Wiki - GameHacking.org - User contributions [en]

Zane / Police NYPD (Hackers of Lore)

2025-12-01T17:11:54Z

Demonic722: /* July 17th, 2009 */

==July 17th, 2009==

'''LMZ''': You've been infamously known for doing such codes as "Very Very Blue Skies" for Final Fantasy VII, and ice skating codes for a wide range of games...

'''Zane''': Yea I know, the fact this question reflects on me shows people take notice of my word. lol

To be honest I hacked these codes for fun and for the hell of it, but hacking the same stuff everyone else hacks is boring, least with the codes I made there different, not always the most important or useful, but can least be good for good laugh or two, and shows you can do more in a game then simply cheating.

'''LMZ''': What codes do you think you're most well known for?

'''Zane''': Well I'm sure other people know me for what's listed in question number 1, but I like to be known for my better codes like WWF Warzone nude code, or steal anything from store in Zelda Links Awakening, or Final Fantasy 9 Debug menu or nude Terra code Final Fantasy 6, or my personal favorite Have full control of slot commands for Setzer to name a few.

'''LMZ''': What would you say is your favorite hack?

'''Zane''': I've hacked a few like store modifier, music modifier codes, and graphic fix code for Final Fantasy 6, what's mention in question 3, to many codes to think of, but I proud myself on the more useful and fun codes like the sprite control code for Final Fantasy 7 demo.

'''LMZ''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Zane''': Don't know, don't care.

'''LMZ''': What do you think is the most difficult type of thing to hack, and why?

'''Zane''': Honestly debug codes, but also codes like sprint control, fmv modifier, store modifier, random battle codes, see game ending, stuff of that nature.

'''LMZ''': What's your favorite type of thing to hack?

'''Zane''': You might be shock but it's not color mods, and ice codes, and stuff like that, I like modifier codes being music mods, towns people mods, sprite mods, size mods, doing the impossible in game sort of codes.

'''LMZ''': What's the most annoying thing about hacking?

'''Zane''': The whole finding the right code thing, personally I prefer memory hacking much faster, and easier, finding a code to help find more codes, sure it's cheating, but code hacking is code hacking to me. lol

'''LMZ''': What do you dislike most about the scene?

'''Zane''': The fact they don't make hacking device like the game shark pro for say older and current day game systems, which to me is a shame and a pain at the same time in terms of hacking.

'''LMZ''': What games did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Zane''': RPG games, there the hardest and most time consuming to hack but there fun because there's always plenty of codes to find.

'''LMZ''': Have you got any special hacking techniques?

'''Zane''': I steal them of course!!! RRRRR, lol Nah I used to hack codes by using codes that exist to make new or better codes, over time though I started using memory of the games to make and hack codes, much faster and easier then hacking codes one by one doing searches on code device, etc.

'''LMZ''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Zane''': Yes, there's been a few, can't recall them all because it's been awhile, but I think it was a perfect walk through walls code for a game, and I think a code for final fantasy 7 being perfect replica of Midgar, now that's hard code to make, won't see a guide on that anywhere.

'''LMZ''': What were some of the most obnoxious to pull off hacks you've done?

'''Zane''': Sprite control code Final Fantasy 7 and 8 demo, graphic restore code for Final Fantasy 6, to name a few.

'''LMZ''': Was there ever a code you tried to make but couldn't get to work right?

'''Zane''': The bypass code for Arc Of The Lad games, work fine for Game Shark Pro users damn Game Shark CDX made it a problem in the first place.

'''LMZ''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Zane''': I don't hack as much as I used to, but I spent time hanging with friends, dating, and doing other stuff like other people do.

'''LMZ''': What do you think needs to happen for the game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Zane''': Build a better emulator. lol Nah to insure that code devices, emulators and roms, among other things continue to exist, other wise they might take it away points to the playstation 3 as proof of that, so if all possible fight for your right to hack codes.

'''LMZ''': ...and a final question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Zane''': Don't become a pain like Chris Bain. lol

Nah seriously when hacking do it for you not for everyone else, being popular isn't what makes you a great hacker it's what you can hack and the type of codes you can hack that separates you from being like the rest of being different and being the best.

But mostly you should hack for fun and for hell of it like I do, other wise it'll feel more like work and who actually likes work, I'm sure even Lazy Bastard would agree with me as he's reading this I'm sure. lol

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Zane / Police NYPD (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T21:04:19Z

Demonic722:

==July 17th, 2009==

'''LMZ''': You've been infamously known for doing such codes as "Very Very Blue Skies" for Final Fantasy VII, and ice skating codes for a wide range of games...

'''Zane''': Yea I know, the fact this question reflects on me shows people take notice of my word. lol

To be honest I hacked these codes for fun and for the hell of it, but hacking the same stuff everyone else hacks is boring, least with the codes I made there different, not always the most important or useful, but can least be good for good laugh or two, and shows you can do more in a game then simply cheating.

'''LMZ''': What codes do you think you're most well known for?

'''Zane''': Well I'm sure other people know me for whatï¿½s listed in question number 1, but I like to be known for my better codes like WWF Warzone nude code, or steal anything from store in Zelda Links Awakening, or Final Fantasy 9 Debug menu or nude Terra code Final Fantasy 6, or my personal favorite Have full control of slot commands for Setzer to name a few.

'''LMZ''': What would you say is your favorite hack?

'''Zane''': I've hacked a few like store modifier, music modifier codes, and graphic fix code for Final Fantasy 6, whatï¿½s mention in question 3, to many codes to think of, but I proud myself on the more useful and fun codes like the sprite control code for Final Fantasy 7 demo.

'''LMZ''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Zane''': Don't know, don't care.

'''LMZ''': What do you think is the most difficult type of thing to hack, and why?

'''Zane''': Honestly debug codes, but also codes like sprint control, fmv modifier, store modifier, random battle codes, see game ending, stuff of that nature.

'''LMZ''': What's your favorite type of thing to hack?

'''Zane''': You might be shock but it's not color mods, and ice codes, and stuff like that, I like modifier codes being music mods, towns people mods, sprite mods, size mods, doing the impossible in game sort of codes.

'''LMZ''': What's the most annoying thing about hacking?

'''Zane''': The whole finding the right code thing, personally I prefer memory hacking much faster, and easier, finding a code to help find more codes, sure it's cheating, but code hacking is code hacking to me. lol

'''LMZ''': What do you dislike most about the scene?

'''Zane''': The fact they don't make hacking device like the game shark pro for say older and current day game systems, which to me is a shame and a pain at the same time in terms of hacking.

'''LMZ''': What games did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Zane''': RPG games, there the hardest and most time consuming to hack but there fun because thereï¿½s always plenty of codes to find.

'''LMZ''': Have you got any special hacking techniques?

'''Zane''': I steal them of course!!! RRRRR, lol Nah I used to hack codes by using codes that exist to make new or better codes, over time though I started using memory of the games to make and hack codes, much faster and easier then hacking codes one by one doing searches on code device, etc.

'''LMZ''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Zane''': Yes, thereï¿½s been a few, can't recall them all because it's been awhile, but I think it was a perfect walk through walls code for a game, and I think a code for final fantasy 7 being perfect replica of Midgar, now thatï¿½s hard code to make, won't see a guide on that anywhere.

'''LMZ''': What were some of the most obnoxious to pull off hacks you've done?

'''Zane''': Sprite control code Final Fantasy 7 and 8 demo, graphic restore code for Final Fantasy 6, to name a few.

'''LMZ''': Was there ever a code you tried to make but couldn't get to work right?

'''Zane''': The bypass code for Arc Of The Lad games, work fine for Game Shark Pro users damn Game Shark CDX made it a problem in the first place.

'''LMZ''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Zane''': I don't hack as much as I used to, but I spent time hanging with friends, dating, and doing other stuff like other people do.

'''LMZ''': What do you think needs to happen for the game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Zane''': Build a better emulator. lol Nah to insure that code devices, emulators and roms, among other things continue to exist, other wise they might take it away points to the playstation 3 as proof of that, so if all possible fight for your right to hack codes.

'''LMZ''': ...and a final question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Zane''': Don't become a pain like Chris Bain. lol

Nah seriously when hacking do it for you not for everyone else, being popular isn't what makes you a great hacker it's what you can hack and the type of codes you can hack that separates you from being like the rest of being different and being the best.

But mostly you should hack for fun and for hell of it like I do, other wise it'll feel more like work and who actually likes work, I'm sure even Lazy Bastard would agree with me as heï¿½s reading this I'm sure. lol

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

ZoMBiE343 (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T21:00:26Z

Demonic722:

==April 17th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''ZoMBiE343''': My favorite was the Super Nova code that I created for FF7. You could use one/any character's limit break to use Super Nova. Unfortunately, it only worked against Safer Sephiroth, in the final battle, and I didn't have the tools/knowledge/equipment to figure out why. I was actually trying to hack a limit modifier. I used my GameShark Pro to freeze the value after Sephiroth cast it. I was going to turn my Playstation off...but I said, 'let me finish him off with an Omnislash'....my brother and I couldn't stop screaming when the camera zoomed into cloud's face and did the Super Nova animation. We were even more excited to find out that it did Super Nova damage (instead of Omnislash). Good times.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''ZoMBiE343''': I was always envious of this guy CzarDragon. He created the famous Debug Room code in FF7. That was such an awesome, ground breaking code. It really taught us what could be hidden in any game! As it turns out, he was actually trying to create a code to change cloud's size. Little did he know, that when he was searching for memory values that, yes the map changes ...but so does Cloud's size! ...Map modifier, Size modifier....this is why you have to be very careful with how you hack a certain code.
OK, I'm coming back to answer this question again. When I was 8, there was a Super Mario Bros. NES Game Genie code that turned all the Goombas into Toad! ...Yes, all the goombas were Toad. It was awesome. To this day, I have been unable to find this code, but that code is what made me very curious about how cheats were made.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''ZoMBiE343''': CodeMaster and CzarDragon. I never understood what was involved when creating codes and I always had lots of ideas. I also loved that they got to play games as much as they wanted.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''ZoMBiE343''': My first code was probably infinite health for the mini-games in Ape-escape. I created things like "inifinte health" or "one-hit knock out"

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''ZoMBiE343''': Codes that literally take the game apart or make hidden elements of us regular gamers. I hate how they'd tease you with things like, putting Sephiroth or Lynx in your party, and not let you play as them. These kinds of codes require a lot of creativity. I never had a disassembler and couldn't use assembly language to figure out what the game was doing. I had to use my brain and say, "jumping means my character goes higher from the ground. Maybe...just maybe, the game stores a number that represents how high my character is from the ground". I would follow this logic and create, let's say, a mega-jump code.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''ZoMBiE343''': The ones that no one ever expects to be possible. The codes that really make you pick up a game and play it all over again. I must have beat FF7 about 15 times.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''ZoMBiE343''': Final Fantasy 7...duh. Mostly Squaresoft games. There were a lot of similarities with how their games were designed. HOWEVER, one game, Vagrant story used NEGATIVE numbers to store how high your character jumps in the air. SO, as your character jumped higher, this memory address kept DROPPING. I remember showing this to CodeMaster and he rudely told me, "Have you ever heard of SIGNED mode???" ...I asked him to look at it and within 30 seconds he had the code (a better one, mind you)...and he was floored. He said, "maybe the programmers were doing the weed when they came up with this" .....Good times. :)

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''ZoMBiE343''': I was disappointed with the SuperNova code after many months of trying to get it work OUTSIDE of the Safer-Sephiroth battle. Or, I did make a code in FF7, that actually give you weapons with triple materia links! Normally you could only link two materia, say Final Attack + Phoenix (when you die, Pheonix gets cast)....well, how about: Final Attack + Double/Quad Attack + Knights of the round? (When you die, your opponent gets 4 Knights of the Round on him! ....but Sadly, I lost this code two seconds after creating it. I never even got to test the materia theory out. =(

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''ZoMBiE343''': I actually collect vintage comics, comic artwork, play handball, go to the gym. Honestly, I work for a very successful dotcom company...they keep me very busy. When I'm not working, I try to relax and stay as far away from a computer as possible. :)

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''ZoMBiE343''': We need another Gameshark Pro...but for today's console...perhaps some console <-> PC link device.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''ZoMBiE343''': Whatever you do in life, make sure it gives you the things you want. Be passionate about everything you do and everything you enjoy. Also, don't get discouraged if you don't succeed the first time around. I don't consider myself to be the smartest guy in the room, but I am always eager and willing to learn. You should do the same, by always being a student of life. :)

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Whipon (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:58:04Z

Demonic722:

==February 4th, 2010==

'''LMZ''': What would you say your greatest achievement in the hacking scene was and what inspired you to do it?

'''Whipon''': I'm very proud of my menu hacks for Dragon Warior IV and Captain Tsubasa II for the NES. Its surelly my greatest achievement. What inspired me to do these hacks?: the need. I needed a way to select those items in game, without extra tools. I was very happy when I finished them.

'''LMZ''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Whipon''': Its hard to choose. But its surelly my Rings of Power hack, more specifically the hack that gives your party infinite HP.

'''LMZ''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Whipon''': Castlevania: Chorus of Mysteries. Its a Castlevania 1 hack for the NES. I'm a Castlevania fan, and is allways good to me to find new great hacks of that amazing game.

'''LMZ''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Whipon''': Pugsy for sure. He was my mentor. He's a great guy, allways willing to help. I owe him a lot.

'''LMZ''': What was your first hack?

'''Whipon''': My first attempts were done with save state hacking. Dragon Warrior IV again, I remember to hack the inventory digits with a Hex Editor, doing some save state comparing.

'''LMZ''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Whipon''': Multi jump codes / jump in mid air codes. These are very frustrating to make, since it takes hours of time, and sometimes you just can't find the code. Personally I have lots of problems finding these type of codes.

'''LMZ''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Whipon''': I love invincibility codes. They are a must.

'''LMZ''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''Whipon''': When I spend lots of time to find a code and I fail to make it.

'''LMZ''': What do you dislike most about the hacking scene?

'''Whipon''': Newbies without humility. They are annoying.

'''LMZ''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Whipon''': I loved to hack Rings of Power. This game is hard as hell, even to hack it, because it has DMA for the stats of the characters. Having found a way to cheat in it was great. Pugsy helped me a lot with it, and I learned a lot in the progress.

'''LMZ''': Do you have any specific hacking techniques or peculiarities?

'''Whipon''': I tend to use save state hacking to find difficult values from time to time. You know, sometimes, searching the ram its futile.

'''LMZ''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Whipon''': Of course, I remember to have found a secret menu in Streets of Rage 3 by save state hacking. Its that level select menu that has been posted recently. I found it by accident, and lost it in a hard drive crash.

'''LMZ''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Whipon''': My multi jump code for Mega Turrican. It took me several hours to figure it out.

'''LMZ''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly?

'''Whipon''': I never managed to make a invincibility code for Little Samson, for the NES. I have to try it again someday with more time :p.

'''LMZ''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Whipon''': I like anime a lot, watching movies too.

'''LMZ''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Whipon''': It will allways thrive. There's lot of excellent hackers allways willing to help the newbies. These newbies will be great hackers someday. I don't think we need any special event.

'''LMZ''': And... One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Whipon''': Take it as a game. Hacking codes must be as fun as playing the game :D. At least I feel that way.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Whipon (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:57:44Z

Demonic722:

VisitntX (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:52:14Z

Demonic722:

==May 4th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': You've hacked at least 4,346 codes across 8 consoles and 1809 games, most of which were Game Genie codes, including Infinite Energy and Invincibility codes for pretty much every Genesis fighting/beat'em-up game. What was your inspiration in hacking these?

