I thought cheat codes were there originally for debugging and playtesting
this post was submitted on 09 Jun 2026
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They removed them because they have the technical ability to do so (due to game engines, ease of testing, etc.)
Odd take.
I can't think of a single thing that used to be a cheat code that is now a microtransaction.
Want easy mode? It's now a menu. Infinite lives are the default. Immortality modes and slow motion aiming are often under accessibility options.
None of these can be purchased.
Old games had cheats because they were hard as nails, and a game where you can't get past the second level wasn't going to hold a kid's interest for long.
Play a mobile game like candy crush or whatever, a sports game like 2k, etc and you’ll that op has a point.
Quality shower thought
The first time I ever paid for access to cheat codes was in 1990.
Provide examples if that is the case.
Cheat codes were originally for testing and, occasionally, for fun. Sometimes they became Easter eggs. I can't think of a single game where your assertion is true today or in the past.
Uhh, that doesn't add up. Cheat codes started getting used less, as far back as the PS1 generation - long before dlc existed. It was a pretty rapid shift from that point on.
It's weird hearing incorrect things about history from people who were evidently not born yet, when I was there. How do I go back?
Cheat codes were a debugging tool.
As development tools got better, they became obsolete.
No, cheat codes as debugging tools is like 25% of the story at best. That may be how they got their start, but it completely misses how they were very much a wider cultural phenomenon for some time.
In 007 there's a cheat to make everyone's heads comically bigger. In Tomb Raider, entering a cheat input incorrectly causes Lara to explode. In Heretic, if you enter cheats from Doom you'll get the opposite of the intended effect. In Gauntlet: Dark Legacy there is an entire litany of secret character models you can play as, if you choose the right character and give them the right name. There's a cheat that turns Banjo-Kazooie into a washing machine. Another one that initiates a zombie mode in Scott Pilgrim. There was a golfing game where hitting the ball 100 times and then inputting a shortened version of the Konami code generated a completely different Fantasy Zone minigame.
Do those sound like helpful debugging tools?
There was a time when entire websites were devoted to cheat codes and easter eggs (of course the most enduring ones were the broader sites that included whole walkthroughs like GameFAQs), and entire books would be published just for cheat codes.
Ultimately cheat codes were far more about easter eggs and unique game experiences than they were for debugging purposes - especially since as plenty of people have already pointed out, it wasn't long before better debugging tools were invented anyway.
The end of the day it was just a trend. People had interest in these things, then interest subsided.
IDK man, console access and cheats are still pretty common for PC games. Although there are exceptions too, at least one game series I know, first few titles had console access and cheats, then they removed it after they stupidly left DLC content accessible through console commands in the base game... Which is pretty much an example of what OP claimed. So maybe it's not always the reason, but it sure is sometimes.
Which game was this?
There's a big difference between cheat codes and paid stuff for whales.
Is this r/im14andthisisdeep from 2011?
It's a shower thought. Pretty heavy judgement for something people supposedly just think about when they have nothing better to do.
A lot of cheat codes were back in yonder days for testers and Q&A. Need to check something on stage 9, instead of playing through the game use the code to jump there to test. Got stuck but need to test further, noclip to go through terrain then test again for replication purposes. They weren't intended for us but were a very nice and welcome addition. Now they don't have extensive Q&A anymore to need such.
Also journalists, many of whom didn't grow up with videogames.
Difficulty used to be seen as a way to adjust the play time, which was tied to the value proposition for the customer. A lot of older games used to have a gigantic difficulty spike 3 or 4 levels in specifically for rental markets. The Lion King and Battletoads are famous examples. The idea is you get the players hooked with a couple of reasonably challenging levels, then put in a wall that eats up the whole weekend they rented the game for so they want to rent it again next weekend to try to get past it.
If you give journalists cheat codes then they can go and get screenshots of the later levels and write about how cool they are, further incentivizing players to keep renting or jjsy buy the game outright and push past.
Didn't consider it from that angle, I just know a lot of times it was Q&A testing tools.
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They still have the QA stuff, it's just done differently. An in-game terminal that's disabled for the release build, for instance.
