The Story Of The Game Genie
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 31 ธ.ค. 2016
- In the 80s, if you wanted extra lives, the ability to skip levels, to be invincible, or anything that wasn't included in your console's video game... you were out of luck. That all changed in 1990 when Codemasters created the Game Genie, opening the world of console video games to amazing ways to cheat and to an extent, a form of hacking. The Game Genie was important not only for being a groundbreaking device but also for establishing a legal precedent. In this video we'll take a quick look at the Game Genie's various abilities and console versions, how it worked, as well as its fight just to make it to the market.
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My brother and I managed to create some pretty nifty codes for Battletoads when we were kids. We would spend hours typing in random combinations and writing them down in a notepad. If the code did something, we would circle it and write a brief description of the effect. Some of the coolest ones were: psychic punching (hit baddies even when you're nowhere near them. Unfortunately, the snowmen had this power too), glass (everything you hit would shatter like glass), and puke toads (look like a pile of glitchy barf. This one was just for fun). Ah, good times!
+JacobraTheGreat haha that's awesome. You guys had way better luck than I did.
I would say more perseverance than luck. I would say 99.99% didn't do anything lol
Jacobra The Great Man those was the days in gaming. Beating and playing the game was one thing. But the other side was to figure out the codes or to unlock them. Games aren't like that anymore.
Haha, me and my bros did the same for Mortal Kombat 😆 Also, I remember that, of all people, we enlisted the help of my mom to "soup-up" certain Super Mario Bros. 1 codes, which made them stronger. I think it was even in the instruction manual how to do it, but in the NES days, we were too young/impatient 😆
I had game genie for nes but it broke my nes is no more it died
Very nostalgic. I also remember ringing up my parents phone bill by calling the 1-900 numbers that gave you walk throughs on games when you couldn't get past a certain puzzle/stage.
Lets not forget that Game Genie couldn' t only make you jump higher, punch harder, and live forever, but it could also make you jump lower, punch weaker and live shorter
Unfortunately growing up has left me with no time to play games the last console I purchased was a PS3 and it barely ever gets used for anything other than Netflix, watching your video was great it reminded me of all the fun times I had plaing Nintendo in my childhood
The last console I bought (new) was the PS2. =(
In my 20's, I was already too busy to play games. I do pick up a retro game every so often. And I did buy the Wii a few years ago (lol) to play random Wii and Gamecube games.
That Bill and Ted commercial: holy shit. Great video, man! I love these retrospectives.
Phil The Conquistadork thanks man! That commercial was just... so 90s. I both love and hate it! Lol
You know there's another Bill and Ted in the works? Pretty sure Keanu has signed on as well
xbfalcon83 Yaaassssss!!
he has been signed on and the movie in development for the better part of a decade.. will most likely not happen and then sony will buy the rights and genderswap the movie
well, considering it started production mid last year, I'm still hopeful
I subscribed just for more old ass commercials. I love it.
+Robert Paulson haha. Yeah, I try to throw those old commercials in whenever I can. I have a video that's a compilation of most of the ones I've used so far. I'll probably be putting one of those compilations together every once in a while.
I have two uncles and when I was growing up they were both in to Atari and Nintendo to varying degrees. One uncle would finish everything he bought and I distinctly recall watching him beat Zelda 2 to show me the ending since I was six and would not do so myself until almost 2005. Anyway, the game genie is where they diverged the most. One uncle would play everything he could and legit beat it and my other Uncle would only play games with cheats and game genie stuff. I took after the uncle that beat his games legit but I had so much fun with my other uncle trying these codes out. I'm really loving your channel, dude. I grew up in the midst of everything you're covering (I wanted a 32x so bad when they first came out but then I got a PC and well...) and it has been a REAL joy watching and listening to your videos. This is exactly my type of content through and through. You've got something really special here and you're doing folks our age a great service. We were there to see all this stuff change year after year unto this very point. I miss those days now more than ever and I thought my retro love had hit its zenith around 2005.