'''VisitntX''': Well my inspiration basically was that nobody ever made such codes for those systems and I didn't know why, so I started to learn and Pugsy helped me a lot in that matter, so once I understand it just kept trying to cover all of those fighting/beat'em up games for genesis. Was the challenge of trying to find another method to apply, to beat all the problems and to do something nobody did before for that system.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''VisitntX''': I don't have a favorite one, but if I have to choose probably I will go for the Infinite Energy code I made for X-Perts for the Genesis system. Also I really love every perfect invincibility code I did.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''VisitntX''': Freeze Time for Out-Run, now, is not that great of a code, but I love it, as a great fan of this game I remember playing it with the first MAMEs that run it correctly. Still remember when I played the game in an old Arcade as a little kid. Is more because the feeling it produces in me, that I could beat the game after lot of years. There are lot of more complex codes that were probably more difficult to find, but I still love this one.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''VisitntX''': Actually is the same person, Pugsy influenced me with his impressive codes for MAME and I look up to him because of his huge knowledge and his kindness, he always help new hackers.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''VisitntX''': my first code was a PAR I made for Super Mario World like 8 or 9 years back, it was infinite lives, since then I just kept doing codes, learning how each system control the memory, how each game-house works, and then once I thought my skills were useful I started to posting the codes I did, and just kept doing codes. Now my first hack was for Genesis, it was a game genie code for infinite energy for the game Home Alone.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''VisitntX''': The most difficult is probably a true and perfect collision on/off hack. I mean, difficult could be also try to make infinite energy for each of your characters in RPG games when you have a 5 line code limit in a real Game Genie, but not when you have infinite space to work and modify. Always talking of hacks, not RAM codes.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''VisitntX''': Definitely Invincibility. Make invincible a character, making it go thru every enemy as a ghost is what I like the most. But only perfect invincibility.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''VisitntX''': Is that sometimes you go too deep because the challenge is so fun and then forget about other things as your mind don't need to think in the problems of your world, just it needs to try to change a little piece of code.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''VisitntX''': The stupid division, and the stupid war. That there is still people stealing codes, people that never give the correct credit to the creators. Ok, we do it for fun and to help gamers, but still is grateful when something you did is useful and the credit is given.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''VisitntX''': Probably the Golden Axe saga, mostly the one, as I'm a huge fan of this game, and making a good invincibility also with the other codes was really fun to do.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''VisitntX''': Yeah, lot of times cuz I'm a really mess. It happens often with me, there are great invincibility codes I made that were lost, and those were really cool invincibilities.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''VisitntX''': The most difficult was X-Perts, I spend so much time in that game. But it was fun, the bigger problem is that I didn't figure out sooner that when a character has energy above a certain point the game crash, even if you do it directly to the RAM.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''VisitntX''': I'm very persistent, I don't like to retreat at nothing, so I just kept always trying and trying and learning how to do this or that, asking for help, and then in the end I ended doing it as I wished to. But there is still a couple of SNES hacks that disturb me because I couldn't made them as I really wanted to. One was a character select for a fighting game, can't remember the name, the other was an invincibility for an awful game, sort of platform and beat'em up. And a couple of codes here and there, like one that I had to do it other way because in that NES pirate game didn't work as I wanted to.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''VisitntX''': I like sports, love soccer and basketball, used to play both a lot at the streets. I love music, I'm always hearing it, all the time. And I really love to spend time with my girlfriend and with my family. And I'm a huge fan of movies, watch a lot of them.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''VisitntX''': The union first. Then we need to keep helping new hackers to enter this world, as more people learn there will be more people that can help others, more codes, more games covered, a bigger scene.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''VisitntX''': Do it for fun, do it for a little challenge to your mind, do it to help others, but never do it to escape reality, to spend all the night just doing codes. You'll find a lot of problems, so just keep in mind that there are a lot of good people who will help if you ask them nice. If you still can't figure it out, just leave it, do something else, tomorrow you can keep trying, soon or later it will comes to you.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Viper187 (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:46:40Z

Demonic722:

==April 17th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among quite a few other things, you hacked over 30,000 codes for Turok (N64). What inspired you to do so?

'''Viper187''': Needed something to do, I guess. I realized there were a lot of aspects of each enemy that could be manipulated and started hacking them

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Viper187''': Depends on if you go by usefulness or just cool factor. I always thought my Exploding Enemies hack for Turok was pretty neat, even though I haven't actually spent that much time using it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Viper187''': Para's "Jesus Mode" for Mario 64. That's just all kinds of 1337.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Viper187''': I definitely looked up to macrox and learned a lot from him. I probably learned the most from Parasyte though.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Viper187''': Well, first thing I ever did for myself was Infinite Health on SF Alpha 2 with an actual SNES Pro Action Replay 3. First thing I ever submitted was Offensive/Defensive Attributes modifiers for CAW on WWF Warzone (N64) as Viper316.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Viper187''': Well, 2 things make codes difficult, IMO: the programming of the specific game (1), and the tools available (2). Timers can be the easiest or most impossible code you'll ever try to hack on a game. It took me 4 years to crack one once. As for tools available, some things can become very simple if there's a debugger to be used, and utterly impossible without it because of random addresses.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Viper187''': I'd have to say Invincibility, although it's overly difficult to hack most of the time. I always liked Mega Jumps and Infinite Jumping too. Basically, codes that are almost always assembly based hacks. lol

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Viper187''': hmm...I'm thinking Mario 64. The game was just awesome to begin with, and it left a lot of hacking opportunities to the open-minded folks with skills.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Viper187''': I literally spent years trying to figure out Infinite Turbo for Gretzky 3D Hockey. One of those incredibly simple things that was apparently programmed by crackheads.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Viper187''': Too many to list, really. You run across a lot of odd little things that just refuse to work when you hack as many codes as I have. The flashlight on Turok 2, Boost Anytime for Star Wars Racer, 4WD on Mariokart64, etc. I don't know that I'll ever sort those out.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Viper187''': Watching movies and screwing with computers/programming/web design.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Viper187''': Somebody needs to find a way around this DRM shit, whether legal or not, and release some proper hacking software for PS3, Xbox360, etc. The code encryption also needs to die for good. And people need to start writing better emulators. lol

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Viper187''': Code hacking is an acquired skill, much like programming in some ways. Some even consider it an art. Once you master the basics, nearly any hack is possible if you have the right tools for the job and you can deduce how exactly the game would handle the type of activity you're trying to modify. The important thing is not to give up on a hack easily. Keep looking for new methods, get other hackers' thoughts, etc. Good luck.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

TruWizdom (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:44:16Z

Demonic722:

==April 23rd, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among other things, you hacked the Debug code for Arc the Lad III, and the Call Chocobo Anywhere code for Final Fantasy IX. What inspired you to hack these?

'''TruWizdom''': The challenge; finding a simple code such as a item modification code was never insipiring to me.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''TruWizdom''': heh they were all fun, dont really have a fav. they were all a challenge on making what i thought wasnt/couldnt be made.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''TruWizdom''': i think that would be zombies code for seph. everyone loved that code.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''TruWizdom''': Ya know when i entered i didnt have much knowledge of the whole hackign games as a whole i would say KE and CM were my biggeest influences, but everyone inspired me, that made any code. once i started i was hooked and looked to anyone and everyone that was willing to help. many ppl put out faqs or offered help to me, so basically i would say the whole community was supportive

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''TruWizdom''': lol, sorry i cant remember that far back, prolly something completelly useless after 78964893574 screen freezes or a simple max modifier. but i know it was epic cause i can still remember the feeling of accomplisment, not so much the code itself.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''TruWizdom''': Breakpoints, simply cause the preknowledge needed is pretty high, i never took a programming class before making codes so they simply confused me.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''TruWizdom''': Debuggers, flag codes, simply cause with them you can truely break the game ^^

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''TruWizdom''': the time it takes to write down modifiers, lol. some games have hundredes of items. writing them all down is bleh!

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''TruWizdom''': gamefaqs putting down ppl that cheat!!! lawl nah j/k whats not to like abotu the scene? never really saw anything that i didnt take with a grain of salt, nothing comes to mind atleast.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''TruWizdom''': most fun game, hmmmm again prolly no favorite they all have their aspects, but i mainly like roleplayin games to play or hack. they have more to offer.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''TruWizdom''': only about 5 times a game. i dont remember how many times i lost a code, then the programming changes or such, making the same search pattern not work.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''TruWizdom''': Choco code for ffix prolly the damn memory kept shifting on me, finally found out it was 2 codes 1 was a flag one was the actuall code. that code took me like 4 days to figure out

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''TruWizdom''': lol many from a full functional debug code to a simple(er) breakpoint to keep memory locked. gotta have the patience to hack!

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''TruWizdom''': lol aside from hacking and gaming i work, that keeps me very busy specially now kinda eats into the others times!

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''TruWizdom''': for companies to not be so criptive or for more bright minds to step up and create devices that let us search for codes. companies always thought they were loosing sales to hacking but i think it promotes the game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''TruWizdom''': for aspiring hackers i would say never give up sure sumthing can take hours/days to figure out but the reward and the satisfaction you feel afterwards are well worth it. its very contagious; since i started i got a few other ppl hooked on it, and they made some codes that impress me. luck skill or happenstance makes no differnce its getting the code that makes it worth while ^^

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Szalay / Szalay Lajos (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:39:21Z

Demonic722:

==February 26th, 2010==

We're breaking down a language barrier here, so don't be surprised if we get vulgarâ€¦

'''GMO''': What would you say your greatest achievement in the hacking scene was?

'''szalay''': With all the consoles out (PSX, PS2, and XBox) I never stopped learning how to hack games and I make a ton of codes. Making debug codes for XBox games.

'''GMO''': What was your inspiration for this?
'''szalay''': Hack and fuck women!

'''GMO''': Oh God, we have corrupted you! I have to break this down to simple terms. Serious before I go to Hungary and hurt.

'''GMO''': Why do you like to hack?

'''szalay''': In the beginning, I got my first PSX1 and played games. I saw this connector on the back side and thought, "WTF is this about?" I asked people what does this do and the responses were no one knew at least in my country. Online someone responded it was for a cheat card. I never heard of a cheat card (Action Replay). It's not easy for me to get one, and to not know what or how it works. Funny I know.

'''GMO''': LOL Amazing funny.

'''szalay''': Once I figured out what it was I had to buy a new PC with an ISA slot. Plug it into the IO card
to get Caetla working. I actually had Action Replay 1.2 but I Flashed it to Caetla. No one told or taught me how to use PSX.exe or I had to understand MIPS3000r. It was really hard for me to learn and while trying to get good results. It was funny hard because I had to teach myself everything since code guides and documents weren't available in my language. those were the good
ol' days of PSX!. A year later PSX2 came out and I have email contact with you (GMO) if you remember.

'''GMO''': I remember. It was about a Tenchu 3 elf

'''szalay''': My email like this; Dear GMO etc etc and u reply ,"uh I'm dear? lol"

'''GMO''': What was your favorite code for PS2?

'''szalay''': My first code was Rapid Fire on Socom! Yet, I didn't receive credit. Liquidvlade deleted my post and submitted it to CMX.

'''GMO''': Interesting, I am going to have to settle that matter with him. But yes itâ€™s true. szalay lajos did in fact make the Rapid Fire code for SOCOM1.

'''GMO''': What is your most memorable XBox hack?

'''szalay''': That would have to be Deus EX. I was the first one to hack games using the Unreal engine on XBox. The Unreal engine is when the games address share all the same information. It's quite a bitch to hack. But I remember when me, you (GMO), and CMX hacked it together. I learned about there to helped me hack codes for the others.

'''GMO''': What is your favorite code you like to make for PS2?
'''szalay''': debug menus, debug FPS (force branch), etc

'''GMO''': What is the coolest code you made on XBox?

'''szalay''': console command hax
i.e.:
if you play on PC and use console can type / god, give all / etc
now this features I used for xbox1 too with IGK command

from source:
godtog:
db 'god 1n',0,0
toggle_god:
cmp Sel_Item1[ebp],1
jne noton
push eax
lea eax, [godtog+ebp]
push eax
mov eax, 14DCB0h
call eax
add esp,8
ret

mov eax, 14DCB0h = magic address what inject /UNICODE" to memory
db 'god 1n',0,0 = label for inject
if replace to db 'noclip 1n',0,0 then no clip etc
so not bytes codes

http://www.xboxtrainers.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=636

'''szalay''': You seen my last trainer for DOOM3?

'''GMO''': No, I haven't

'''szalay''': first for CMD method http://www.xboxtrainers.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=653
and for DOOM3 http://www.xboxtrainers.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=636
No one has done this before. Play DOOM3 in 3rd Person View!

'''GMO''': You are crazy!

'''GMO''': Do you remember the first hack you made?

'''szalay''': Yes, All homebrew games and after Enclave and Curse - The Eye of Isis

'''GMO''': Is there anyone you ever looked up to past or present?

'''szalay''': When I first started it was very hard and I had no one to ask for advise or tips. Presently, I do not look up to anyone either. I enjoy my time with my hacking buddies as we share
info with each other on a daily basis. We are a dream team me, GMO, Skiller, and CMX. We hack many games together. For XBox, dootdoot was very helpful with the information how to put my trainers together. It is very hard work trying to hack x86 after you spent a lot of time with MIPS series.

'''GMO''': DO you want to say anything to any of the new hackers out there?

'''szalay''': Work hard and try to learn as much as possible. I am still learning every day. Even the little things you learn can be a big help. Hax and fucks women!

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Szalay / Szalay Lajos (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:39:05Z

Demonic722:

==February 26th, 2010==

We're breaking down a language barrier here, so don't be surprised if we get vulgarâ€¦

GMO: What would you say your greatest achievement in the hacking scene was?

'''szalay''': With all the consoles out (PSX, PS2, and XBox) I never stopped learning how to hack games and I make a ton of codes. Making debug codes for XBox games.

'''GMO''': What was your inspiration for this?
'''szalay''': Hack and fuck women!

'''GMO''': Oh God, we have corrupted you! I have to break this down to simple terms. Serious before I go to Hungary and hurt.

'''GMO''': Why do you like to hack?

'''szalay''': In the beginning, I got my first PSX1 and played games. I saw this connector on the back side and thought, "WTF is this about?" I asked people what does this do and the responses were no one knew at least in my country. Online someone responded it was for a cheat card. I never heard of a cheat card (Action Replay). It's not easy for me to get one, and to not know what or how it works. Funny I know.

'''GMO''': LOL Amazing funny.

'''szalay''': Once I figured out what it was I had to buy a new PC with an ISA slot. Plug it into the IO card
to get Caetla working. I actually had Action Replay 1.2 but I Flashed it to Caetla. No one told or taught me how to use PSX.exe or I had to understand MIPS3000r. It was really hard for me to learn and while trying to get good results. It was funny hard because I had to teach myself everything since code guides and documents weren't available in my language. those were the good
ol' days of PSX!. A year later PSX2 came out and I have email contact with you (GMO) if you remember.

'''GMO''': I remember. It was about a Tenchu 3 elf

'''szalay''': My email like this; Dear GMO etc etc and u reply ,"uh I'm dear? lol"

'''GMO''': What was your favorite code for PS2?

'''szalay''': My first code was Rapid Fire on Socom! Yet, I didn't receive credit. Liquidvlade deleted my post and submitted it to CMX.

'''GMO''': Interesting, I am going to have to settle that matter with him. But yes itâ€™s true. szalay lajos did in fact make the Rapid Fire code for SOCOM1.

'''GMO''': What is your most memorable XBox hack?

'''szalay''': That would have to be Deus EX. I was the first one to hack games using the Unreal engine on XBox. The Unreal engine is when the games address share all the same information. It's quite a bitch to hack. But I remember when me, you (GMO), and CMX hacked it together. I learned about there to helped me hack codes for the others.

'''GMO''': What is your favorite code you like to make for PS2?
'''szalay''': debug menus, debug FPS (force branch), etc

'''GMO''': What is the coolest code you made on XBox?

'''szalay''': console command hax
i.e.:
if you play on PC and use console can type / god, give all / etc
now this features I used for xbox1 too with IGK command

from source:
godtog:
db 'god 1n',0,0
toggle_god:
cmp Sel_Item1[ebp],1
jne noton
push eax
lea eax, [godtog+ebp]
push eax
mov eax, 14DCB0h
call eax
add esp,8
ret

mov eax, 14DCB0h = magic address what inject /UNICODE" to memory
db 'god 1n',0,0 = label for inject
if replace to db 'noclip 1n',0,0 then no clip etc
so not bytes codes

http://www.xboxtrainers.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=636

'''szalay''': You seen my last trainer for DOOM3?

'''GMO''': No, I haven't

'''szalay''': first for CMD method http://www.xboxtrainers.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=653
and for DOOM3 http://www.xboxtrainers.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=636
No one has done this before. Play DOOM3 in 3rd Person View!

'''GMO''': You are crazy!

'''GMO''': Do you remember the first hack you made?

'''szalay''': Yes, All homebrew games and after Enclave and Curse - The Eye of Isis

'''GMO''': Is there anyone you ever looked up to past or present?

'''szalay''': When I first started it was very hard and I had no one to ask for advise or tips. Presently, I do not look up to anyone either. I enjoy my time with my hacking buddies as we share
info with each other on a daily basis. We are a dream team me, GMO, Skiller, and CMX. We hack many games together. For XBox, dootdoot was very helpful with the information how to put my trainers together. It is very hard work trying to hack x86 after you spent a lot of time with MIPS series.

'''GMO''': DO you want to say anything to any of the new hackers out there?

'''szalay''': Work hard and try to learn as much as possible. I am still learning every day. Even the little things you learn can be a big help. Hax and fucks women!

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

RPGod (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:35:07Z

Demonic722:

==May 10th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among many other things, you co-hacked the Final Fantasy VII Debug Room code with CzarDragon, which changed video game hacking forever. What was your inspiration for this?

'''RPGod''': Heh, I remember this, I had JUST gotten my GameShark Pro, and I was playing around with some codes. I remember seeing CzarDragon's room modifier code on the Official Gameshark Message Boards. At this point, I still strongly thought that maybe a reviving Aerith scene was very much intended to be in the game, and so I decided to go through every room in the game to see if anything was left behind on the disc. I came across the now famous debug room, and was really excited.
I spent about 45 minutes just exploring it and thought it was pretty neat. I came back on to the forums, and posted it, but I had NO idea it would become as big as it did. I remember some of the biggest gaming sites posting about us. The GIA had nothing but praise, IGN called it hacker vandalism. It was pretty awesome.

