,
• Bugs. – and, finally, errors in the logic of the game.

Cheat codes

The simplest type of cheat code is one that the game designer creates himself and hides in the video game itself, causing any unusual effects that are not part of the usual game mechanics.

Cheat codes are usually activated by entering a secret sequence of buttons on a keyboard or other input device (such as twisting sticks on a console controller). Some games may also offer a debug console, which is used to edit game options. Effects may include unlocking characters or improving their performance, such as granting a car with a higher speed, entering god mode (immortality) or noclip mode (the ability to walk through walls). Also, often codes are built into the game that allow you to change the visual component of the game – to influence weather conditions, change the model of the main character or his opponents, etc.

Unlike other methods of cheating, cheat codes are implemented by the game developers themselves, often being only a tool for seamless testing of certain aspects of the game. One of the earliest known examples of this type of cheat is the Konami code created in 1986 by Konami developer Kazuhisa Hashimoto while he was working on a port of the 1985 arcade game Gradius for use on the Nintendo entertainment system. The code allowed access to the entire arsenal of weapons at once, which greatly facilitated the task of passing.

This type of cheating takes place mainly in online games. Bots are computer programs that imitate human behavior and allow performing various actions (repeated or one-time) that affect the gameplay without the intervention of the player.

Bots are especially widespread in the MMO RPG genre, in which the so-called grind is an integral part of the gameplay, which boils down to killing a huge number of computer opponents in order to gain a level and collect various resources, currency and quest items from their dead carcasses. The bot can do all these actions on its own – the player launches the program, logs in and goes about his business, in order to return later and “harvest”.Typically, for the cheats used during the game, the administration of game servers punishes gamers with an account with an account.

There are also trading bots, which in some cases are even approved by developers. There are a lot of situations for their use. For example, a person needs to sell an expensive artifact inside the game or exchange a bunch of resources, he puts the character in the city center in the trade mode, sets the price and leaves for a walk, after which he returns and understands that he was thrown out of the game after half an hour (any reason is the Internet disconnection, server restart, etc.). As a result, he did not sell anything. Bots are corrected at a time, due to the function of automatic reconnecting. Yes, and they load the system much less than if you run several game customers at the same time.

Trainers. Modification of gaming data

Advantages can be easily achieved by changing the game data. Such methods are often less reliable than the use of cheat codes included in the game by its creators. This is due to the fact that some programming styles or a bizarre video game logic, various versions of the game or even the launch of the same game at different times or on various hardware configurations can lead to conflicts and errors. Therefore, the traineer program may not take any effect or at all will not allow the gamer to launch the game. It should also be remembered that changing game data is usually a violation of a license agreement, in which a ban on file modification is often prescribed.

The easiest way to wedge into the game data is to enlist the help of memory editing, which allows the player to directly edit numerical values ​​at a specific address. This type of software usually includes a function that allows you to search for memory to help the user find areas in which known values ​​are located (such as the number of lives, the number of cartridges, and weapons in numerical equivalent). If the game resources are not encrypted, you can perform modification and manually by opening the desired file using a text editor. For example, it often happens that in the list of resolutions supported by the game there is no resolution of the screen of your monitor. It doesn’t matter – in the settings you can almost always install it forcibly and correct the viewing field there to give the picture a more natural look.

The modification of gaming data also includes a fake of network traffic, which is implemented much of playing the game with cheats and codes. A similar method of deception in online games includes editing the packages sent to change the outgoing network traffic, which has a direct impact on the game. In the past, cheaters actively used this loophole, but in our time the games are developed with protection against network and package modifications.

Unusual effects

Chit codes can sometimes cause unusual or interesting effects that do not necessarily make the game easier. For example, one cheat code in Jurassic Park makes dinosaurs “undead”. Another indicative example is Dungeon Siege, where the activation of the Chita to expand the onion of the onion also allows enemies to shoot at the same distance, thereby eliminating the advantage that the cheat gave. The input of the Chita can even complicate the game: give the enemy special abilities, increase the general difficulty, make neutral observers attack the player or make the character vulnerable, underestimating his health to the minimum acceptable level.

The same category includes Easter eggs – hidden messages left by the developers of the game. Although such hidden content does not affect the gameplay, these “eggs” are scattered in many games and can hint at future games in the series or give more diverse information. Some Easter eggs can be found only with fraudulent measures, such as the Noclip mode (passing through the walls) or opening game resources to third -party software.

Developers often like to play a joke of lovers to get advantages for themselves dishonestly. For example, the use of cheat codes from DOOM in the DESCENT game only displays sarcastic messages from programmers on the screen, and the use of Descent codes in the sequel (Descent II) underestimates the level of the character’s shields and energy up to 1%. DOOM codes used in Heretic give the opposite effect, for example, instant death instead of invulnerability. The original code of the “Divine mode” DOOM (IDDQD) does not work in Doom 3, but creates a console message: “Your memory serves you good.”

Conclusion. Is the cheats good or bad in games?

As you can understand from all of the above, the cheats used for the game are a stick about the two -edges. On the one hand, they allow players to feel a new experience or “jump” through the game moments uncomfortable for them. The ability to introduce a code or correcting game resources can be indispensable in a situation where a person wants to just relax for a game and enjoy the plot without spending a lot of time on restarts after deaths or crawling on levels in search of ammunition. On the other hand, cheats are able to spoil the initial idea of ​​developers. This negative moment is mainly of multiplayer games, where cheaters spoil the rest of the players all the pleasure of network battles or take first places in rating tables.

I believe that most of the readers are curious and creative guys! Therefore, I assume that curiosity and thirst for knowledge will lead you from cheat codes- to modding games- and from there to the development of your own games!

If you are interested in cheats for a specific game, you will find them on this page: a list of cheats for games.