Man, I remember the game genie. Those were the days when I actually still had consoles as a kid. I stopped getting them after the PS1 and moved on. I had already been checking out PC games, even playing some on the old Commodores, and while the console industry kept growing and booming, I was playing awesome games on the PC. One of the things the PC allowed for that the consoles didn't was seriously impressive cheat codes, often including "God Mode" natively, without a cheat device.
These days, there really are no cheat devices for consoles. You can potentially edit save files and such, but that's just not the same. If a PC game doesn't have robust cheats, there are also trainers made specifically to edit memory addresses in various games. There are very few games that don't have at least a few good trainers for them. One game of note that still hasn't been quite cracked is "Evoland". It's a really interesting game, but there is just no way to cheat with it. Even with custom-made CheatEngine hacks, it just can't be hacked, especially the health system. I swear, they made something that could have been so simple, super complicated to avoid trainers.
In any case, loved the Game Genie. It spoiled me though!
oh man this video almost made me cry remembering my childhood i remember getting one of these in 1990. great channel
+nocturnalmayhem Thanks for checking the channel out man. I appreciate it
Live your channel man. Brings back a lot of memories
Thanks man, I appreciate it.
What an amazing random video, it kept me hooked from beginning to end! Thanks
+Maximus Von hugendong thanks! Glad you enjoyed it!
Hey! I shared your documentary playlist to a small group that I'm a member of in FB. You deserve more subscribers!
+George Watanabe Thanks so much man! That was really kind of you. Really appreciate it.
Quickly becoming one of my favorite gaming history channel. Notification squad is definitely on for your channel. GREAT FUCKING STUFF brother!
+Steve Bosell Thanks a lot man! I'm mastering part 3 of the Rare series right now and it's been quite a pain in the case to edit. Reading this comment probably saved my monitor from meeting a window. Lol
I have a feeling your monitor and your window would not got along too well
I seen this in my recommendations and I have to say this was way better than I thought it was going to be :) good job
Thanks, I appreciate it!
I remember this thing. A friend of mine actually had an NES with the Game Genie. Wonderful stuff.
Had one but it broke
Oh hell yeah bro, I just found your channel and it has tons of awesome content.
Thanks man! I appreciate it!
The Game Genie is useful in other ways: I used to own a copy of _Tiger-Heli_ for the NES, but I noticed that the levels were very repetitive. To see if there was any ultimate goal, such as an end boss, I put in an invincibility code, turned the television set off, and let the game run for several hours. When I turned the TV back on, the game was still running-no boss, no goal, no purpose other than survival duration.
I traded in my _Tiger-Heli_ cartridge for another title shortly thereafter.
Thanks for the video. I'm from Mexico; we didn't have Game Genie :(
Only had the magazines and the TV shows to help us with the games. Keep the good work.
+Dan Bills thanks for taking the time to watch. I can't imagine not having the game genie. Without it I wouldn't have been able too beat a lot of games.
Your mini docs are so well done! This is cliche to say but this deserves way more views!
Just subbed. You are very good at this. Keep up the great work.
+scottcongdon thank you, I appreciate it.
The game genie was a lifesaver as a young kid, my brother seemed to breeze through games and I got frustrated. Great video.
Fascinating as always. I remember that Bill and Ted rip off commercial so vividly it's sad. i also liked how you included the clip from the WCW action figure commercial. i had a few of those as well. Great work all around.
+Stevinfinite thanks man. I was just trying to do what no video dude had ever done before. But yeah, once i found that wcw commercial it was going in the video faster than writers distance themselves Hulk Hogan's Thunder In Paradise.
I live down the road from Codemasters HQ. I went to the same high school. 😂
Different years though.
Greetings from England! 🇬🇧✌️
I remember spending hours generating codes for Street Fighter II for the SNES resulting in multiple fireballs and wide uppercuts for Ken and Ryu. Generating genies codes was fun in itself.