'''Lazy Bastard''': You were one of the founding members of GSHI (in fact, you were the only member besides '''Lazy Bastard'''...er, me...in the beginning). What do you think precipitated the need for a place like GSHI back then?

'''RPGod''': I think we just wanted a place we could hang out and talk, without the bullshit of the official forums. The GSHI was OUR place, and WE made the rules.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''RPGod''': Hmmm, probably the Debug Room for FF7, just cos it was the first big thing I was a part of hacking. It really started something, back then.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''RPGod''': That's a tough one. I remember back in the day, there were so many cool codes that I loved. But I think the most recent one would be for the PC version of Final Fantasy 7. I don't know if this really counts, but these guys found a way to modify the files for the game so that it would replace the field models with the battle models, so we get much more detailed models in events and such. They have gone so far as to rip cloud from crisis core, and insert in into Final Fantasy 7 PC. Kinda neat!
My second favourite was the debug menu for Final Fantasy Tactics. It was just really really cool.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''RPGod''': I don't know if I had any influences going in. I have just always loved seeing and doing things in games that we are not supposed to see/do. When the GameShark Pro came out, it gave me an opportunity to do just that.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''RPGod''': I'm not sure if it was the very first, but it's the first I remember. It was in 1993, and it was for the NES. I had an old Game Genie, and I used to just write random sentences with the letters available, and then see if they did anything. Usually it was inappropriate language and things like that.
The Game was The Muppet Adventure, and the code was "IAGAYT" and the code would let you go straight to the last level. Kind of random, but cool nonetheless.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''RPGod''': The really cool ones. Anyone can do unlimited lives, unlimited health, unlimited time/arrows/bombs, etc etc etc. But ones that do truly cool things always seem to be much harder.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''RPGod''': Same as the last one. Really unique ones, or ones that let you do and see things you are not supposed to.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''RPGod''': Heh, when I'd be working on hacking something, and then it would crash, and I'd lose all my progress. That always sucked!

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''RPGod''': I don't know if I can comment on this one, as I have been out of the scene for a long long time.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''RPGod''': I always loved messing around with Final Fantasy Tactics. There was just so much to it, plus it's one of my all time favourite games.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''RPGod''': Yeah many many many many many many many many times. I was always too lazy to write things down, and I'd say "Oh man, there's no way my playstation will crash, I'll be fine dude!" and then...... crash! It always seemed to happen.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''RPGod''': I remember when I finally got a no battles code for Xenogears. That was so damn hard to find! I don't remember how I finally did it, but it was really weird.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''RPGod''': I was trying to make a code for Castlevania SoTN that would make it so bosses would be available to fight over and over, but it never really worked.
The other big one was Kartia. I loved that game. I found "debug menu", in a string of hex in the game's menu system, and I tried long and hard to figure out how to access it, but never managed to figure it out.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''RPGod''': I don't hack games anymore, but I still love playing games. I write music, and play guitar bass and I'm learning drums. I love playing pool and going bowling with my friends. I spend a lot of time at the gym, and I love rock climbing.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''RPGod''': I don't hack anymore, but I'd have to say, we need hacking devices on the newer platforms. That's the only way, I think. There will always be a scene for the old consoles, but we would need to see it on the new ones as well.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''RPGod''': Hacking was something I loved doing, and although I don't do it anymore, it was a lot of fun, and I met some really cool people. Keep doing what you love to do, and you never know what you may hack.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Richard Aplin (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:26:39Z

Demonic722:

==April 17th, 2009==

'''Ace''': I read your everything2.com message about making the GameBoy Game Genie, care to elaborate further on its creation?

'''Richard Aplin''': Lots of wires!
(All the following relates to cartridge-based consoles from 1985-1996 or so, e.g. Gameboy, Genesis, NES, SNES, GameGear, etc)

We had no way to get any info on the hardware or software of the consoles (and we had a very litigious relatonship w/Nintendo) , so we did it "the hard way" by reverse-engineering them - by literally going to a store, buying a few systems, tearing them apart, and attaching a logic analyser to them.
A logic analyser is basically like a digital oscilloscope (shows you what high-speed signals are doing in real time) but typically has lots of separate channels (32-48). You connect each channel to signals/chip pins that look "interesting" inside your console, run the analyzer, then spend some time figuring out what all the signals are doing and what the hell is going on.

Once you've got the basic signals figured out (typically you want to figure out the pinout of the cartridge connector) - found the address and data bus of the CPU and the basic control lines (Read, Write, etc) then you've got to the point where you can typically build a 'dev board'.
We'd build a PCB (with suitable cartridge edge connector on it) that contained an EPROM, an FPGA, a bunch of SRAM, a high-speed parallel port, and typically for fun a 2-line LCD display and some lights. The eprom contained whatever boot code was required to get the console booted, then it entered a monitor program where you could remotely view/change the console memory using the parallel port on the board.
The parallel port always used the ubiquitous "PDS" style interface (PDS= Programmers Development System, at the time a very widely used - and very fast - PC-based cross-assembling system by Andrew Glaister and others) so everything was fairly standard.

-- Cartridge protection systems
To get a dev board going typically you have to discover and bypass any "rights enforcement" mechanisms on the console - for the NES and SNES this was the famous 'lock chip' (we just used a passthru or modified the console to disable the lock chip), on the Gameboy it was an interesting trademake-based protection (in theory you couldn't write a Gameboy game that DIDN'T display a "Nintendo(TM)" bitmap logo on startup. There was a boot rom in the gameboy that read a block at start of the GB cart and displayed it on the screen as a bitmap. It also checked to ensure that this logo was byte-for-byte the same as a copy stored in teh boot ROM. Basically, they forced you to commit trademark and copyright infringement - you couldn't make a GB cart that actually booted that didn't also contain their bitmap image (copyright data) that was also displayed onscreen before the cart started (trademark infringement). Neat!
However, they made a fairly elementary mistake in the implementation... they read the logo twice - once to display it and again later on to check that it exactly matched the boot rom version. This means you could swap the logo data out (using hardware switching) and at least get your own logo on the boot screen, bypassing the Trademark part... ;-)

Once you have a dev board going, and can download and run code, alter memory etc on your console (usually with nothing but a black screen), then 'all' you have to do is work out what all the custom chip registers do (!), and you can eventually write a complete game.

So Codemasters was interested in both releasing games for these consoles (usually "Unlicensed", e.g. the Codemasters "Camerica" NES Games) - with the Sega Megadrive/Genesis we did the same thing (Codemasters were about to release unlicensed Genesis cartridges on the market, and won a legal battle meaning that at the 11th hour Sega cut a deal with us to avoid the whole thing blowing wide open)

Ok so that's reverse engineering.

When I turned up at Codies (they hired me when I showed them a home-made Genesis dev-board I'd built), they had already done a couple of years of hard work and successfully launched the NES Game Genie (including legal battle) and were making good money.

They had teams of people making codes (a guy called Graham Rigby was the main Codemeister - he lived in a room full of nothing but shelves and racks of NES games - he had every NES game in every territory I think)

They wanted other formats, so I turned up and 'did' the Gameboy (reverse engineered it, built a gameboy dev board. built a prototype game genie, etc), then the Sega GameGear dev board+Game Genie, a Genesis development board ('Rachel'), then the SNES Genie 2 (the first SNES Genie was made by our partners in the US, it was a very dull thing, but they got it out quick).

The Genie2 was really a labor of love with lots of nice features (triggering/switching cheats from the controller was sweet) but alas it was stillborn. (see later)

'''Ace''': In your everything2 posting you said you've got one of only 5 SNES Game Genie II's in existance. Care to take some pictures of it and any other unreleased Game Genie/Codemasters related things you may have?

'''Richard Aplin''': Sure I still have the SNES GG2 prototype..

https://gamehacking.org/images/snes_ggii/IMG_4419.JPG
https://gamehacking.org/images/snes_ggii/IMG_4420.JPG
https://gamehacking.org/images/snes_ggii/IMG_4421.JPG
https://gamehacking.org/images/snes_ggii/IMG_4422.JPG
https://gamehacking.org/images/snes_ggii/IMG_4423.JPG

It had lots of fun features...
32K battery-backed SRAM, 5 buttons and 4 LEDs
It had a lot of clever technical things inside - unlike older Genies which only did "byte replacement" in hardware, the GG2 also could intercept the game's interrupts on the fly and hence injected code into the running game.
This gave us huge flexibility.

a) turn codes on+off dynamically while playing (with the buttons on the GG2 or you could program 'soft keys' on the controllers - the was awesome; you could essentially add cheats to buttons on the controller - eg. press L2 at any time to become flying mario!)
b) find your own codes (really sweet automatic system, you just played the game and pushed one of the buttons when you died or whatever; after doing this a couple of times it usually magically found you a cheat code)
c) RAM and ROM based codes
d) stealth ROM codes ('cloaking' - the ability to make a ROM code only activate if a specific sequence of bus activity preceeded it - It made it possible to have a ROM cheat code that easily evaded almost any cartridge self-checksum routine)
c) slow down/pause games
d) the GG2 would actually pull your game scores out of the console RAM and store them in battery-backed memory for you - when you powered up the GG2 with a cart plugged in it recognized the game and showed you your high-score table, stored cheats, etc. Was lovely...
e) errrmm what else.. it did literally everything we could think of putting in there. ;-)

A really nice SNES user interface for it was written (and I think completed!) by a team at Big Red software (R 'Fred' Williams did the SG2 I think) and the whole thing was probably 80% towards being a shipping product before it got axed. :-(
Not Codemasters' fault, it was more market timing. We were a little too late with it, and Galoob had stacks of the first version in warehouses, so.. them's the breaks.

It was a shame Codies sort of abandoned the Game Genie line after doing a marvellous job of inventing, producing & fighting tooth and nail in the courts to get it out there.
It made them a good bit of money at the time, but after the SG2 was cancelled Codies mostly lost interest in it all.

I think Datel carried on profitably for years and years afterward with variations on the Game Genie. I don't know why Codies didn't act more aggressively against Datel to defend their invention; I know for a fact that we had a good patent infringement case against them (I researched it), but hey, whatever, I was the "mad inventor" not the biz guy.

'''Ace''': What's your opinion on the Game Enhancer/Cheat Device industry of today? Where do you see it going?

'''Richard Aplin''': Don't really follow it, but everything went "software only" years ago. Finding cheats for consoles is a lot easier if you have the ability to make snapshot copies of the console's RAM. In the 90's we could do that easily, nowadays it's virtually impossible unless you want to dump the RAM out via ethernet to a waiting PC. Virtualization/emulation of course changes the rules again. ;-)

'''Ace''': Why did the NES Game Genie have the limitation of writing to the later part of the game basically the ROM and not include the RAM.

'''Richard Aplin''':
a) The NES genie was very simple device, only allowed 3 ROM locations to be substituted. RAM modification generally requires patching an IRQ vector and providing some code to run there.
b) I don't think they thought of it when they designed the first one (before I arrived).
c) K.I.S.S! Launching the Game Genie took years of work and legal hassle, I think they had their hands full.

I added it to the Genie's I did later.

'''Ace''': What type of tools were used in the creation of Game Genie Codes for NES before the advent of emulators?

'''Richard Aplin''': We usually used a custom PCB that had (typically) a parallel port, a passthru connector for the original cart, and basic byte-replacement hardware. Also a few simple tools running (I think) on a Commodore 64.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Rainsphere (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:20:45Z

Demonic722:

==May 6th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': You hacked some of the most impressive codes for PSX, specifically for Final Fantasy VII, and thus influenced a lot of hackers in their ways of thinking. What inspired you to do this?

'''Rainsphere''': I loved FFVII. I had done everything possible in the game yet still felt there was so much more fun to be had with it. So when I got my first GS I was determined to find out what other things I could do with FFVII that were unique and different from what other people were doing.

'''Lazy Bastard''': You were one of the active hackers at the GS School of Hacking. What set that forum apart from other forums of the time?

'''Rainsphere''': People at GS School of Hacking were much more friendly and helpful with code projects. It was great to collaborate with other hackers on particular codes. I found that GS School of Hacking was much more active in making more of the unique codes that I was attempting to create.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Rainsphere''': I have two. The "Walk anywhere" code was great fun. It was a collaboration with a friend on GSCCC named Zackv3. We essentially made the game think you were a Gold Chocobo, thus allowing you to walk over ocean and mountains. Was great fun.
The second would be "Underwater" code. It took out the ocean entirely, allowing you to explore the caverns below. There are quite a few caverns that weren't in the original game storyline (thus inaccessible with the submarine) that you could explore with that code.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Rainsphere''': Play as Sephiroth. It was a huge code, but was uber cool. Big props to the people that put that together.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Rainsphere''': My collaborator, Zackv3.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Rainsphere''': I want to say Unlimited Gil, but I'm not sure...It was quite some time before I found the hacking community so I had actually created a lot of already created codes.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Rainsphere''': I always hated changing models around. It was a pain to find the model you were looking for, and when you found it you typically didn't know the value to change it to what you want.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Rainsphere''': The ones that let you do the seemingly impossible.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''Rainsphere''': The time it consumes as you wrack your brain looking for the right combination to make it do what you want. (But it was still a blast)

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''Rainsphere''': How quickly people are willing to "claim" segments of your code as their own. That always annoyed me.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Rainsphere''': Of course, FFVII, because I loved the game, and it had a million different ways to be hacked.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Rainsphere''': All the time, and I'd have to rehack to get it again.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Rainsphere''': The "Walk Anywhere" FFVII code was pretty intense. It involved turning you into a golden chocobo but having the appearance that you're still Cloud, also it had to have a menu activator (as you couldn't open the menu while on chocobos) and a button combination switch to turn the code on and off.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Rainsphere''': I tried to hack a code to make you a "Beastmaster", essentially allowing you to get the spells/abilities of whatever monster you were fighting. I never finished it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Rainsphere''': I go out with my friends to the movies or for drinks. I do a lot of different coding now. I have recently started writing addons for World of Warcraft, so that's pretty consuming as well.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Rainsphere''': We need better hacking utilities...the GS was a pain due to the lack of PC->GS capabilities.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Rainsphere''': If you can dream it, find it and hack it.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Misfire (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:18:30Z

Demonic722:

==April 23rd, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking codes, you broke most of the XPloder encryption schemes for the Playstation, and the CodeBreaker code and "code save"/"day1" encryption schemes for PS2. What was your inspiration for doing this?

'''misfire''': Poking around the Xploder PSX code encryption was actually my first experience in cryptography. I figured out where the device stored the unencrypted codes in RAM and basically did a (dumb) brute-force attack to break the different schemes. Since then I've been fascinated by crypto stuff and have written many tools by reverse-engineering one thing or another. One of the main reasons why I've cracked virtually any piece of the CodeBreaker PS2 is that I truly believe that hacking needs to be free. No code encryption. No proprietary formats. An end to control.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''misfire''': Hm, that's not easy to answer. I can particularly remember how proud I was when I managed to get the PSX game TOCA WTC PAL running with the Xploder. It required a dedicated Enable Code due to a nasty LibCrypt protection. I wrote an XOR decoder in Turbo Pascal (!) to detect and patch the encrypted subroutines. This was one of my favorite hacks.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''misfire''': I guess Nachbrenner's 3-axis camera modifier for Tony Hawk's Skateboarding (PSX) was one of the most impressive things I've ever seen.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''misfire''': In the early days when PSX hacking became a hobby of mine, I definitely looked up to Nachbrenner and UL1. Back then, our favorite cheat device was the Xploder and with it I gained most of my basic hacking knowledge in the late 90's. I think it was Nachbrenner who influenced me the most in the hacking scene. What a great time we had in the good old days... Also, Code Master was quite helpful when I taught myself the C programming language to write my first "proper" tools. I've always liked his ASM codes and programs like GSCC2k. (Unfortunately, lots of things changed after he became CMX, but that's another story...). Of course, Parasyte was and is an inspiration for me. I think what is most admirable is the fact that he made his source code available to the public. In this aspect, he served as a role model for me.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''misfire''': IIRC, this was "Infinite Time" for a demo version of Puma Street Soccer. I did it using an Xploder Professional with X-Assist and I remember how happy I was when I saw that the clock was actually "frozen". Shortly afterwards I started hacking PSX games using a PC and the X-Link trainer software.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''misfire''': If the game is programmed in an "unconventional" way, almost every code can be a pain in the ass. Similarly, hacking can be difficult if you don't have the right tools to do it (see PS2).

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''misfire''': I've got a passion for simple and elegant solutions. It is often amazing what you can do by only patching a few bytes or even bits. ASM hacks don't have to be complex to be beautiful.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''misfire''': Nowadays, this scene is full of leechers and wannabes who don't care about other people's work. They're the reason why many hackers do not release their work to the public (not to speak of source code) which is a damn shame!