This is only really possible with modern game engines though. Older games were often using code that was written specifically for that game. So simply disabling the cheat codes could likely break things elsewhere in the game. But modern game engines that were written with those testing tools in mind are able to safely disable the cheats before release without breaking the rest of the game.
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It’s more likely because cheat codes were development / QA tools to make testing the game easier. They got left in because they were behind hidden, strange button sequences etc, removing the code risked breaking something that would be harder to test without the codes, and they can be fun.
With better development tools, debuggers/profilers, and easier ways to distribute builds, they stopped being left in the game. And with the gamification from achievements/trophies, cheats would devalue/trivialise unlocking achievements etc and break their purpose.
cheat codes were development / QA tools to make testing the game easier. They got left in because they were behind hidden, strange button sequences etc, removing the code risked breaking something that would be harder to test without the codes, and they can be fun.
That's maybe how they started, but between then and now was a time when developers would very specifically add in cheat codes that had nothing to do with development or debugging, and were often just extra things added in to make the game more fun to play. (See 'paintball mode' in Goldeneye N64 for a prime example of that.) But those kinds of cheat codes seem to have fallen out of fashion.
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Yeah, really need that sense of pride and accomplishment while we pay for another loot box
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The gaming industry didn't remove content from games because it takes too long to develop, they removed it so they could sell us DLC and a half finished game.
Cheat codes were a byproduct of flimsier game development standards.
Main reason why game development times inflated so much were due to today's gamers have higher standards when it comes to balancing. Some indies even have to rely on volunteer testers, just so they don't get bomb threats from Asmonfan1488 due to not all weapons were perfectly balanced.
actually i think the standards have lowered, because there is an expectation that if a game is unbalanced, it will be fixed via a patch.
in the past if a game was going to be unbalanced it would always be unbalanced, and so the pressures were higher to get it right the first time.
its problem better to assume that the arms race in graphics and features is more to blame. yet with all that extra time and money indie games still rise above.
cheat code prevalence is fad that comes and goes.
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I haven't really seen this trend like... at all. Even Assassin's Creed style games where you can buy XP packs or certain items or whatever is not really the equivalent of old timey cheat codes.
If anything I would probably argue the introduction of online Achievements probably halted the prevalence of cheat codes.
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We were never meant to have cheat codes at all.
No, they removed them because ~console dev modes were easier and more flexible to use. Cheat codes mostly just existed for testing purposes, with the occasional silly one thrown in just because.
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I just ordered an amiibo emulator off AliExpress.
My wife is like "isn't that cheating" and I'm like "yeah, but it's pay-to-play, so I'm okay with that".
It's less cheating than a game genie...
Can't a phone with NFC and an app send any Amiibo's signal? I'm pretty sure I've done that before.
Yes. Some phones can even be used to make NFC tags. You can buy blank tags and grab bin files and write them. I have tags for max level Wolf Link and Majora's Mask items for BoTW.
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The only thing close to cheat codes I've seen are the bonus modes you unlock in Uncharted, like Slow motion, and mirror mode. Which are not DLC.
I'm not aware of any game where you can buy literal cheat codes, though.
Closest that comes to mind is Assassins Creed Odyssey with the XP booster.
For 1,000 Helix Credits ($9.99), you can purchase a permanent XP booster that gives you 50% extra experience points for the remainder of the campaign.
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The most devious of their schemes are the "skip the grind" kind of micro transactions. The sleaziness of making your game a slog just so you can sell the solution to the problem they created is diabolical.
The rich kid solution. Just SMH when I play against some super-low level player with all the skins and kit that normally take months to acquire - if they can even be earned in the first place, some items are cash only. Usually huge tryhards too with other “skill assists”.
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Also end game special objects.
Sometimes when you beat a game you get a special skin or object for a rerun.
Nowadays that's a preorder-dlc.
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Most cheat codes got removed because game devs got better at separating debug tooling from game logic, but especially because publishers and console verification are very strict about what games are allowed to ship with. Shipping with debug tooling is one of the easiest ways to fail validation.
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And they forced you to be always online for verification so modders couldn't do it for free.
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