I remember making my own codes and seeing what they did. I would see a pattern in the codes and continue it.
Love your videos man. I stumbled across one on Reddit and have been catching up on them ever sense... You have a great demeanor for this kind of thing.. I got a google alert about some DKC + Drinking, but I can't find the video....that sounds exactly like something I need in my life. Good luck and I hope you keep getting more views..
+Matthew White Hey, thanks for the compliment man! Yeah, I was playing a Lytle DKC to test out my live stream setup. I was quite intoxicated lol. I took it down afterwards since it was just a test and a mind numbingly awful hour of gameplay. Just dumb death after dumb death.
haha, sounds perfect.. if you had made it to the minecart madness stage..that would have been interesting to see!
+Matthew White That's as far as I made it man. But my hand eye coordination was shot at that point. I couldn't get past it.
Excellent videos man. Very well done.
+Shawn Does thanks!
Not bad, you almost have my subscription. Some of the information on your saturn video had some incorrect pictures ascociated with the named people , but the facts where pretty darn close. Good job on this and the saturn video.
+caliktil thanks
This channel was an awesome find. Sub'd and stoked for more. Thanks!
+ziahassan89 Thanks so much!
Great video! Thanks, John Petrucci!
I wish it had done more for "Ghosts n goblins" which was insanely hard.
+Scott Lowell agreed!
Hey man...GREAT video!!! Luv this stuff!!! Thanks
+jason tennyson thanks man!
Sure thing! And I agree with Phil...that Bill and Ted commercial...rofl
Strangest thing, despite it being a UK invention, The Game Genie wasn't that popular here, The Action Replay from Datel was far more well known here.
+Larry Bundy Jr yeah, it is pretty odd now that you mention it.
I must confess I never even heard of a Game Genie until years later, But I loved the Trainer mode in later models, why look up codes when you can create your own. Took about 3 minutes to create infinite lives/health cheats.
Oh, fun fact: It was renamed the Game Genie as it allowed you to enter three codes (wishes) :D
+Larry Bundy Jr I loved my game genie. There were many NES games I probably wouldn't have finished without it. It was especially helpful when you had a rental that you only had a few days to play. The commercials for it were god awful though. Even as a child I thought they were pretty lame.
Overall, the NES/Famicom wasn't as popular here, Larry, as you already certainly know. I thought it was cool that CodeMasters, a budget software house, could develop and release this cool hardware. My nephew had one for his Nintendo, but I always preferred the Datel Action Replay, as it had the trainer to help you make your own codes. My brother had that for his Sega, I think that was for his Megadrive/Genesis, though.
Datel bought codemasters
I remember Game Genie, it helped me out so much and I wish there was something similar now. It was so clever and amazing how it could affect the games like that.
U get trainers now......mainly for pc
The game genie it was so unique! I used the SEGA génesis versión and I remember what with a specific code with which I can change the architecture of the Sonic 1 levels (I don't remember what it was) and I had passed hours of fun playing the most bizarre levels design that ever can exist for the game.
Thanks for bringing back that memories, and long live to the game genie!
Love the genie too. The GameShark/Action Replay is the technically better product, but I grew up with the game genie so it'll always be my favorite.
Wrestling With Gaming me too. My friend had the action replay, but I always was happy with my game genie
I love these videos, I'm binging them now! I hope my channel can grow like yours. You do awesome work!
Great video. I never knew they had a Game Genie for the Gameboy and the GameGear. Very cool!
Nice video, easy to listen to and very informative. Subscribed :)
Detailed information. Great presentation. Great video.
Thanks so much!
love the channel keep up the good work
+Darknights23 Thanks so much. Truly appreciate it.
cool vid man! I rocked the game genie back in the day! wish they had for new gen consoles
This was very well done! Gained a sub today!