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''misfire''': Back in the days I loved to hack PSX demos. This way, I was able to play/test my favorite games as long as I wanted without any time limit. Sometimes I got to see all the weapons/items weeks before the final game made it to the stores. This was lot of fun.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''misfire''': I cannot remember finding an awesome code in the first place. :)

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''misfire''': Cracking the CodeBreaker V7 code encryption was very challenging and fun at the same time.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''misfire''': Of course. There were a few games I wasn't able to hack any useful codes for. I can't tell if the developers were mean or I was just too impatient/inexperienced at that time.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''misfire''': With friends, (European) handball, basketball, pool, music, reading, Linux and other geek stuff.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''misfire''': We need more open source projects like Artemis. It's the first step in the right direction. Again, hacking needs to be free! (And I should finally get my ass up, stop talking about writing a PS2 remote debugger and actually finish it... ;))

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''misfire''': Never give up. Gain experience. Be polite and respect others.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Luigi (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T20:02:41Z

Demonic722:

==January 21st, 2010==

'''Ace''': What would you say your greatest achievement in the hacking scene was?

'''Luigi''': I believe I was the first (I could not find other examples at the time) on the original Sony psx to prove that conditional if/then codes could be stacked so that a series of conditions had to be met to activate a single code.

'''Ace''': What inspired you to do that?

'''Luigi''': I was trying to help someone create a code where he wanted to make a Kombat Kode for Mortal Kombat Trilogy (you press a series of buttons to activate the code). I had told him that I would try finding the addresses for each of the icons and then stacking them as "d" codes so that it would keep reading if true then do the following for each icon untill it reached the address he wanted to affect. Well CzarDragon said that he did not believe this could work. I was actually a little annoyed at the time so I set out not to prove him wrong but to prove that I could be right. I made a code where a player got infinite life if and only if he was Noob Saibot "AND" it was the second round of Kombat. I tested it for days under every possible condition before posting it. Zardoz and Bonsang (Fabrice Faure who now works at Datel creating codes for the Action replay) commented on this mentioning that I figured it out by myself. Czar and I are cool and he is a well deserved legend in our community.

'''Ace''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Luigi''': My favorite has to be the one that enabled the unplayable fighters in Soul Blade 1.1 for the Sony psx. I was a noob but had this code at CM's site that said "By Codemaster and Luigi". I know it sounds lame but at the time I thought that was really cool.

'''Ace''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Luigi''': There are so many it would be hard to choose but, I would have to say the codes to make Lara fly in tomb raider games. I have mastered moving her around with it. I used it so much as a shortcut in my hacking.

'''Ace''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene?

'''Luigi''': I would have to say Codemaster. His GSCC2000 opened new vistas. Gavin was inspiring and so was Seeing %u201CBonsang%u201D move on to working for Datel.

'''Ace''': Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene?

'''Luigi''': Actually codeboy of good ole' interact.

'''Ace''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Luigi''': Tomb raider 1.1 play as Gold Lara. I played it like crazy. I soon got the Nickname Luigi (because I actually looked like Luigi and was so into the games and codes).

'''Ace''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Luigi''': Those where all the information within a level is static. If it doesn't change then it is very tedious to find.

'''Ace''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Luigi''': Without a doubt my favorite type of code is playing or unlocking non-playable content. Unplayable fighters, cars, levels, items, and options. I believe if it is in the game then you should be able to use it. My favorite type of hack is still visually viewing ram looking for patterns.

'''Ace''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''Luigi''': Sometimes a search will get so monotonous that you forget what it was that you were doing and have to start all over.

'''Ace''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''Luigi''': A lot of people don't like to share what they know (not talking about people under non-disclosure agreements). Call me an idealist but, I would like to see what alot of hackers could do to a game if they worked collectively on them like projects (maybe dedicated sites for a game with forums?).

'''Ace''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Luigi''': The Spyro the dragon games. My wife likes the series (before they took away the exploring and collecting gems). They are not too frustrating to play and not too difficult to hack. Ehrgeiz was fun too (the RPG mode especially)

'''Ace''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Luigi''': Would you believe it was one of the Holy Grails at the time. Tomb raider three play as Nude Lara (and it was only a few lines of code in the same section as the make all enemies disappear code that I made). People said it was not possible at the time and you were not even allowed to request the code at CM's site because "There is no such code. It was an April fools%u2019 joke".

'''Ace''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Luigi''': Tomb raider 1.1 Atlantis level-Move the inaccessible life packs from the lava room into the hallway. This drove me nuts. The switch does not open the door but releases lava. The door is not meant to be opened. It is to trick you. I could change the door to look open but not make it physically capable of being crossed. I had to find the value of a life pack and the area where all the items are kept in ram. Then using the position modifiers for Lara as a guide I offset each life pack address and altered it until the correct ones moved. Then I simply had to adjust x, y, and z axis to put them in the hall. Since then I can now actually alter the playing field itself and go outside the boundaries and through the walls. If I find time (yeah right) I will make an awesome code or pass along my research to some other hackers.

'''Ace''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Luigi''': Oh so many of those. Mortal Kombat trilogy Do stage fatalities at any time without a "finish him". I can't seem to force the stupid timer to zero with this address altered. My invisible Lara in Tomb raider 1.1 I never could get the ponytail to be disappear.

'''Ace''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Luigi''': My family which includes my wife BlackGoddess, making cds including Death Metal compilations , t.v., movies, computer.

'''Ace''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Luigi''': We as hackers have to find our passion that many of us have lost. Hackers need to remember what we forgot. It never really was about cheating. It was about all the cool stuff you could do. The first Gamegenie was not called a cheat device. It was released as a "game enhancer" that could create "special effects". Your old games were fun again. We are too quick to do the basic infinite life/all items hacks and move on. We don't even touch on the really good stuff much anymore.

'''Ace''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Luigi''': Don't be afraid to just try stuff. You can stumble upon some pretty good stuff that way. Even the original Gamegenie said to experiment.

'''Ace''': Do you have anything else you would like to say to the readers?

'''Luigi''': The best story I have was not relevant to the questions. It was the time that I openly challenged Codemaster to a hacking contest. This was back when the official Interact site and Codemasters%u2019 site had people who would troll the boards to start trouble. Being a Noob to all of this I fell for it and got pulled into a heated flame war in a thread at Codemasters%u2019 site. Someone was saying something like Codeboy and his followers were only able to hack lame stuff. I had my Interact official utilities, some pretty cool codes that were works in progress, and being a member of the high I.Q. society Mensa on my side. So I issued a challenge to Codemaster in the thread. Hack codes, you post I post back and forth until someone is declared the winner. Post your best if you are so great. Well, I was laughed at by everyone at Codemasters%u2019 site. Truth was, I knew I couldn't actually win but, I would make it as much of a battle as I could. CM got wind of my challenge and said he would not get into such a competition online (I can only guess now that he had nothing to gain from it. If he won then he beat an unknown hacker who had no medals. If he did lose (yeah, fat chance) then he would lose a lot of thunder. Anyway, whatever the case was it never came to be. Both sites came to have a truce (more or less). Posts bashing each other were forbidden eventually, and CM introduced me to his codecreator2000 which was everything I could have wanted then (I still use it today sometimes). I have major respect for all the hard work CM has put into the hacking scene. And the crowning feather in my cap was when I submitted a few of my codes to Codemasters%u2019 site and he condensed one (Soul Blade greatest hit version: Enable 13 Secret Characters That Cannot Be Unlocked or otherwise accessed). The credit read, Code by Codemaster and Luigi.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

LiquidManZero (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T19:59:05Z

Demonic722:

==April 21st, 2009==

'''Ace''': As a long time administrator of GSHI, why are you wearing no pants? Err, what did you find unique about GSHI when you joined?

'''LiquidManZero''': Who said anything about no pants? I'm wearing some right now.

As I recall I turned up a month or two after Lazy and RPGod had started everything up from the remains of Gamer's Revolt (I think that's the name). At the time I'd been bumming around the GameShark School of Hacking as well as GSCCC for awhile. Lazy was also around both places so I'm not sure which one I heard about GSHI through first. GSHI was interesting because I knew of most of the people involved. After some time I ended up as a moderator on the ezboard. What likely resulted in my ending up as "the guy who does things" was my submitting premade pages of my codes to Lazy for the purposes of greatly speeding up them being added to the site.

'''Ace''': As the lead developer of GSHI, what has motivated you to keep the machine that is GSHI running all of these years?

'''LiquidManZero''': GSHI is a cool place and I had some neat ideas for what to do with it. Part of it ended up being that hardly anybody else was working on the site. Another part was that things happened very slowly. I wanted to make it possible for things to be done faster and easier as well as by any of the staff who felt like bothering.

'''Ace''': What is the toughest administrative decision you've had to make while at GSHI?

'''LiquidManZero''': To not kidnap the president with ninjas. Nothing real really comes to mind.

'''Ace''': What do you think the most annoying thing about the hacking scene is?

'''LiquidManZero''': The people in the scene who try to push everything down a path toward destruction, for whatever selfish or greedy reasons they have.

'''Ace''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''LiquidManZero''': I'd say... The "Barrier Unprotect" code for Metal Gear Solid. Mostly due to the background story of how it happened.

There was a mention of the idea in the original copy of the GS Fairytale... Which had originally been an email conversation between '''Ace''' and Lazy. During November 2005 I realized I had an idea of how to hack the code when randomly reading the story. I turned out to be correct on that and finished the code a couple hours later.

'''Ace''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''LiquidManZero''': I think Zombie343's Sephiroth code. Really cool idea. Amazing it works... and I believe it was managed entirely without assembly hacking.

Unfortunately at some point I think I upset Zombie343 a bit by explaining to somebody on GSCCC how to alter the code to work with other character slots. I don't think he remembers that.

'''Ace''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''LiquidManZero''': It wasn't really any specific person as a major influence. Mostly it was GSSoH as a whole. As far as who I pretty much looked up to early on, it was King Edgar 0. Rumor has it that is related to my rather awful name.

'''Ace''': What was your first code/hack?

'''LiquidManZero''': The first codes I made were "Have All Items" and "Have All Materia" for Final Fantasy VII. Both I did using just a Gameshark v2.3 and poking around for such a code on another game. Comparing some other ones I figured out how the serial repeater worked. Early hacking wise I believe was something boring like infinite health for Brave Fencer Musashi.

'''Ace''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''LiquidManZero''': Some kind of dynamic memory allocation canceller. DMA is an absurdly obnoxious problem with hacking to start with. The problem with making such a code is rarely are any games using the technique set up in such a way things can be nailed down. If it IS possible there's a good chance the developers were batshit crazy, like with Star Ocean 2. I think people still get headaches remembering that whole mess even after CMX made the stabilizer code.

'''Ace''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''LiquidManZero''': Ones that allow access to debugging features in the game. Some of them are quite boring but others are really neat. The coolest looking one I know of is the debug menu in Maken X (Dreamcast). Allows a very huge amount of screwing with the game using the windowed controls. They can all be dragged around with the virtual mouse cursor.

'''Ace''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''LiquidManZero''': The lack of sufficient means to hack everything. Both as far as the major lack of ways to deal with a lot of systems in a practical manner and the wimpy tools that exist in general.

'''Ace''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''LiquidManZero''': Final Fantasy VII. Lots of little things that could be done, and still plenty more stuff that hasn't been hacked yet even now over a decade after the release of the game.

'''Ace''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''LiquidManZero''': More times than I can count.

'''Ace''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''LiquidManZero''': Not sure. I do know the most ridiculous thing I ever did hacking wise, though. Wrote down about 4KB of data on paper to the final boss in Front Mission 3, and then overwrote one of the player characters with that data in the battle. The result was an exact duplicate of the boss, playable in the battle.

'''Ace''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''LiquidManZero''': Not remotely uncommon, mostly thanks to trying to do PS2 hacking. Even when the means of hacking and game are behaving it gets rather tricky. Most of the things I've tried to hack for a recent system either failed entirely or only partially worked at best.

'''Ace''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''LiquidManZero''': Screwing around randomly, listening to music, some programming stuff. A lot of the random screwing around involves watching TV shows/movies/anime and farting around with various artistic-like stuff. Can't say I really get much done, heh.

'''Ace''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''LiquidManZero''': Means of hacking, specifically current systems, very much need to be created and existing ones expanded. New people coming into the scene is another important point. Perhaps someone managing an impressive revolutionary sort of thing would be useful... Even though I don't think it's absolutely required.

Another possibility is the scene really should stop relying so greatly upon dodgy consumer retail cheat devices and things that aren't quite "hacking tools". The way companies making cheat devices have behaved somewhat gives the impression they'd like to rid the world of freelance hackers. If they don't, the console manufacturers certainly do... That's mostly unrelated though.

'''Ace''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''LiquidManZero''': Try hacking anything cool sounding that comes to mind. If you can't do it, try again later after you've learned more. Learning PowerPC and ARM assembly would also be quite useful these days. Perhaps more importantly... It's worth doing hacks you find interesting even if you have no reason to believe anybody else will care about the results.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Kickenchicken57 (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T19:53:50Z

Demonic722:

==April 30th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among other things, you create KodeGarage, a great utilitiy for cheat code manipulation and related things, and hacked the Auto-Kill code for Metroid Prime Hunters. What was your inspiration for doing these things?

'''kickenchicken57''': KodeGarage was created because I had wanted one utility that could perform all of the tasks that I would need to do while creating NDS codes, and I had wanted to share that with the community.
The Auto-Kill cheat was an idea that I had came up with when trying to find a usefull cheat that would make use of the "assembly cheat" possible in the NDS action replay. I would have to thank Parasyte and Kenobi for their input which had helped me create this cheat.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''kickenchicken57''': Probably the Auto-Kill cheat because it was so fun to create.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''kickenchicken57''': I don't have one in particular, but I would say in general infinite ammo codes may be my favorite type.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''kickenchicken57''': I think my biggest influence and person that I had 'looked up to' was Kenobi. I recall that he had given me plenty of advice as I learned to hack.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''kickenchicken57''': I believe my first hack was for San Francisco Rush: Extreme Racing for N64. I had started modifying existing addresses until the colors in the game had chaged dramatically. Not exactly a real hack but it is the first that I can remember.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''kickenchicken57''': Walk though walls. For some reason I never could create one of those.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''kickenchicken57''': My favorite type to use is infinite ammo. I really enjoy making cheats that make use of modifying the games code or injecting your own code into the game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''kickenchicken57''': My least favorite aspect of hacking would probably be when you just can't figure out a way to create a cheat that you are working on.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''kickenchicken57''': I really enjoyed hacking the advance wars games for GBA and NDS because they had a lot of potential for cheats. I enjoyed mapping out the structures of the units to be able to manipulate each and every aspect of them.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''kickenchicken57''': It wasn't awesome, but I had created a code several times for bomberman for the gameboy that would allow you to turn on or off individual pieces of the music, but I never remembered to save that one :(

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''kickenchicken57''': The Auto-Kill cheat for metroid was difficult as I was still new to assembly and had to find someone willing to go through several test runs with me to check for bugs.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''kickenchicken57''': I did try to create a code for Advance Wars that would let you switch your super power in game by making use of a button activator, but I could never figure out how to to create the cheat that let you use super powers other than the one meant for your player.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''kickenchicken57''': Enjoying the outdoors, trying new things, and spending time with my wife, family, and friends.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''kickenchicken57''': I think open source systems such as the x-gamestation at http://www.xgamestation.com/ will be a major help to the hacking scene. Allowing users to tinker with complete working systems such as these is very important to keeping the hacking community alive.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''kickenchicken57''': Never give up and don't be afraid to ask for help. There are people willing to help if you just ask the right questions and put forth the effort. It is well worth the effort when you hack that one code that you've always thought would be cool to have when no one else has hacked it yet.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Kickenchicken57 (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T19:51:50Z

Demonic722:

John LeRoy Hennessy (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T19:49:52Z

Demonic722: /* June 22nd, 2009 */

==June 22nd, 2009==

'''Note''': Answers to these questions were received in audio form; these can be found here - https://GameHacking.org/downloads/John_Hennessy_Q&A_MP3.7z

'''LB''': You pioneered the modern RISC architecture, particularly pivotally when you founded MIPS Computer Systems (now MIPS Technologies) and introduced the MIPS R2000, the first RISC microprocessor. What inspired you to do so?

'''JLH''': Of course, the RISC architecture that MIPS developed had its roots in the Stanford MIPS research project. We were inspired to start the Stanford MIPS research project because we made the observation that instruction set architectures which had been designed and honed for mainframes and mini-computers might need to change due to the shift to microprocessor technology, with its different trade-offs. I also, given the experience I'd had as a consultant working on the first VLSI VAX microprocessor, had reached the opinion that architectures had become overly complicated without a significant increase in performance that paid for that complication, and I think both those things influenced our belief that we should rethink instruction set architecture and a leaner, meaner instruction set architecture should be the direction that we go. Now, after we completed the research project, like good academic researchers, we published our papers, and we expected that industry would see the significantly greater performance, 2, 3, 4 times what other microprocessors were capable of doing, and much faster than the VAX mini-computers of that time, at a fraction of the price. But the technology was largely ignored, and we were convinced, largely by Gordon Bell, who'd been the founder of the Digital Equipment Corporation, that if we were not willing to start a company to develop the architecture and make a commercial version of our research project, that the technology, the RISC approach, would die. Of course, we redesigned the entire microprocessor, and a new architecture, based on the concepts, but re-architected, became the MIPS R2000; like you said, the first RISC microprocessor.

