Oh wow, I wasn't expecting it to actually support full programs. I'm definitely going to try porting a few things to it just for the hell of it.
Cosmic Smash/Hidden content So it's less likely to go missing: https://pomegd.hatenablog.com/entry/2023/01/06/204130 I came across this blog post suggesting there are two extra codes to swap out the player model (and remnants of a stage select), but they don't work. The suggestion seems to be that the rest of the codes work in the NAOMI version too - I'm not in a position to test that. ...although it does seem very likely, given this is a feature on the Dreamcast.
Well the board code works on Naomi at least! I will try out the others when I have some more free time. EDIT - There's probably loads of arcade easter eggs and codes we could add, I'll add a grand tour through sega's arcade history to me sega retro todo list!
Not really a "cheat" but it's something to look out for: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/genesis/586456-shove-it-the-warehouse-game/cheats (what a list this is - out of order and they switch from "level" to "stage") Something we hadn't listed on our Shove It! ...The Warehouse Game page is that the original Japanese version... has a lot more levels. The US has 16 stages (with 10 "rooms" each), whereas Japan got 25 stages... which means a bunch of these passwords don't work in the US version. It's a classic case of ROM sizes - the US version shipped on a 128kB ROM, while the Japanese one went for 256kB. Shove It! ...The Warehouse Game/Passwords I'm going to guess DreamWorks knew a game about pushing boxes around wouldn't sell in high numbers, so went for cheaper cartridges. Then again it's apparently taken 34 years for anyone to notice so I guess they were right.
Flicky This has to be fake, surely? Basically impossible unlock condition, with levels that nobody has, apparently, ever seen? Surely we'd have sprite rips of this secret level by now!
Yeah, no chance. Someone good at TASes could repeat the first run (although the RNG would be different so it would be a fair bit of work to do part 2) to prove it, but there's just no way someone hasn't noticed that. #7832: Winslinator's Genesis Flicky in 13:47.13 - Submission #7832 - TASVideos I also note in the TAS notes that the 10 round bonus works on multiple rounds and not just after the first 10 rounds like we currently say.
Of course it's fake, Flicky is from 1984 at the earliest and January 1991 at the latest, and that one is the Game Toshokan version.
I made another list This time it's "cheats" on SMS Power that we don't have mirrored on Sega Retro. Or their coverage is better. Or they have a list of passwords, which we don't consider "hidden content", but are missing all the same. We've actually marked hundreds of games as "having passwords", but in most cases, have yet to actually list what those passwords are: Sega Retro:Todo/Passwords SMS Power will almost certainly continue to have the edge when it comes games that generate passwords on the fly... though to be fair, I don't really have the time or patience to reverse engineer 4239804238403 games to work out what makes these features tick. (I've been a bit lazy with the copy-pasting so the names might be wrong)
From what I understand, all console versions of S.S. Lucifer: Man Overboard! (neé Sink or Swim) have 100 levels. They also share the same sets of 6-character passwords, so your Mega Drive codes will work on the Super Nintendo, and vice versa. The Game Gear version only has a subset of passwords though. After the first six levels, apparently you only get codes every five levels (i.e. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 11, 16, 21, 26, 31, 36 etc.): https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/gamegear/940015-man-overboard/cheats I was just verifying if this was true and uh... well it is, but it almost isn't: Here's where the passwords are stored. Lots of 0s in there though - what gives? Well it turns out the Game Gear also has 100 passwords, but rather than remove the redundant ones, the first characters were changed to "0", which is unavailable on the password screen. If the password screen let you enter numbers, would these work?
Deep Fear on Saturn listens for a button code a the title screen: It plays a sound after you enter it. I can't tell what it does - my guess is something on the Pause menu, but I think it requires you to be further in the game than I explored. Any ideas?
so what I'm getting from this is that some particularly enterprising troll should edit the cheat to say something like (NOTE: only applies to the version released on Game no Kanzume Vol 1)
Another mystery for your list @Bo102010 (dug up from earlier in this thread) Tomb Raider is a bit of an odd one out when it comes to codes, PSX & PC both have a level skip and an all weapons code but Saturn is all over the place PAL version appears to have all codes disabled (or are they just different?) US/Japan has a level skip code that you enter on the pause menu whilst highlighting EXIT TO TITLE US/Japan also makes a 'code accepted' noise if you enter the level skip code on the inventory screen but it appears to do nothing (or does it?) The only prototype I found can't use the level skip code because the menu works differently. I will give Deep Fear a go although I must admit I've never even heard of it!
Tomb Raider: I'll take a look. Games with passwords: Thunderhawk II should go on the list; GameFAQs et. al. have a good list. I reverse-engineered a bit of the system that checks them - it's not a static list; each password encodes information and as long as the checksum passes, it's valid. Amusingly, the code uses the string NOSEY GIT as part of the descrambling process; I took it to mean "we're insulting you for snooping around this code." I previously (with the help of Andreas Scholl) cracked the Burning Rangers password system. The list of special ones on GameFAQS etc. is correct, and then there are gazillions of valid other passwords. Three Dirty Dwarves I will have something written up on soon. I'm pretty sure no password will activate the "JOYRECORD" mode.
Quest for the Shaven Yak Starring Ren Hoëk & Stimpy/Hidden content "???LOG" is an accepted password in this game. What does it do? https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/gameg...the-shaven-yak-starring-ren-and-stimpy/cheats "MORE LOGS" oh god yes i love logs give me more aka I have no idea what this means, and apparently neither does the internet at large. More logs.
Caught out by this noise: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/genesis/586025-animaniacs/cheats Animaniacs/Passwords Animaniacs on the Mega Drive has three difficulty modes, so three sets of passwords, right? Yes... but you can play levels in any order you want, with the password system keeping track of your progress. It means rather than 15 passwords as I was led to believe, there's actually... 42? And I'd have to play the game a dozen times to see them all? Damn you Konami for being slightly more clever than usual.
Jammit is a game I can't be bothered to understand: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/genesis/586253-jammit/cheats GameFAQs lists passwords, and yeah... seems fine. But there's more in the ROM: Some of these codes are listed online for the 3DO version, but they seem to work on the Mega Drive too.
I've just started playing the SMS version with the code and so far, the only change that I encountered was the second level, which normally has the Muddy Mudskipper theme for the background music, now plays the Log song. ♫It's Log! It's Log! It's big, it's heavy, it's wood! It's Log! It's Log! It's better than bad, it's good!♫
3D Lemmings is mildly interesting: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/saturn/574032-3d-lemmings/cheats GameFAQs and others doesn't list any Saturn cheats at all, only bog-standard level passwords. But it turns out those PlayStation codes for viewing the FMVs (SPACEXXX, EGYPTXXX, ARMYXXXX and MAZEXXXX) do actually work on Saturn. So that's a thing. But there are three other codes that are accepted and... I don't know the game well enough to tell you what they do: KRAUTROK TOECHEEZ PASSWORD I like the last one - the screen says "enter password", and if you do as it says and enter "password", the code is accepted. Still no idea if it does anything. There's also a redundant password for level 1: "FUNSTART". That might be new to the internet.
Black Dawn/Hidden content The internet lists a weirdly elaborate level select code for this one, which involves holding down buttons and releasing them in a certain order - it doesn't seem to work? Also there's a "no collision detection" code for the PlayStation version listed without a Saturn counterpart - does one secretly exist? Two passwords are accepted by the game but once again, no idea what they do: 5360 0666 Well okay that's a lie - 5360 crashes the game when the mission starts. A PlayStation leftover?