+Keegan Calmes Thanks so much. This is one of my first videos and man, there are lots of things I wish I could go back and change about its presentation. I go into much more detail now. If you liked this video you'll probably like that one I just did on the Sega VR. th-cam.com/video/3UN_pN9ZU8Y/w-d-xo.html
Thanks for checking the channel out. I know that there are literally thousands of gaming channels on TH-cam so I really appreciate it.
How does this channel only have 10k subs? This is very good production value, wake up ppl!
+Torchmanz Thanks!
Hi man, another great video, thanks very much!
Darius Robert Newton Ghazi-Torbati thanks a lot! i appreciate you continuing to watch!
what a great video. great job man, im proud of you.
+dead babies thanks for taking the time to watch
I have always been fascinated by these cheat devices. Especially the Pro Action Replay MK3 for the SNES; I spent weekends finding my own cheats and messing with Megaman X in all sorts of ways. I'm glad that I still have that MK3 but nowadays I use it mostly as a passthrough to play US SNES games on my PAL switchless modded SNES.
Awesome video man. Thank you.
+Aaron Bramall Thanks, glad you liked it.
The Game Genie is where I got my start in comp sci!!
+Ivy A Nguyen that's awesome!
I still remember all those commercials running on tv..... aaah the memories.
Dear Gamie Genie,
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THE HELP!
Great show. Keep up the hard 👍🏻 work.
+BASHEM72 thanks!
Damn you really took me back to my childhood...thanks
I liked the video and want to see more like it!
+foamidable Thanks!
I loved the plug in mod chip I had for my original ps1. It acted as a game genie, allowed the use of burned copies of any game and it allowed me to play foreign market games on us model systems. It was always interesting trying to figure out the controls for Japanese games when you can't read the information manual.
They had the permanent solder in versions to but I preferred to never do something like that in a non reversable way if I could avoid. Also I think later games started to be able to detect if a system had one of those chips and would then refuse to play.
My best finds were for Super Tecmo Bowl. Changed codes to change the length of the quarters to just about anything, including infinite. But the best was a code that made defenders miss every diving tackle attempt. They would dive at a 90 degree angle to your position every single time. LOL It was hilarious!
That Game Genie commercial scared me...
GOLD 1515 That's my daddy you're talking about.
@@bradley_klein which one? Lol
love the Eveready shirt!!
I still remember putting in the code for super jump on Mario 1 and jumping the whole map an learning the hard way what happens when you jump over the flagpole lol
In addition to codes, I ALWAYS thought of Game Genie as a tool that helps the games start up more consistently etc... I have a working NES system with about 20 games and the genie. I dont play it MUCH, but when I do, I use the genie not for codes, but to make sure I can actually play, still have to blow etc... but...
I never knew I wanted to learn about the Game Genie until I was sitting here watching a video of it. Way to go lol.
+horrorghoul lol thanks 😀
Cool channel! I remember the Game Genie. :D
+dagda825 thanks. I actually still use my game genies lol
Very well done!
+vape nation thanks!
alright, im subbing! great videos!
Thanks!
this is awesome! i loved my original NES Game Genie
Thanks a lot for watching. Really appreciate it. I loved my genie too. I especially loved the SNES version. There are many a game I would never have finished without it.
Awesome and Groovy Cool!
I had a Pro Action Replay for the Sega Genesis back in the day.. it wasn't as well known the game genie but was far superior as it let you make your own codes rather than having to rely on printed code books. In the pre internet age that was a god send. It was also great into to hacking in general for a kid. .
Playing as the bosses in Street Fighter 2 was the same highlight of my game genie days. That, and specials in mid-air and everyone has wall jump.
Awesome documentary man! I loved using the game genie back in the day. It was also fun messing around and entering random characters to see if you could come up with your own codes. I did enter one random code that changed the colors but unfortunately I didn't write it down. I still need to get the SNES and Game Boy versions.Also were the different versions colored differently? (eg. gold NES version vs. black NES version)
I remember that thanks to this thing my friend and I beat many games we couldn’t beat before due to their extreme difficulty. Specially for the NES.
Awesome channel i subbed right away
Thanks!