'''LB''': As founder and lead scientist of MIPS Computer Systems/MIPS Technologies, you were responsible for the processors of several of the gaming systems (N64, PSX, PS2, etc) we've all come to love (and hack). We're guessing this isn't the first time you've been hailed as one of the fathers of modern gaming; did you expect the MIPS architecture to play so heavily in the electronic entertainment industry?

'''JLH''': The emergence of the MIPS Technologies/MIPS Computers architecture into the gaming systems happened in an interesting way. As you probably know, initially Nintendo was looking at trying to get a major breakthrough in gaming and they had developed special purpose graphics processors to deal with that, but it became quite clear that in order to get the overall performance they needed, they needed a processor which was much more adept at moving data faster. At that time we had just designed the 64-bit version of the MIPS architecture, and it was the only processor that could possibly develop the capability...the bandwidth really, to deliver the data that was really necessary to draw with these new graphics processors. So that was really the beginning of it, and of course, as you point out, it went on to PSX and PS2. So in some ways it was accidental, although, one of the things that certainly happened and drove it was, the MIPS architecture was one of the cleanest, fastest architectures around, and, in the gaming industry, that speed, that performance capability, turned out to be much more important than compatibility with an old line of x86 architectures. So, I didn't expect the MIPS architecture to do that, but it certainly sky-rocketed the architecture to much broader use, and really established MIPS as the standard in a whole new segment of the industry.

'''LB''': As we're a part of the greater video game community, we have to ask: what is your favorite video game of all time?

'''JLH''': My favorite video game...well, I have to admit that my first video game that I ever saw was Pong, so I grew up on very early things like Pong, Donkey Kong, Pac-Man, so those were my first generation. Super Mario Bros was a big step forward. I think one of the games that I look at as really a breakthrough was Doom. It was a game that not only brought first-person-shooters really to then going from the perspective of the player, but used lots of new interesting graphics techniques, to really make a major breakthrough. So, normally, when I get to play video games, which isn't very often, I'm more of a strategy type of person, but I did admire the real breakthroughs that those early games, and even later, like Doom, really did represent.

'''LB''': Between your current presidency of Stanford University, your professorship of computer science and electrical engineering, chairmanship and board membership of various industry-shaking companies (Google, Cisco, Atheros, etc) and day-to-day living, you're definitely a busy guy. That said, do you still find time to work on new ideas and technologies? If so, assuming you're free to talk about it, what's currently in the works, and, perhaps of even more interest, what's still in the 'drawing board' phase?

'''JLH''': You're absolutely right; I'm very busy, and most of the things I think about these days are solving various problems that exist, either at the university primarily, or the boards of companies I sit on. I don't have as much creative time, I used to say "free thinking time", that occurs when you're taking a shower in the morning, because I have a lot on my mind, but much of what I think about now is, "Where are the opportunities in terms of emerging technologies?", and, because of my responsibilities at the university, that's broadly...well, I think about things like "What are the opportunities in stem cell technology?", "What are the opportunities in bio-engineering?", one of the fields I'm most excited about - bringing high-quality engineering talent to biological applications, particularly with the deployment of nanotechnology and integrated circuit technology that can be applied in the bio sector. New battery technologies, new solutions for clean energy...and of course, of course, in computer science, where I think there are great opportunities. I think we've seen some real breakthroughs recently. Stanley, the car developed by my colleagues in computer science, that won the DARPA Grand Challenge and demonstrated that we could make an autonomous vehicle that could navigate was a real breakthrough, and I think we'll continue to see breakthroughs of that form. Nowadays, the challenge is not so much, "Can we deliver the performance and the memory necessary?", it's creating innovative uses of that technology that really makes something that's a big step forward for users.

'''LB''': Within the realm of technology, is there anything in particular that someone else has accomplished recently, which you find especially impressive?

'''JLH''': One of the things that I think that's most impressive is some work that one of my colleagues in material science, Cui is his name, is doing, that is a new nano-technology-based battery structure, that uses...rather than using lithium with carbon, uses lithium with silicon. It could represent the biggest breakthrough in battery technology in twenty years. Now, of course, it's still in research stage, but if it really happened, it could revolutionize the amount of capacity we have in batteries, making your iPhone and various portable devices last days, weeks, rather than hours, and potentially making electric cars a highly viable technology [here's a website describing the technology: http://news.stanford.edu/news/2008/january9/nanowire-010908.html ] . I think we are also just on the cusp of really liberating machine learning, to do really interesting things. We've seen some important applications in spam detection; in Stanley...in autonomous vehicles. I think we're going to see more of that, with the computer intuiting what people mean when they do a search, when they ask for a summary of information, all those kinds of things, and I think those applications are going to be interesting. We're also in the infancy of wireless technology; as wireless becomes more and more pervasive, we'll see interesting new applications where you can get whatever information any time you need it, any place, right away, and I think that will change the way we think about using the Web and lots of online information.

'''LB''': What do you like to do with your free time?

'''JLH''': Well, I don't have that much these days. I do do a lot of reading; I'm usually working on two books at once - one fiction, one non-fiction, and I read the non-fiction book usually in the conventional form, right now I'm working on a Biography of Darwin, in preparation for a trip to the Galapagos, and fiction...I read whatever I can get on my kindle, because I read it when I'm exercising, so it happens to be some crime/mystery/historical fiction novel about Louis XVI's son. So, that's what I do for most of my time. I also started playing golf a few years ago, and I found it's a great game for getting me outside, and enjoying some natural outside, and forcing me to concentrate on something other than my full plate at the university.

'''LB''': Who did you look up to the most as you gained interest in, learned, mastered, and improved upon the world of digital technology? Who directly influenced you more than anyone else? [doesn't have to be the same person for both]

'''JLH''': Well, certainly, during my time, I've had different mentors that interested me in different ways. My early interests came from my father, who was an engineer, who got me interested in digital technology, and then a good friend, with whom I built a high school science project, a tic-tac-toe machine...built, believe it or not, out of spare, surplus relays that we could get. Of course, many people recognize, tic-tac-toe is a game that you can never lose if you go first. But, boy, it sure it impressed a lot of my high school classmates to have a machine that could do tic-tac-toe. Later, in college, I had a young faculty member who stirred my interest in computer science. At that time, there were no computer science majors, so I majored in electrical engineering, but he gave me the opportunity to work in computer science, and to work in his research laboratory, which was a really wonderful opportunity. That continued through graduate school, where I was lucky to get a research project early on, and it brought together current-time systems with the early microprocessor technology of today. And then, when I came to Stanford, I worked with a number of faculty, including Forest Baskett, who really ran much of the research program that MIPS was done under, and before that, the Geometry Engine, which became Silicon Graphics, and inspired me to work in the area of experimental computer science, and how important it was, which is really, of course, where I made my career.

'''LB''': What has been the most exciting moment in your career to-date?

'''JLH''': Well, that's hard to say. I think, getting back the first MIPS research processor at Stanford and seeing it work was a wonderful moment. Seeing that first R2000 processor ship, and the first boards, which were built then for Prime Computer, and the first actual complete system which we built. Those were truly extraordinary moments, and each one of the major projects I've worked on has had a wonderful moment in which we demonstrated that some concept we had really worked, and worked in practice, at least in prototype style, and those were always terrific moments.

'''LB''': What do you think will be our greatest technological challenge in near future computing, and what must be done in order for us to properly weather this storm?

'''JLH''': I'm gonna say there are two challenges. One is in the applications domain, and it comes down to compelling, what are sometimes called 'killer apps', that are easy to use for people, that really do serve a key function. I think with the invention of the iPhone, and various other things, we're seeing more and more of these, because we've opened up a whole new level of creativity. In fact, there's an interesting parallel between things like...well, what the PC earlier, the iPhone, and various game processors have done: they've liberated lots more people to contribute. And that's in exact parallel to what happened with the VLSI revolution in the 1980's, where the availability of integrated circuit technology to a broader design community - not just to the people that manufactured the integrated circuits: the Intels, and Zilogs, and AMDs, and Nationals of the world - but to a broader community, liberated a whole bunch of new designs. Out of that came, of course, both Silicon Graphics, and MIPS, among others. I think there is a big thing around applications, creative new applications that people really find compelling, and make their lives better, and really make important contributions. We also have some important technical challenges. The most important technical challenge is figuring out how to use parallelism/multi-core effectively; really effectively. We don't know how to do it yet, we don't know how to write software so that programs easily port between configurations of processors, and between, let's say...a two-processor core and a four-processor core. We have a lot of work to do, we're way behind on software, and that's going to be a major challenge to develop that software and framework for writing that code.

'''LB''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers and innovators, what would it be?

'''JLH''': Well, I think the thing that has made computing so exciting for me is that it's a discipline that's constantly changing. It's constantly providing new opportunities. The fact that hardware marches on, creates new capabilities, new opportunities, means that there are constantly new things to do. It's the next game, it's the next application, it's the next capability that you liberate that makes it so exciting. And, I think one of the interesting things about computing is, exciting as that core technology is, and driving the hardware faster, and figuring out how to get more done...it is the applications that people build, whether it's a video game, whether it's a great new capability on my iPhone, whether it's new capabilities on my desktop machine. That, I think, is what's going to keep this discipline exciting, and I think there will be lots of new opportunities to go to the next step, to create an even more realistic environment, and to really show people what this technology can do.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

John LeRoy Hennessy (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T19:49:29Z

Demonic722:

==June 22nd, 2009==

Note: Answers to these questions were received in audio form; these can be found here - https://GameHacking.org/downloads/John_Hennessy_Q&A_MP3.7z

'''LB''': You pioneered the modern RISC architecture, particularly pivotally when you founded MIPS Computer Systems (now MIPS Technologies) and introduced the MIPS R2000, the first RISC microprocessor. What inspired you to do so?

'''JLH''': Of course, the RISC architecture that MIPS developed had its roots in the Stanford MIPS research project. We were inspired to start the Stanford MIPS research project because we made the observation that instruction set architectures which had been designed and honed for mainframes and mini-computers might need to change due to the shift to microprocessor technology, with its different trade-offs. I also, given the experience I'd had as a consultant working on the first VLSI VAX microprocessor, had reached the opinion that architectures had become overly complicated without a significant increase in performance that paid for that complication, and I think both those things influenced our belief that we should rethink instruction set architecture and a leaner, meaner instruction set architecture should be the direction that we go. Now, after we completed the research project, like good academic researchers, we published our papers, and we expected that industry would see the significantly greater performance, 2, 3, 4 times what other microprocessors were capable of doing, and much faster than the VAX mini-computers of that time, at a fraction of the price. But the technology was largely ignored, and we were convinced, largely by Gordon Bell, who'd been the founder of the Digital Equipment Corporation, that if we were not willing to start a company to develop the architecture and make a commercial version of our research project, that the technology, the RISC approach, would die. Of course, we redesigned the entire microprocessor, and a new architecture, based on the concepts, but re-architected, became the MIPS R2000; like you said, the first RISC microprocessor.

'''LB''': As founder and lead scientist of MIPS Computer Systems/MIPS Technologies, you were responsible for the processors of several of the gaming systems (N64, PSX, PS2, etc) we've all come to love (and hack). We're guessing this isn't the first time you've been hailed as one of the fathers of modern gaming; did you expect the MIPS architecture to play so heavily in the electronic entertainment industry?

'''JLH''': The emergence of the MIPS Technologies/MIPS Computers architecture into the gaming systems happened in an interesting way. As you probably know, initially Nintendo was looking at trying to get a major breakthrough in gaming and they had developed special purpose graphics processors to deal with that, but it became quite clear that in order to get the overall performance they needed, they needed a processor which was much more adept at moving data faster. At that time we had just designed the 64-bit version of the MIPS architecture, and it was the only processor that could possibly develop the capability...the bandwidth really, to deliver the data that was really necessary to draw with these new graphics processors. So that was really the beginning of it, and of course, as you point out, it went on to PSX and PS2. So in some ways it was accidental, although, one of the things that certainly happened and drove it was, the MIPS architecture was one of the cleanest, fastest architectures around, and, in the gaming industry, that speed, that performance capability, turned out to be much more important than compatibility with an old line of x86 architectures. So, I didn't expect the MIPS architecture to do that, but it certainly sky-rocketed the architecture to much broader use, and really established MIPS as the standard in a whole new segment of the industry.

'''LB''': As we're a part of the greater video game community, we have to ask: what is your favorite video game of all time?

'''JLH''': My favorite video game...well, I have to admit that my first video game that I ever saw was Pong, so I grew up on very early things like Pong, Donkey Kong, Pac-Man, so those were my first generation. Super Mario Bros was a big step forward. I think one of the games that I look at as really a breakthrough was Doom. It was a game that not only brought first-person-shooters really to then going from the perspective of the player, but used lots of new interesting graphics techniques, to really make a major breakthrough. So, normally, when I get to play video games, which isn't very often, I'm more of a strategy type of person, but I did admire the real breakthroughs that those early games, and even later, like Doom, really did represent.

'''LB''': Between your current presidency of Stanford University, your professorship of computer science and electrical engineering, chairmanship and board membership of various industry-shaking companies (Google, Cisco, Atheros, etc) and day-to-day living, you're definitely a busy guy. That said, do you still find time to work on new ideas and technologies? If so, assuming you're free to talk about it, what's currently in the works, and, perhaps of even more interest, what's still in the 'drawing board' phase?

'''JLH''': You're absolutely right; I'm very busy, and most of the things I think about these days are solving various problems that exist, either at the university primarily, or the boards of companies I sit on. I don't have as much creative time, I used to say "free thinking time", that occurs when you're taking a shower in the morning, because I have a lot on my mind, but much of what I think about now is, "Where are the opportunities in terms of emerging technologies?", and, because of my responsibilities at the university, that's broadly...well, I think about things like "What are the opportunities in stem cell technology?", "What are the opportunities in bio-engineering?", one of the fields I'm most excited about - bringing high-quality engineering talent to biological applications, particularly with the deployment of nanotechnology and integrated circuit technology that can be applied in the bio sector. New battery technologies, new solutions for clean energy...and of course, of course, in computer science, where I think there are great opportunities. I think we've seen some real breakthroughs recently. Stanley, the car developed by my colleagues in computer science, that won the DARPA Grand Challenge and demonstrated that we could make an autonomous vehicle that could navigate was a real breakthrough, and I think we'll continue to see breakthroughs of that form. Nowadays, the challenge is not so much, "Can we deliver the performance and the memory necessary?", it's creating innovative uses of that technology that really makes something that's a big step forward for users.

'''LB''': Within the realm of technology, is there anything in particular that someone else has accomplished recently, which you find especially impressive?

'''JLH''': One of the things that I think that's most impressive is some work that one of my colleagues in material science, Cui is his name, is doing, that is a new nano-technology-based battery structure, that uses...rather than using lithium with carbon, uses lithium with silicon. It could represent the biggest breakthrough in battery technology in twenty years. Now, of course, it's still in research stage, but if it really happened, it could revolutionize the amount of capacity we have in batteries, making your iPhone and various portable devices last days, weeks, rather than hours, and potentially making electric cars a highly viable technology [here's a website describing the technology: http://news.stanford.edu/news/2008/january9/nanowire-010908.html ] . I think we are also just on the cusp of really liberating machine learning, to do really interesting things. We've seen some important applications in spam detection; in Stanley...in autonomous vehicles. I think we're going to see more of that, with the computer intuiting what people mean when they do a search, when they ask for a summary of information, all those kinds of things, and I think those applications are going to be interesting. We're also in the infancy of wireless technology; as wireless becomes more and more pervasive, we'll see interesting new applications where you can get whatever information any time you need it, any place, right away, and I think that will change the way we think about using the Web and lots of online information.

'''LB''': What do you like to do with your free time?

'''JLH''': Well, I don't have that much these days. I do do a lot of reading; I'm usually working on two books at once - one fiction, one non-fiction, and I read the non-fiction book usually in the conventional form, right now I'm working on a Biography of Darwin, in preparation for a trip to the Galapagos, and fiction...I read whatever I can get on my kindle, because I read it when I'm exercising, so it happens to be some crime/mystery/historical fiction novel about Louis XVI's son. So, that's what I do for most of my time. I also started playing golf a few years ago, and I found it's a great game for getting me outside, and enjoying some natural outside, and forcing me to concentrate on something other than my full plate at the university.

'''LB''': Who did you look up to the most as you gained interest in, learned, mastered, and improved upon the world of digital technology? Who directly influenced you more than anyone else? [doesn't have to be the same person for both]

'''JLH''': Well, certainly, during my time, I've had different mentors that interested me in different ways. My early interests came from my father, who was an engineer, who got me interested in digital technology, and then a good friend, with whom I built a high school science project, a tic-tac-toe machine...built, believe it or not, out of spare, surplus relays that we could get. Of course, many people recognize, tic-tac-toe is a game that you can never lose if you go first. But, boy, it sure it impressed a lot of my high school classmates to have a machine that could do tic-tac-toe. Later, in college, I had a young faculty member who stirred my interest in computer science. At that time, there were no computer science majors, so I majored in electrical engineering, but he gave me the opportunity to work in computer science, and to work in his research laboratory, which was a really wonderful opportunity. That continued through graduate school, where I was lucky to get a research project early on, and it brought together current-time systems with the early microprocessor technology of today. And then, when I came to Stanford, I worked with a number of faculty, including Forest Baskett, who really ran much of the research program that MIPS was done under, and before that, the Geometry Engine, which became Silicon Graphics, and inspired me to work in the area of experimental computer science, and how important it was, which is really, of course, where I made my career.

