What Happened To Cheat Codes In Games?

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What Happened To Cheat Codes In Games?


Whilst modern gaming has changed quite drastically, there are certainly things that many players would’ve hoped to remain from older games as a bit of fun – players can still occasionally come across an Easter egg or something unique, but the days of writing down a list of cheat codes are long gone. For some titles, particularly more modern casual titles like games of chance found at sinlicencia.org, cheat codes simply have no place, but what about other single player titles, and are cheat codes something that could potentially return in the future?

The short answer, and sadly for many, probably not – games have evolved where most feature an “always online” DRM, even if playing single player the games are rarely single player these days and require a constant internet connection to share and this means players who would use these codes would get an unfair edge over similar players where seamless introduction of multiplayer features have been included, but these aren’t the only reasons as online play makes up a small part of the transition.

Cheat codes

More sophisticated game engine and system tools can be partly responsible too – in the past cheat codes would be used as debugging and testing tools – need to test something? Enable infinite lives or god mode. Need to see if a certain level works as intended? Use a level skip cheat code. Nowadays, modern game engines have these tools built in for testing purposes and the same debugging codes are no longer required and have simply phased cheat codes out over a period of time. This also comes down to the more corporate teams that work on games too, in the past smaller teams may have added codes in just as a little extra, and it’s the same teams that often include easter eggs too? but the more corporate teams are expected to simply do the work and stick to a deadline, no time to add in fun cheat codes and additional extra when there are timeframes to meet.

A big change that may have also impacted this slice of fun comes from mods, DLCs, and purchasable content – there’s a huge amount of money involved in additional content from microtransactions and downloadable content, and a wealth to be found through modding support too, it wouldn’t make sense to add in a code that allows a player to unlock every vehicle in the game if they’re periodically added in with a price tag.

It’s certainly something sad to see, cheat codes were an extremely fun part of gaming for many players growing up and allowed for a lot of freedom, and something younger players may never get to experience in the same existing way with modern gaming being what it is.



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