@@WrestlingWithGaming no problem you're very underrated deserve way more subs
@@WrestlingWithGaming keep up the good work!
Great video, would love to see a followup on how Gameshark and Action Replay ties in to the timeline. I used numerous Gamesharks after Game Genie but never knew when/how Gameshark came onto the scene
+djh816 Thanks! I did plan on covering the Game Shark and Action Replay in the future. My next video is going to be on the Atari Jaguar and it'll be out in about a week or two. I may do the Game Shark after the Jaguar video since there have been a lot of requests for it.
Awesome! Thanks :D
I always wondered what maniac came up with the idea for the Game Genie? It really gave us ways to play much more than the original game, and use all type of tricks to alter and debug a game. I also think it gave people who may not have the best health or may have another disability to be able to beat a game. Personally, that's why I would use it, I am disabled and it helped me do things I couldn't normally do on a console growing up. Nowadays, of course we have savestates on emulators, and most pc games (not online games on servers of course) have infintie savestates to make your way through a game without replaying it 1000 times. I had the game genie for sega genesis and gameboy, i never had any issues using the game boy pocket but I think I had a smaller version that was made later, than the one shown here. I later had the Nintendo 64 Gameshark and of course eventually got action replay for Saturn, GBA, DS, and plenty of other consoles.
I love 90's videogames commercials!
Excellent presentation
+Matt Salas thanks!
Still have mine, with the codebook and she still works fine. Best xmas present my older brother and I received in 1990! I wanted the super NES version but never did get around to buying it. One of my classmates let me borrow his and was able to finally beat final fight as well as topple my brother's records in F-Zero.....he was pissed.
Great video! What a time trip! My only criticism would be that I wish you went into detail why Game Genie went out of business. The first time I ever heard of them was in 1997 but I couldn't find them anywhere unfortunately. I'd kind of like to hear that story some time. Any way, great job!
+I Want To Believe thanks! Yeah with these early videos I unfortunately didn't really follow up with what happened afterward. Something I corrected later on. I believe the main thing with the game genie is that the change to disc media made it more difficult to come up with cheating mechanisms. Plus they had actual competition from things like the game shark later on.
+Wrestling With Gaming Good to know! I'll be sure to check out your other stuff. Thanks for listening to my feedback man
+I Want To Believe of course man. I'm always open to feedback.
I had the SNES Game Genie. I had tuns of fun with this thing. I messed around with the existing codes to come up with my own cheats or down right altered the game entirely. I still own the note book I had written pages of codes for games.
I still have my game genie for my Sega Mega Drive (the Australian version of the Sega Genesis) which I bought in about 1990. It was a lot of pocket money back then but I am still happy I got it today.
Goddamn. Game Genie and Game Shark we're an amazing part of my gaming life.
Stil got one for my gameboy with code book in back :D
Strange that Game Genie was made by Codemasters, a UK company, yet I had never even heard of Game Genie at the time, let alone see it, it wasn't until many years later that, on the internet, I learned of its existence. Action Replay was originally the most popular cheating device in the UK, I still vividly remember the magazine adverts for it, showing some robot man who looked half like a Terminator endoskeleton, the other half clad in spiked armour. I could never afford an Action Replay for my Mega Drive (was something like £60?), but years later I got the Xplorer cheat cart for the PSX (originally advertised as the "X-Terminator", most likely renamed due to lawsuit worries, was then later renamed again as "Xploder"). I think the original Xplorer (Pro, FX) line of cheat carts for the PSX were the last of the actual cheat carts before they turned into that memory card + CD combo crap. I also had an Equalizer cheat cart (Datel's lower end version of the Action Replay) for the N64, it was terrible and would corrupt itself all too often, I had to take it back for replacements several times, but when it did work, I had some really cool codes for Goldeneye so I could play full single player levels in multiplayer. My favourite level was always facility, so I was able to go all the way to the end of the level to the big gas chamber and camp out, killing my mates whenever they entered, great times!
another great retrospective. that bill and ted commercial was hideous!