'''LB''': What has been the most exciting moment in your career to-date?

'''JLH''': Well, that's hard to say. I think, getting back the first MIPS research processor at Stanford and seeing it work was a wonderful moment. Seeing that first R2000 processor ship, and the first boards, which were built then for Prime Computer, and the first actual complete system which we built. Those were truly extraordinary moments, and each one of the major projects I've worked on has had a wonderful moment in which we demonstrated that some concept we had really worked, and worked in practice, at least in prototype style, and those were always terrific moments.

'''LB''': What do you think will be our greatest technological challenge in near future computing, and what must be done in order for us to properly weather this storm?

'''JLH''': I'm gonna say there are two challenges. One is in the applications domain, and it comes down to compelling, what are sometimes called 'killer apps', that are easy to use for people, that really do serve a key function. I think with the invention of the iPhone, and various other things, we're seeing more and more of these, because we've opened up a whole new level of creativity. In fact, there's an interesting parallel between things like...well, what the PC earlier, the iPhone, and various game processors have done: they've liberated lots more people to contribute. And that's in exact parallel to what happened with the VLSI revolution in the 1980's, where the availability of integrated circuit technology to a broader design community - not just to the people that manufactured the integrated circuits: the Intels, and Zilogs, and AMDs, and Nationals of the world - but to a broader community, liberated a whole bunch of new designs. Out of that came, of course, both Silicon Graphics, and MIPS, among others. I think there is a big thing around applications, creative new applications that people really find compelling, and make their lives better, and really make important contributions. We also have some important technical challenges. The most important technical challenge is figuring out how to use parallelism/multi-core effectively; really effectively. We don't know how to do it yet, we don't know how to write software so that programs easily port between configurations of processors, and between, let's say...a two-processor core and a four-processor core. We have a lot of work to do, we're way behind on software, and that's going to be a major challenge to develop that software and framework for writing that code.

'''LB''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers and innovators, what would it be?

'''JLH''': Well, I think the thing that has made computing so exciting for me is that it's a discipline that's constantly changing. It's constantly providing new opportunities. The fact that hardware marches on, creates new capabilities, new opportunities, means that there are constantly new things to do. It's the next game, it's the next application, it's the next capability that you liberate that makes it so exciting. And, I think one of the interesting things about computing is, exciting as that core technology is, and driving the hardware faster, and figuring out how to get more done...it is the applications that people build, whether it's a video game, whether it's a great new capability on my iPhone, whether it's new capabilities on my desktop machine. That, I think, is what's going to keep this discipline exciting, and I think there will be lots of new opportunities to go to the next step, to create an even more realistic environment, and to really show people what this technology can do.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

James0x57 (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T19:46:36Z

Demonic722:

==May 23rd, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among many other things, you hacked the Super Spinner for Twilight Princess (GCN and Wii- all regions), and hacked a code for TimeSplitters 2 that let players individually walk around in the air and out of bounds, both of which received a lot of attention. What was your inspiration for these?

'''James0x57''': When I play through a game, I'm constantly thinking of what I'd change or how I could add something new to it - even on the systems I don't/can't hack. So playing through Twilight Princess on the GCN, I thought, of all the items, the Spinner had the most potential for modification... Speed up, last forever, jump higher, etc etc. So once I beat the game I went to town searching for those values. The air walk code for TimeSplitters 2 came up the same way- I was in the Siberia level in Multi Player and just had to know how much of the level was there. Hence, walk in air. Bit of programming got it to work for all 4 players individually. My brother and I spent hours ducking out of bounds, flying into the air, destroying each other. Fun fun!

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''James0x57''': Probably the Air Walk one for TS2.. or the All Guns code for it. That was fun too.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''James0x57''': That's a tough one to answer.. I think the code I had the most fun with was probably the walk through doors code for GoldenEye 007. There have been many impressive and inspirational codes since then, of course.. but that one gave me hours and hours of replay value.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''James0x57''': JaytheHam was a huge influence for me. Him and I exchanged info and hacked together quite a bit, he even helped me get started with ASM hacking. He lives in NZ, I'm in the US - gotta love the internet.
And for father-figure type guy; Parasyte. I'm sure a lot of hackers would answer that way. He's just done so much for the scene and who knows how long before, or even if, GCN hacking would have started without him. Cheers mate.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''James0x57''': Infinite Jumps for the original Smash Bros. for Link on Hyrule Castle. I then did most of the rest only to find out that they ALL just got posted on GSCentral.com.
I was going to enter the scene with those codes but it was years later when I came back as GCN Hacker87 posting an item code for Wind Waker.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''James0x57''': Haha, I might be the only one to say this but: Debug codes. I just haven't had any luck at all with them! Maybe someday though. haha

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''James0x57''': Anything that adds or drastically increases an ability the game character might have. Color mods are fun too. :P

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''James0x57''': Freezing the game sucks. Gotta reset and start all over.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''James0x57''': Seeing discredited codes irks me; the hacker deserves recognition for his/her work.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''James0x57''': TimeSplitters 2 was great because I found a lot of things that didn't make it into the final game like weapons and an entire map maker skin! It's kind of exciting to find those kind of things.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''James0x57''': Fortunately, no, that never happened to me. I did lose a few simple codes at the beginning of GCN hacking though.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''James0x57''': I had to port the Super Spinner from NTSC-US to PAL without a memory dump or access to a hacker from that region. And that code is scattered all over the RAM. What I wound up doing was using information from existing Twilight Princess PAL codes (a specific infinite rupies code and an ASM hack that used unused memory) along with a willing tester from that region. I wrote this 30 line ASM hack that would change the value of the rupies to a specific 8 bits of the PAL region's memory from about 12 different places. And it all depended on what buttons the tester was holding when they walked through a door.. I typed up specific sequences and instructions and after a game crash and a fix, I received all the results from the tester and managed to use the information to calculate the offset between the regions for each piece of the Super Spinner code. I was thrilled when it worked. hahah

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''James0x57''': I was working on a drive-in-air code for RoadKill that never came to be. Got really far but just couldn't get it to work correctly. Also, the walk on water code for Wind Waker has an issue with waves that I never managed to work out.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''James0x57''': I like working out - running, sit-ups, push-ups, that kinda thing.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''James0x57''': I'd have to say community unity. It's pretty scattered right now.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''James0x57''': Share your knowledge, have no secrets with hacking.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

HyperHacker (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T19:42:31Z

Demonic722: /* April 21st, 2009 */

==April 22nd, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking quite a few well-known codes, you hacked the first (and currently only, I believe) custom track for Mario Kart 64. What inspired you to do so?

'''HyperHacker''': Well, there were a few sources actually. Basically one day I thought "hey, nobody's looked at Mario Kart's levels yet, I should do that", and I made some simple hacks, adding floating messages in the air, then kinda got bored of it and moved on to other projects for a while...until I fell in love with this Japanese girl, and wanted to come up with something to impress her. I'd been thinking about making a track, but I had no decent ideas and wasn't too interested in doing all that work. But I was listening to some tunes and that song came on and I thought holy crap perfect. And from there had the idea to design a track around that theme.

'''Viper187''': You originally went by Pika9876. Why the obsession with Pokemon? ;)

'''HyperHacker''': I was like 12? :-p I still find them some of the greatest games of all, though only the first two generations :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''HyperHacker''': well the Mario Kart track is my favourite ROM hack. As for codes I think the Infinite Longshot/Hook Onto Anything for Zelda OoT. That's a lot of fun.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''HyperHacker''': I suppose all the work done to Super Mario World by the community surrounding that. They've really hacked the crap out of that game; it's pretty amazing.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''HyperHacker''': I guess Parasyte, he was always a "hacker god" and it was a long time before I could do a lot of the things he could.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''HyperHacker''': Well, the first thing I did was remaking the infinite health code for Mario 64 just to learn how the process worked. My first "hack" if you can really call it that was to redraw Mario as a girl in Nesticle's graphic editor. I know the first ASM hack I ever did was Infinite HP for G/S, didnt work very well though :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''HyperHacker''': A lot of times it depends on the game engine...they tend to make one thing easy and another difficult. Overall, probably hit detection, that's very complex math so it becomes a real pain to hack.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''HyperHacker''': Codes that unlock debug modes and other cool things left over in the game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''HyperHacker''': Often there's a lack of decent software to do the job. Good debuggers are difficult to find, especially on Linux.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you dislike most about the hacking scene?

'''HyperHacker''': People can't get along, always going crazy because someone "didn't credit them" for their one-line code that any idiot could make in 5 minutes, splitting off into their own little communities, etc, and kids these days who equate hacking with ISO loaders and just want want want without any appreciation for what it takes to actually make a hack on modern systems, and what you can do with it besides just piracy.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''HyperHacker''': Probably Mario Kart 64, because you can really do some crazy stuff with it, the code isn't overly complex or fussy, and the results are usually quite entertaining. Pokï¿½mon G/S were also fun.

'''Viper187''': Was there a game that was just the most evil piece of programming you ever had the cursed luck to hack codes for?

'''HyperHacker''': I think Zelda OoT wins that one, actually... the code is rather a mess. It loads item routines and such on the fly, and tends to be quite sensitive, crashing easily, so it can be a huge pain to actually find the routine you want, and then the game crashes, you load up again, and it's moved. I've been somewhat fortunate in avoiding games that are deliberately evil with their code, but Nintendo is pretty good at being sloppy and weird :-p

'''Viper187''': Do you have any specific hacking techniques or peculiarities?

'''HyperHacker''': I've basically just learned to notice a lot of patterns... there are a surprising number of little things in game code you can rely on being consistent even though they have no need to be, primarily because they're using well-known design patterns and structures. One place where knowing how to code can help, just learning those same patterns. Sometimes, you find a technique that has no real logic to it, but works anyway :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''HyperHacker''': yes, I put together various trippy effect codes in Mario 64 to make the game a total drug trip...I called it Mario's on Shroomz and it was maybe 15 lines. It did all sorts of crazy things. The sound was all weird effects, the graphics flowed and moved and flashed, cannon sights and shadows looked like they'd melted, etc. I had it stored on my Gameshark when it completely died, wouldn't even boot up...I'm sure I posted it online somewhere too but I've never found a copy since then.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''HyperHacker''': well right now I'm working on making bigger levels in Super Mario World, by adding more RAM to the cartridge and moving the level data there. Adding RAM is just one byte change in the header but there are tons of pointers and routines that need to be changed to make it work with the level data moved and it's proving very difficult to find them all.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''HyperHacker''': I never did figure out the maximum speed for the planes in Diddy Kong Racing. They work a lot different from the other vehicles so all I managed to do was slow it down or completely break the physics.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''HyperHacker''': I waste a lot of time on Youtube and funny websites, sleeping too much, or just walking around town for no particular reason. Recently I've been trying to draw things in Inkscape, since I found I can actually do fairly well with vectors. I can't draw a damn thing any other way :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''HyperHacker''': I think hacking future consoles could get very interesting with online services. We've already seen commercial cheat devices just about eliminated with updateable firmware, and hacking X360 is just about impossible if you want to play online because of its design. So I think the most important thing to keep hacking newer consoles will be keeping one step ahead of the manufacturers who try to prevent hacks from working, finding exploits and writing apps to enable hacking. Of course hacking the classic consoles will never die... at least until every old game has been hacked to death :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''HyperHacker''': Don't ask "is it possible" or "can it be hacked". Because unless you're asking for something beyond the limits of the hardware, the answer is always yes. It's all just code, that can be changed. Infeasible, maybe, impossible, not at all. I'm always making and seeing hacks that people thought were impossible, and often they turn out not that difficult. Also...cool hacks can impress chicks ;-)

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

HyperHacker (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T19:39:19Z

Demonic722:

==April 21st, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking quite a few well-known codes, you hacked the first (and currently only, I believe) custom track for Mario Kart 64. What inspired you to do so?

'''HyperHacker''': Well, there were a few sources actually. Basically one day I thought "hey, nobody's looked at Mario Kart's levels yet, I should do that", and I made some simple hacks, adding floating messages in the air, then kinda got bored of it and moved on to other projects for a while...until I fell in love with this Japanese girl, and wanted to come up with something to impress her. I'd been thinking about making a track, but I had no decent ideas and wasn't too interested in doing all that work. But I was listening to some tunes and that song came on and I thought holy crap perfect. And from there had the idea to design a track around that theme.

'''Viper187''': You originally went by Pika9876. Why the obsession with Pokemon? ;)

'''HyperHacker''': I was like 12? :-p I still find them some of the greatest games of all, though only the first two generations :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''HyperHacker''': well the Mario Kart track is my favourite ROM hack. As for codes I think the Infinite Longshot/Hook Onto Anything for Zelda OoT. That's a lot of fun.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''HyperHacker''': I suppose all the work done to Super Mario World by the community surrounding that. They've really hacked the crap out of that game; it's pretty amazing.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''HyperHacker''': I guess Parasyte, he was always a "hacker god" and it was a long time before I could do a lot of the things he could.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''HyperHacker''': Well, the first thing I did was remaking the infinite health code for Mario 64 just to learn how the process worked. My first "hack" if you can really call it that was to redraw Mario as a girl in Nesticle's graphic editor. I know the first ASM hack I ever did was Infinite HP for G/S, didnt work very well though :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''HyperHacker''': A lot of times it depends on the game engine...they tend to make one thing easy and another difficult. Overall, probably hit detection, that's very complex math so it becomes a real pain to hack.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''HyperHacker''': Codes that unlock debug modes and other cool things left over in the game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''HyperHacker''': Often there's a lack of decent software to do the job. Good debuggers are difficult to find, especially on Linux.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you dislike most about the hacking scene?

'''HyperHacker''': People can't get along, always going crazy because someone "didn't credit them" for their one-line code that any idiot could make in 5 minutes, splitting off into their own little communities, etc, and kids these days who equate hacking with ISO loaders and just want want want without any appreciation for what it takes to actually make a hack on modern systems, and what you can do with it besides just piracy.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''HyperHacker''': Probably Mario Kart 64, because you can really do some crazy stuff with it, the code isn't overly complex or fussy, and the results are usually quite entertaining. Pokï¿½mon G/S were also fun.

'''Viper187''': Was there a game that was just the most evil piece of programming you ever had the cursed luck to hack codes for?

'''HyperHacker''': I think Zelda OoT wins that one, actually... the code is rather a mess. It loads item routines and such on the fly, and tends to be quite sensitive, crashing easily, so it can be a huge pain to actually find the routine you want, and then the game crashes, you load up again, and it's moved. I've been somewhat fortunate in avoiding games that are deliberately evil with their code, but Nintendo is pretty good at being sloppy and weird :-p

'''Viper187''': Do you have any specific hacking techniques or peculiarities?

'''HyperHacker''': I've basically just learned to notice a lot of patterns... there are a surprising number of little things in game code you can rely on being consistent even though they have no need to be, primarily because they're using well-known design patterns and structures. One place where knowing how to code can help, just learning those same patterns. Sometimes, you find a technique that has no real logic to it, but works anyway :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''HyperHacker''': yes, I put together various trippy effect codes in Mario 64 to make the game a total drug trip...I called it Mario's on Shroomz and it was maybe 15 lines. It did all sorts of crazy things. The sound was all weird effects, the graphics flowed and moved and flashed, cannon sights and shadows looked like they'd melted, etc. I had it stored on my Gameshark when it completely died, wouldn't even boot up...I'm sure I posted it online somewhere too but I've never found a copy since then.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''HyperHacker''': well right now I'm working on making bigger levels in Super Mario World, by adding more RAM to the cartridge and moving the level data there. Adding RAM is just one byte change in the header but there are tons of pointers and routines that need to be changed to make it work with the level data moved and it's proving very difficult to find them all.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''HyperHacker''': I never did figure out the maximum speed for the planes in Diddy Kong Racing. They work a lot different from the other vehicles so all I managed to do was slow it down or completely break the physics.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''HyperHacker''': I waste a lot of time on Youtube and funny websites, sleeping too much, or just walking around town for no particular reason. Recently I've been trying to draw things in Inkscape, since I found I can actually do fairly well with vectors. I can't draw a damn thing any other way :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''HyperHacker''': I think hacking future consoles could get very interesting with online services. We've already seen commercial cheat devices just about eliminated with updateable firmware, and hacking X360 is just about impossible if you want to play online because of its design. So I think the most important thing to keep hacking newer consoles will be keeping one step ahead of the manufacturers who try to prevent hacks from working, finding exploits and writing apps to enable hacking. Of course hacking the classic consoles will never die... at least until every old game has been hacked to death :-p

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''HyperHacker''': Don't ask "is it possible" or "can it be hacked". Because unless you're asking for something beyond the limits of the hardware, the answer is always yes. It's all just code, that can be changed. Infeasible, maybe, impossible, not at all. I'm always making and seeing hacks that people thought were impossible, and often they turn out not that difficult. Also...cool hacks can impress chicks ;-)

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Hybrid (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-29T19:35:15Z

Demonic722:

==April 22nd, 2009==

'''Ace''': As an updater for GSHI, what would you say makes GSHI unique?

