Cheating Week #1: An Oddly Religious Cheat
Christianity – and several other religions – teach us that in order to gain an eternal life of undying happiness, we must suffer in this one, working hard to attain grace. Cheats generally teach us a more Gnostic lesson, that power comes with knowledge – in this case, the knowledge of cheat codes. But there was one game that attempted to show kids the meaning of hard work even as it encouraged them to cheat their asses off…
And that game was Ikari Warriors.
That’s the arcade version, but you get the idea – a top-scrolling Rambo-em-up where you could drive tanks about the place, with enemies coming at you in wave after wave of endless blue and occasionally red death. And eventually you have to fight El Presidente, who’s some kind of gigantic mutant.
It was pretty much the same on the home systems, but there was a well-known cheat you could tap in at the high-score stage – all you had to do was type in FREERIDE and you were effectively immune from death.
The only problem was that you needed a high score first.
The lowest high score you could possibly usurp was 18000 points, and the baddies scored you 100 for every one you killed. Counting gun emplacements, you had to kill about 120-150 people to get on that table, and frankly that was a bit hard without some sweat put in. It looks easy for Mr Youtube – or ‘hirokiti55nanakusado’ as he is known on that venerable video organ – but it wasn’t easy for the average schmoe who isn’t an Ikari Warriors expert. At the time it was a teeth-gritting grind to get far enough to implement your cheating power, and even today I can’t get more than two thirds of the way before expending my final life in a futile gesture, clutching the air as I pirouette hopelessly into the digital mud.
It was the metaphorical equivalent of putting the cheat up on a high shelf where baby couldn’t reach. Maybe this was all about teaching kids the value of hard work. After all, even cheaters like me shouldn’t have it completely easy. Still, it was a strange decision to make – though not as strange as a cheat decision by the Bitmap Brothers. Of whom more later as our Cheating Week continues.