Thanks! Yeah, that Bill & Ted's game genie commercial was so exquisitely bad and 90s. I mean, I loved it.. and I hated it. But I loved it. I think you know what I mean. I thought about putting it at the beginning of the video since I know not everyone watches to the end but I thought it best to leave it towards the end as a reward/punishment for making it all the way through. Thanks again man. Are any of those cats on your channel yours? I think it said Ruby was your cousins. Just curious, I've got three myself. I'm pretty sure two of them think they own me though.
yes Roti and Moon are mine. Ruby is my Aunts. i love animals :)
Same here. Roti is an awesome cat name. I always liked cats from afar but never saw myself as a cat owner. Then Starbuck, my first cat, showed up as a malnourished kitten on my doorstep 4 years ago. She's the cat on my chair in my youtube avatar. Now she's my buddy and I can't imagine her or my other two cats in my life.
Okay, I know im commenting too much- last one, your Cat's name is Starbuck!? A+ name....which startbuck though?
plz be the katie sackhoff one...young me watched battlestar for almost that alone...her and the old man..."whadda ya hear Starbuck?" ...never gets old
I remember using a friend's game genie on my SNES 'Final Fight' game New Year's Eve 1993. Beat the final boss then-nothing. Black screen. Whether it was the genie or the booze from raiding the liquor cabinet I don't know. I do remember us laughing hysterically trying to enter codes because his Super Advantage had the turbo buttons on-try doing that plastered.
Glad i found this channel
Thanks!
Your t-shirt is cool, haven't seen one of those batteries in forever.
+Carl Zimmerman Thanks. I haven't either. I suspect they're selling more shirts than batteries these days. From what I remember their batteries died pretty quickly.
Love to see you cover game shark
+ryan larrabee oh I'll be covering the Game Shark and Action Replay at come point. Next video is going to be on the Atari Jaguar and it'll probably be out in one to two weeks. Probably lol. I might just do the Game Shark after that since a lot of people have been asking about it.
So one night I was playing Donkey Kong and was putting in some random codes, I tried out a handful of codes that spelled out words but I ended up with nothing. I then put in APESEX and it made the game faster. Who knew Ape Sex would be the answer to speed up Donkey Kong.
Hyperkin did revived the Game Genie for Nintendo DS, 3DS, and PS3 for a short while and had planned for a PS4 and Switch version but both never see released.
I remember renting a game genie from block buster it truly was awesome.
The game boy version was similar to the game gear one in that it too had a space for the code booklet and came with stickers with codes to put on your games.
I remember this.. so cool
Sweet video!
Nice video. I'd love to see a similar "Story Of" vid for Gameshark, if you ever get the chance.
+Blaine Evans thanks man. I've actually been working on a script for a video covering both the action replay and the game shark. My next video is on a Nintendo topic but the one after that will probably be the Action Replay/Gameshark video.
Sweet! I just discovered your channel but I'm already fan. Looking forward to your AR/GS vid.
Hey, if you need any help with scriptwriting, let me know. I have a bit of indie screenwriting and production experience, with particular skills in wordplay and referential humor. I'll work for credit and goodwill upfront. Also have a Blue Yeti and know how to use it if you need any audio inserts, such as for on-screen quotes.
www.imdb.com/name/nm8816604
“Stay bigger” “live forever”
You are great, i love this kind of "LGR tech tales" kind of videos. Maybe you just chage the background music
+wizard47cpp Thanks! I appreciate you checking the channel out. This is one of my earlier videos. The music does get changed up in later ones. I mean, you still might not like it but at least it's different lol. Thanks again.
Go for it, dudester!
I loved my Game Genies too...still have them.
Game Genie! I had it back in the days!
I still have them for Sega genesis and nes have game shark for psone to thanks for the great video 👍
+James Rivera Thanks man! I still use my genesis game genie to this day myself.