'''Hybrid''': The new and old hackers working together with respect and understanding. The codes that come into here are for varied systems and quite unique.

'''Ace''': You hacked a code to enable Servebot #41 in The Misadventures of Tron Bonne. What was your inspiration for making that code?

'''Hybrid''': It was actually requested in my orginal "taking requests for the following ps1 games thread at cmgscc.com"

'''Ace''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Hybrid''': Depending on which system for NES- Joy Mech Fight- Access All Other Robots Ps1- Namco mesuem Vol 1. Full Movement for Galaga and Urban Chaos Enable Elcasso Isle

'''Ace''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Hybrid''': Thats a tough question, but i would have to say it would have to be the Zombie343's sepheroth code just one of the "Impossibilities" that a creative mind made possible. Also for NES the Kupa Mutiny Code

'''Ace''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Hybrid''': There are many people who i look up to now. but probly the most would be LiquidManZero ,Viper and VisitntX they have always been nice enough to help me out when i had asked them question and when i still do. i really didn't look up to people when i first entered the scene. i was more intimidated by them some of those people i now look up to.

'''Ace''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Hybrid''': one of my first hacks was probly getting and infinite Energy Code for Tiger shark for ps1. only to find out that it was already hacked my first unique codes is probly for the codes for Marvel Vs Capcom under my old email jlk5@prodigy.net

'''Ace''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Hybrid''': i'd probly have to say WTW codes still have yet to do one

'''Ace''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Hybrid''': character modifiers, menu modifiers anything which may allow me to access something that is not supposed to be touched

'''Ace''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''Hybrid''': repeating the same part over and over again to get the desired results. also not being able to get a code to work. and listing out values for modifier codes

'''Ace''': What do you think the most annoying thing about the hacking scene is?

'''Hybrid''': code thievery if you don't want your codes somewhere they shouldn't be there

'''Ace''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Hybrid''': Frogger 2 Swampy's Revenge, i've always loved Frogger as a kid on the C64 and then being able to unlock everything, change characters.

'''Ace''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Hybrid''': yeah all it takes is just one press of a button power instead of reset.

'''Ace''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Hybrid''': the Namco Mesuem Vol 1 Full Movement code for Galaga the screen is split into two planes the top of one starts where the bottom of the other is so you would reach the top of one plane and go to the top of the other and the top and bottom of the visible screen is not even with either plane. using the character modifier to make the ship face the direction and using jokers to move him along the screen it ended up being 124 lines long

'''Ace''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Hybrid''': yeah Duke Nukem Time to Kill. Co-op mode i still can't figure out how to get the enemies to spawn

'''Ace''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Hybrid''': i like to fish accasionally, watch movies alittle graphic designing (even though its gameing related)

'''Ace''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Hybrid''': better tools to hack games. better emulators for systems new and old

'''Ace''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Hybrid''': keep thinking, keep trying. keep your mind open to all possibilities

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Hextator / Zeld (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:39:40Z

Demonic722:

==April 22nd, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking quite a few great codes, you hacked the 'Aim Bot' code for Metroid Prime Hunters. What inspired you to do so?

'''Zeld''': I was inspired because it was the definitive NDS FPS, and I wanted to show off my skill with ARM assembly, put my name out there (which it did...not as much as I would have liked, but it did). Probably also my favorite RAM hack too. It's not perfect, but it's aesthetically pleasing in several ways, from the source to the effect.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Zeld''': That would be my Aim Bot code for Metroid Prime Hunters.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Zeld''': My favorite code is probably frauber/messiaen's Fire Mario hack for SM64 that enables Mario to throw exploding fireballs that can erase objects that they detonate. My favorite hack however is probably my custom battle animation hack for Fire Emblem 7 starring an original character of mine, but that's a ROM hack.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Zeld''': The person who influenced me most is probably Parasyte. That bastard seems to be good at everything, and I considered myself a good candidate to try and match that. I thought "if one Para is awesome, maybe more will be better". As for the person that got me into hacking, well that would be a Fire Emblem hacker named Pukachi/SpyroDi, who specialized in ROM hacking, which is where my roots are.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Zeld''': I can't even remember. I want to guess that it was a code for Fire Emblem 7, though it may have been for Zelda: The Minish Cap or even Megaman Zero 3. The first hack I ever did that required assembly knowledge was for The Minish Cap. Within 2 months of starting to hack things (ROMs, at first), I learned a bit of Thumb assembly from a tutorial in debugging by Labmaster and used the information to locate the bytes for the amount of damage various weapons did in the Minish Cap ROM.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Zeld''': I've never been able to hack a walk on water code except in SM64DS, where I took advantage of Luigi's ability to walk on water already and simply modified the time limit he could do so to be infinite. Finding the right point in a subroutine to replace an instruction with a "nop" to allow walking on water in other games was something I never really tried to do for fear of being terrible at it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Zeld''': Physics modifications. Gravity changes, collision changes (including walk-through-walls), auto-targeting (here I like to make the distinction between using the game's code and writing your own, which I differentiate by calling the resulting codes "auto aim" and "aim bot" respectively), walking on water...all the sorts of things you can't do in an RPG. Replacing objects with more explosive ones. Gaining the ability to move an object that isn't your character with directional controls. Codes that let you use your controller as an interface for spawning and modifying objects. All those appeal to me similarly.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''Zeld''': Dealing with dynamic memory allocation. Especially when the developers have a stick up their ass and reallocate objects constantly when they were fine where they were.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Zeld''': Jet Force Gemini. The game is plenty fun on its own. Throw in some working "infinite this and that" codes and it's even better! Incidentally, no such codes that existed before I re-hacked them worked well at all :/

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Zeld''': I may have found an address or two that I wanted to "get a hold of" and lost to the evils of dynamic memory allocation, but so far I can't remember any that permanently got away. As for the codes I've made, my scary, obsessive documentation habits have prevented any from sneaking into my recycle bin to be deleted. From what I can remember, all the furtive addresses I've encountered that really mattered were tracked down by some means or another (assembly or pointers...sometimes a combination of using assembly to dump pointers!).

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Zeld''': That would be the Metroid Prime: Hunters (U) v 1.0 aim bot. That specific version of the game is still the only one that any incarnations of the aim bot work for. The code took 3 months of planning and 2 months of coding to complete, and the reason it took so long to code was because I was using the wrong kind of mathematics to pound out the targeting calculations, which resulted in 2 failed attempts before a working third was released. Shortly after which Rune copied the code and pasted it all over, claiming that it was hacked by a female. Rune is a dog.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Zeld''': SubDrag asked me to use my adoration for physics mods to compel myself into making an auto-targeting hack for Goldeneye64. Because of the game's heavy reliance on the translation look-aside buffer of the hardware and my laziness to make enough sense of the documentation Parasyte provided to get around the issue, the only information I have even resembling progress toward the final code is the location of the aiming coordinates for the first level, some virtual addresses of assembly that reads those values and an assembly code for testing my ability to modify TLB data, which was shot down by Parasyte as "untestable in the emulator because the emulator may not be emulating it correctly", to paraphrase. Sorry 'Draggers, I don't think I'll ever get this code done. Now probably isn't the best time to mention that I'm a fan of SubDrag as well. To think I failed him D: Actually, I did try Walk through Walls for SM64 as well. I was only able to get it to let me walk through certain objects, but leaving level boundaries killed me like with other WTW codes for that game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Zeld''': I do a good bit of creative writing. Aside from that, being a general lazy ass that gets nothing done.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Zeld''': I'm afraid my answer here will be boring, as it's been said, but I entirely agree with Parasyte. All of this commercial nonsense is hurting the scene. We should be helping each other, not charging each other. You're a good programmer. You know things about hardware. Use that to get a real job instead of ripping off your friends! And if someone asks for documentation...and you have it? SHARE IT, YOU STINGY BASTARD.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Zeld''': Dream big. This is what I do. I think of an extraordinary hack that is likely well out of my ability to hack. The learning and other codes hacked along the way to trying to accomplish that hack are like landing on the moon when shooting for the stars. Except in many cases you may surprise yourself, blast through the moon and hit those stars after all. And then you owe us a new moon, you jerk.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Hehheh (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:37:40Z

Demonic722:

==April 21st, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking quite a few codes, you successfully solved for the way Star Ocean 2 moved addresses to and fro, and co-wrote the Dope RPG Hacking FAQ (which included the former) with KingEdgar0. What was your motivation in doing these things?

'''Heh[]heh''': Well with the SO2 code I was motivated by the fact that I have fun hacking, and enjoy a good challenge. The FAQ was made to encourage more people to enter the Gameshark hacking community, which benefits everyone involved. It was also a good excuse to collaborate with a fellow hacker who I enjoyed talking to.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Heh[]heh''': Probably the code to lock the memory address of the menu in place so that you could always access the "secret" menu option in Star Ocean 2 that would take you to the debug room. This was a product of finding the memory randomization pattern.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Heh[]heh''': I can't think of one specific one, but definitely experience/level codes for RPGs. Once you beat the game it was fun to go back and see what an all-powerful party was like.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Heh[]heh''': KingEdgar0 helped me a lot when I first got involved, and we ended up putting our heads together on a lot of things. So I'd say him for both answers.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Heh[]heh''': Infinite ammo on weapon 1 in Goldeneye for N64.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Heh[]heh''': Anything involving 3D models or collision detection. These are often the most complex parts of a game and thusly the most complicated to change.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Heh[]heh''': Anything that makes me scratch my head and say "How did they do that?".

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''Heh[]heh''': How easy it was to crash a game or lock up your system. You could lose a lot of work because of that.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think the most annoying thing about the hacking scene is?

'''Heh[]heh''': The fact that I've been out of it for so long! When I was involved, it seemed like there was always someone to post a code I just hacked a few hours or days earlier. Not a bad thing, but it's annoying when someone steals your thunder ;-)

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Heh[]heh''': Many times. Between crashes and forgetting to write things down it's easy to lose codes.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Heh[]heh''': My instincts point to the SO2 Debug Room code, but I remember a lot of instances of yelling and system resets throughout my time as a GS hacker.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Heh[]heh''': Plenty. Luckily there was usually a fellow hacker around to help out.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Heh[]heh''': Parties, dive bars, and Fenway Park.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Heh[]heh''': Being able to hack current-gen consoles. It'd be nice if everything was as easy as the PS1 era!

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Heh[]heh''': Be patient and learn to count to FF.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Hehheh (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:37:20Z

Demonic722:

Geiger (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:34:17Z

Demonic722: /* August 9th, 2017 */

==August 9th, 2017==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among quite a few other things, you compiled the latest versions of SNES9x with your own custom, user-friendly debugging capabilities. Pretty much every SNES hacker uses your versions of SNES9x. What inspired you to do this, and how did it all come together?

'''Geiger''': There was a compile of Snes9x available that had command line options to do some limited debugging. (Unfortunately, I forget the exact author.)
I had been using it to some degree to figure some things out in Chrono Trigger, but it just wasn't quite enough. Plus things couldn't be done in realtime.
So to help me out with what would become Temporal Flux, I created my own variant of Snes9x.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What's something you did in the scene which you think was pretty cool, but isn't very well-known?

'''Geiger''': Well, the most interesting thing I put together was an NPC party through event programming in Chrono Trigger. (The patch is available on my website.)
Lost to time, I also came up with a cheat code that always displayed enemy parties in Ogre Battle.
I was also briefly the official Windows port developer for Snes9x for about six months. For various reasons, it didn't work out. (And none of my code was ever committed.)

'''Lazy Bastard''': You've also reverse engineered several classic RPGs in various ways. What was your favorite discovery when reversing a game?

'''Geiger''': Well, the one that brought me the most delight is also kind of boring. While my Chrono Trigger compression code worked fine, it didn't match up to existing compressed packets in the game one-to-one. Several years later, I finally figured out it was due to the direction of data travel. Being able to perfectly recreate the output of the official tool was pretty cool, to me.
But honestly, any given piece of data that I need to spend more than a few minutes on makes me happy when I finally decipher its meaning.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code or hack of all time?

'''Geiger''': You know, funnily enough I don't actually spend a lot of time making hacks myself. Most of my time is spent deciphering data and making tools to accomplish that. So when someone makes something neat with one of my utilities, I tend to just be blown away.
Someone hacked Chrono Trigger to propose to his wife, using Temporal Flux. (There's a video on YouTube.) Knowing I played some small part in that is a great feeling.
I played an earlier version of The Prophet's Guile and was blown away by what they managed to accomplish.
I don't actually pay much attention to most hacks, but the technical work that goes into is always enthralling.
(Don't pay much attention to most completed hack patches, to be clear.)
Someone is currently making a massive retooling of Secret of Mana that's employing a ton of ASM work.
I remember a number of years back, one of the better hackers was porting all the new features in Super Mario World into Super Mario Bros 3, like grabbing and throwing shells, etc.
Yeah, so all that deciphering of data and code and making it do new and exciting things always tickles my brain.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the first thing you hacked for any game?

'''Geiger''': Aside from using the original game genie on the original NES? :)

'''Lazy Bastard''': Yeah, guessing doesn't count :P

'''Geiger''': I don't remember the exact circumstances, but somehow I ran into FF3Ed on Zophar's Domain.
And the source was available.
So I immediately downloaded it, studied it, and then started making it do new things.
like outputting all the Location Maps to bitmaps.
I posted my results to ZD and another hack forum (don't remember the exact name, but don't think it exists anymore).
Someone noticed and approached me to create a Chrono Trigger editor.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Very cool. I remember FF3Ed (and a similar tool for FFII/IV); I loved playing with those.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Geiger''': While I started with Final Fantasy VI, the answer is clearly Chrono Trigger.
As for why? Obviously my fondness for the title.
Also, given what I know of some other titles, it is very technically advanced.
Which is not entirely surprising, given when it came out in the SNES' lifespan.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Geiger''': Well, this is going to make me sound like a jerk, but no one.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Hahah.

'''Geiger''': I didn't know anybody in the scene, and I was well under way when I finally started frequenting boards.
This isn't to say that I don't respect anyone. There are a number of hackers that I feel have an incredible talent for this sort of thing.
(I have already alluded to a few.)
And there are definitely people that I do not think I am the equal to in their respective areas.
I won't start naming them though, because I'd forget someone important.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of hack, and why?

'''Geiger''': Making ASM do something really new, while retaining its old capability.
This is something I have seen only occasionally, but is substantially transformative.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Do you mean adding your own code, such as via a code cave, then jumping/branching to it, then returning to the former EIP, or something more specific?

'''Geiger''': It can be that, although it more frequently takes on the form of total rewrites.
While not the best example of this in particular, but no less technically impressive, I seem to recall someone freed up a ton of memory for other use in Final Fantasy VI by having the battle data not store itself three times.
There's been some lesser (and smaller) examples used directly in Temporal Flux.
Unfortunately, I just can't recall many specific examples.

'''Lazy Bastard''': On that note, what was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Geiger''': That doesn't really happen for me in hacking or deciphering. All of my hair-pulling moments have been while coding utilities.
There was a bug in Temporal Flux where the Overworld Exits were suppose to synchronize with Overworld Event code.
Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.
It took me years to beat that bug.
Might be the worst one I've ever had to track down, and I've traced into the Windows system kernel to find out why a driver was crashing (back before there was code for that).

'''Lazy Bastard''': That said, was there ever a code, hack, application, or functionality you made that you just couldn't get to work quite correctly?

'''Geiger''': With enough time and effort, I have managed to knock out everything so far, eventually.
Someday, I may release another version of GSD if I can ever figure out how to put APU debugging back in.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack, discover, or create something awesome, but then lose it somehow?

'''Geiger''': Nothing serious.
I lament that I can no longer find that Ogre Battle code I made.
And I'm sorry that I didn't keep a copy of Temporal Flux's v1.0 code around.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Geiger''': Television. Internet. Board Games. Nerd Stuff.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite video game ever?

'''Geiger''': hm..
I am very fond of Chrono Trigger, but it has stiff competition from Final Fantasy IV, VI, and Actraiser.
For a singular game, and definitely in the J-RPG category, it is probably Chrono Trigger by a smidge.
But if we extend the question to game series, it is the Mass Effect Trilogy, hands down.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Cool; I love Actraiser...such a novel combination of two genres, like the Langrisser series.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Geiger''': This probably won't earn me any points.
Long-term, I don't think it can thrive.
I don't think it will ever disappear completely.
But there are kids today who grew up on Minecraft, who are barely familiar with any Mario game.
Ultimately, I think the "hack" scene will transmute to a "mod" scene (and is already doing so).
While that frequently requires no less work, it isn't quite the same thing.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Interesting take.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Geiger''': Do what you like, not what will earn you praise. The mob is fickle, but passion will drive you.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Geiger (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:33:41Z

Demonic722:

==August 9th, 2017==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among quite a few other things, you compiled the latest versions of SNES9x with your own custom, user-friendly debugging capabilities. Pretty much every SNES hacker uses your versions of SNES9x. What inspired you to do this, and how did it all come together?

Geiger: There was a compile of Snes9x available that had command line options to do some limited debugging. (Unfortunately, I forget the exact author.)
I had been using it to some degree to figure some things out in Chrono Trigger, but it just wasn't quite enough. Plus things couldn't be done in realtime.
So to help me out with what would become Temporal Flux, I created my own variant of Snes9x.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What's something you did in the scene which you think was pretty cool, but isn't very well-known?

Geiger: Well, the most interesting thing I put together was an NPC party through event programming in Chrono Trigger. (The patch is available on my website.)
Lost to time, I also came up with a cheat code that always displayed enemy parties in Ogre Battle.
I was also briefly the official Windows port developer for Snes9x for about six months. For various reasons, it didn't work out. (And none of my code was ever committed.)

'''Lazy Bastard''': You've also reverse engineered several classic RPGs in various ways. What was your favorite discovery when reversing a game?

Geiger: Well, the one that brought me the most delight is also kind of boring. While my Chrono Trigger compression code worked fine, it didn't match up to existing compressed packets in the game one-to-one. Several years later, I finally figured out it was due to the direction of data travel. Being able to perfectly recreate the output of the official tool was pretty cool, to me.
But honestly, any given piece of data that I need to spend more than a few minutes on makes me happy when I finally decipher its meaning.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code or hack of all time?

Geiger: You know, funnily enough I don't actually spend a lot of time making hacks myself. Most of my time is spent deciphering data and making tools to accomplish that. So when someone makes something neat with one of my utilities, I tend to just be blown away.
Someone hacked Chrono Trigger to propose to his wife, using Temporal Flux. (There's a video on YouTube.) Knowing I played some small part in that is a great feeling.
I played an earlier version of The Prophet's Guile and was blown away by what they managed to accomplish.
I don't actually pay much attention to most hacks, but the technical work that goes into is always enthralling.
(Don't pay much attention to most completed hack patches, to be clear.)
Someone is currently making a massive retooling of Secret of Mana that's employing a ton of ASM work.
I remember a number of years back, one of the better hackers was porting all the new features in Super Mario World into Super Mario Bros 3, like grabbing and throwing shells, etc.
Yeah, so all that deciphering of data and code and making it do new and exciting things always tickles my brain.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the first thing you hacked for any game?

Geiger: Aside from using the original game genie on the original NES? :)

'''Lazy Bastard''': Yeah, guessing doesn't count :P

Geiger: I don't remember the exact circumstances, but somehow I ran into FF3Ed on Zophar's Domain.
And the source was available.
So I immediately downloaded it, studied it, and then started making it do new things.
like outputting all the Location Maps to bitmaps.
I posted my results to ZD and another hack forum (don't remember the exact name, but don't think it exists anymore).
Someone noticed and approached me to create a Chrono Trigger editor.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Very cool. I remember FF3Ed (and a similar tool for FFII/IV); I loved playing with those.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

Geiger: While I started with Final Fantasy VI, the answer is clearly Chrono Trigger.
As for why? Obviously my fondness for the title.
Also, given what I know of some other titles, it is very technically advanced.
Which is not entirely surprising, given when it came out in the SNES' lifespan.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

Geiger: Well, this is going to make me sound like a jerk, but no one.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Hahah.

Geiger: I didn't know anybody in the scene, and I was well under way when I finally started frequenting boards.
This isn't to say that I don't respect anyone. There are a number of hackers that I feel have an incredible talent for this sort of thing.
(I have already alluded to a few.)
And there are definitely people that I do not think I am the equal to in their respective areas.
I won't start naming them though, because I'd forget someone important.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of hack, and why?

Geiger: Making ASM do something really new, while retaining its old capability.
This is something I have seen only occasionally, but is substantially transformative.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Do you mean adding your own code, such as via a code cave, then jumping/branching to it, then returning to the former EIP, or something more specific?

Geiger: It can be that, although it more frequently takes on the form of total rewrites.
While not the best example of this in particular, but no less technically impressive, I seem to recall someone freed up a ton of memory for other use in Final Fantasy VI by having the battle data not store itself three times.
There's been some lesser (and smaller) examples used directly in Temporal Flux.
Unfortunately, I just can't recall many specific examples.

'''Lazy Bastard''': On that note, what was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

Geiger: That doesn't really happen for me in hacking or deciphering. All of my hair-pulling moments have been while coding utilities.
There was a bug in Temporal Flux where the Overworld Exits were suppose to synchronize with Overworld Event code.
Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.
It took me years to beat that bug.
Might be the worst one I've ever had to track down, and I've traced into the Windows system kernel to find out why a driver was crashing (back before there was code for that).

'''Lazy Bastard''': That said, was there ever a code, hack, application, or functionality you made that you just couldn't get to work quite correctly?

Geiger: With enough time and effort, I have managed to knock out everything so far, eventually.
Someday, I may release another version of GSD if I can ever figure out how to put APU debugging back in.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack, discover, or create something awesome, but then lose it somehow?

Geiger: Nothing serious.
I lament that I can no longer find that Ogre Battle code I made.
And I'm sorry that I didn't keep a copy of Temporal Flux's v1.0 code around.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

Geiger: Television. Internet. Board Games. Nerd Stuff.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite video game ever?

Geiger: hm..
I am very fond of Chrono Trigger, but it has stiff competition from Final Fantasy IV, VI, and Actraiser.
For a singular game, and definitely in the J-RPG category, it is probably Chrono Trigger by a smidge.
But if we extend the question to game series, it is the Mass Effect Trilogy, hands down.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Cool; I love Actraiser...such a novel combination of two genres, like the Langrisser series.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

Geiger: This probably won't earn me any points.
Long-term, I don't think it can thrive.
I don't think it will ever disappear completely.
But there are kids today who grew up on Minecraft, who are barely familiar with any Mario game.
Ultimately, I think the "hack" scene will transmute to a "mod" scene (and is already doing so).
While that frequently requires no less work, it isn't quite the same thing.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Interesting take.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

Geiger: Do what you like, not what will earn you praise. The mob is fickle, but passion will drive you.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

GameMasterZer0 (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:19:13Z

Demonic722:

==May 4th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among many other things, you co-founded Codemasters-Project.net, which became the center of the PS2 hacking scene. What was your inspiration for this?

'''GMO''': I was tired of going to 16 sites a day to find codes or find info on making codes. The Codemasters-Project actually met on the GSHI.org website. I posted a thread, "Let's get this party started." This is were i first met Sephiroth (UCF_Codemaster)
This was a pain cause i would go to the gameshark (Interact) Forums, CMGSCCC.com, GSHI, GSCentral, X-Hub, Ace1's, XploderFreax.de, Xianaix Museum, agscc, Hellion's, thegfcc, etc. Even my group iNtHEmIND had a site hosted on PS2NEWZ (psx-scene.org) Everyone kept asking to be a Moderator on their site. UCF_Codemaster is an awesome guy and very generous. He pays for the site and hosting out his own pocket.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''GMO''': That would have to be the USP Suppressor for MGS2 Sons of Liberty because no "Commercial" site has even found it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''GMO''': CMGSCCC's Final Fantasy 7 Ultimate Code, I thought I was badass every time I played because with a Joker I can refill my HP/MP/Limit on the fly. Totally awesome.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''GMO''': Damn that's a hard one... CMX, he deals with me on a daily basis with all my questions he usually ignores :P But he does get the job done. When I first started it was Codeboy, he answered all my questions except ones on encryptions.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''GMO''': Stealth Suit for the Tank Mission on Metal Gear Solid 2

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''GMO''': Games with a Quake engine can be a bitch! Warhammer40K Fire Warrior was a pain to hack. The In-Game Cheats were interesting to find out til you figure the value is the value of (g). "Flippy" pissed me off for an hour to figure out what it did til i released that the In-Game Cheat Flippy was a Stupid ass code for an Inverted Controller. WTF were they thinking!

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''GMO''': Infinite Health/HP/Life, I actually like to finish a game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''GMO''': It's very time consuming. In the beginning, before dump codes, it took 2 minutes to reset the PS2, enter the address, and Load. Just for one code.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''GMO''': When a certain "Commercial" site got pissed cause people were "Porting" codes and they felt they should receive the credit. We ported codes over to other regions cause other regions would never get codes. In America or mainly NTSC games would see a shit ton of codes for a game, and PAL & NTSC J games will see like 2 or 3 useful codes for like 5 main title games. The "Porters" actually supported the devices that complained about them.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''GMO''': Star Ocean 3! Nothing says Double Hash like Star Ocean! To make codes for the game was fun cause only like 4 of us could actually do it at the time.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''GMO''': Character Modifier for Devil May Cry! I was so fucking happy the code worked, that when I resetted the ps2 to boot my GS2 v1.3 the dongle fucked up and I had to do a factory reset.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''GMO''': Ben Lincoln's Debug Menu for Legacy of Kain Defiance. We probably worked on it for 2 weeks to make it shorter then the original 40 Line code, we did lose some of the debug codes in it though.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''GMO''': HF Blade in MGS2 SoL, I have the address and the HF Blade value for both Snake and Raiden, but it would only work as a decoration til you got to where Raiden was naked in the game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''GMO''': I am a hardcore gaming nerd! I play my XBox 360, Wii, World of Warcraft, and spend the majority of time with my Fiance Jen. She plays Left 4 Dead with me :)

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''GMO''': More people get involved, and companies not to discontinue their products.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''GMO''': Never let someone tell you hacking games is impossible! That you do not need a super computer (Franken Station) to hack codes that you cannot afford. Look how far we got without super computer! Look how far they did with them.... Shame.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

DarkSerge (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:14:57Z

Demonic722:

==May 1st, 2009==

'''Ace''': Being an administrator and the official Root Bear of GSHI, what would you say made GSHI unique when you first joined?

'''DarkSerge''': Its smaller userbase and collection of great psx hackers.

'''Ace''': What would you say has been your most well-known, or most impressive accomplishment in the hacking scene?

'''DarkSerge''': Finding half of the enable code for zelda majora's mask. Before then the game was unhackable.

'''Ace''': What do you think the earliest thing you did hacking wise was?

'''DarkSerge''': I did some stuff snes hacking wise. I hacked a bunch of different snes games, mostly platformers like the megaman x games and a few rpgs. What all codes did I make? I only remember a few codes I've made, like enable z saber power up for Megman X3...

'''Ace''': Who or what were your early influences in the hacking scene? As well as who did you look up to at the time?

'''DarkSerge''': KingEdgar0 and Arcane Darkness. They taught me alot of stuff that helped me become a better hacker myself.

'''Ace''': What's the most difficult administrative decision you've made while at GSHI?

'''DarkSerge''': Don't think I've ever done a administrative decision on gshi that I can think of

'''Ace''': What's your motivation for code hacking?

'''DarkSerge''': To hack something that normally you couldn't access/do in the game. I never liked hacking the basic stuff.

'''Ace''': What's your favorite code and/or hack?

'''DarkSerge''': Moon Jump code for Majora's Mask.

'''Ace''': What would you say is your favorite type of code to hack?

'''DarkSerge''': Debug codes.

'''Ace''': What would you say is the most difficult kind of code to hack?

'''DarkSerge''': Anything that involves asm hacks.

'''Ace''': Of the games you've hacked what was the most fun to hack, and why?

'''DarkSerge''': Final Fantasy 9, because this is one of those challenging games to hack do to adress changes in game for the most part

'''Ace''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''DarkSerge''': It was when I was trying to find the enable code for Majora's Mask.

'''Ace''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''DarkSerge''': Alot of times. Too many to list, most of them I don't remember.

'''Ace''': What do you think the most annoying thing about the hacking scene is?

'''DarkSerge''': The newbs that come and constantly ask for codes that are allready hacked that are on the site.

'''Ace''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''DarkSerge''': Hope that the new systems that come out are exploitable so custom firmwares and/or homebrew cheat apps could appear on them.

'''Ace''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''DarkSerge''': I would tell them to have fun while hacking and don't treat hacking like its a Job.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Dark Byte (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:09:08Z

Demonic722: /* September 16th, 2017 */

==September 16th, 2017==

'''Lazy Bastard''': You created Cheat Engine, the application pretty much every PC game hacker uses to hack games, and which millions of people use to apply cheats to games. What inspired you to do this, and how did it all come together?

'''Dark Byte''': I've always liked to cheat in games. In the early days on MSX computers using POKE's and editing the code of games written in BASIC, later on 8086 CPU's save game editing (using DEBUG.COM/.EXE) and messing with open source games. Eventually I encountered tools like GameWizard32 (DOS era) and GameHack (Windows 9x era). With windows NT and later these tools didn't work anymore so I created my own tool to teach myself more about programming as well. Eventually it become Cheat Engine as you know it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What's something you did in the game hacking scene which you think was pretty cool, but isn't very well-known?

'''Dark Byte''': I'm not allowed to say.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code or hack of all time (by anyone)?

'''Dark Byte''': I don't know. I'm usually satisfied with just godmode myself. But I guess hacks that bring back the console or at least the direct commands are pretty neat.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the first thing you hacked for any game?

'''Dark Byte''': Number of lives/godmode .

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite feature of Cheat Engine, and why?

'''Dark Byte''': There's not really just one feature I like. CE is a collection of tools and a lot of them work together with eachother.
But if I have to choose a few I'd say Ultimap(1/2) , Pointerscan and DBVM as they are more interesting features of CE.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Dark Byte''': Honestly I've never really paid attention to the gamehacking scene (I don't think there was any at the time I started). All I did/do is play games and cheat on them. Then share some information about the game on the forum with those interested.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code, hack, application, or functionality you made that you just couldn't get to work quite correctly?

'''Dark Byte''': For some hacks, sure. A lot of my personal hacks involve having to press a hotkey to disable it right before the end of the map else the game will crash. For me it's functioning well enough, but I could never put that online for other people (they'll complain).
For non hacking related there have been some changes in the way I wanted to do things because the system just didn't act like I was expecting or it was going to take too long to implement and not worth it anyhow.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from the hacking and gaming scenes, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Dark Byte''': Watch tv, go out, bike/excercise, walk my dog. That's all.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite video game ever?

'''Dark Byte''': I really can't pick one, and a list will be really long.
But the ones I like the most : Ultima series, Fallout 3, Monkey Island series, Book of unwritten tales series, command and conquer series (exluding 4), and many more (strategy, rpg, adventure).

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Dark Byte''': Keep sharing information and ideas.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Dark Byte''': Stop waiting for people to teach you. Look up what you need, get ideas, experiment with those ideas, then work them out into something useful.
Also, start with small simple games.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Dark Byte (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:07:54Z

Demonic722:

==September 16th, 2017==

'''Lazy Bastard''': You created Cheat Engine, the application pretty much every PC game hacker uses to hack games, and which millions of people use to apply cheats to games. What inspired you to do this, and how did it all come together?

'''Dark Byte''': I've always liked to cheat in games. In the early days on MSX computers using POKE's and editing the code of games written in BASIC, later on 8086 CPU's save game editing (using DEBUG.COM/.EXE) and messing with open source games. Eventually I encountered tools like GameWizard32 (DOS era) and GameHack (Windows 9x era). With windows NT and later these tools didn't work anymore so I created my own tool to teach myself more about programming as well. Eventually it become Cheat Engine as you know it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What's something you did in the game hacking scene which you think was pretty cool, but isn't very well-known?
'''Dark Byte''': I'm not allowed to say.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code or hack of all time (by anyone)?
'''Dark Byte''': I don't know. I'm usually satisfied with just godmode myself. But I guess hacks that bring back the console or at least the direct commands are pretty neat.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the first thing you hacked for any game?
'''Dark Byte''': Number of lives/godmode .

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite feature of Cheat Engine, and why?
'''Dark Byte''': There's not really just one feature I like. CE is a collection of tools and a lot of them work together with eachother.
But if I have to choose a few I'd say Ultimap(1/2) , Pointerscan and DBVM as they are more interesting features of CE.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)
'''Dark Byte''': Honestly I've never really paid attention to the gamehacking scene (I don't think there was any at the time I started). All I did/do is play games and cheat on them. Then share some information about the game on the forum with those interested.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code, hack, application, or functionality you made that you just couldn't get to work quite correctly?
'''Dark Byte''': For some hacks, sure. A lot of my personal hacks involve having to press a hotkey to disable it right before the end of the map else the game will crash. For me it's functioning well enough, but I could never put that online for other people (they'll complain).
For non hacking related there have been some changes in the way I wanted to do things because the system just didn't act like I was expecting or it was going to take too long to implement and not worth it anyhow.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from the hacking and gaming scenes, how do you like to spend your time?
'''Dark Byte''': Watch tv, go out, bike/excercise, walk my dog. That's all.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite video game ever?
'''Dark Byte''': I really can't pick one, and a list will be really long.
But the ones I like the most : Ultima series, Fallout 3, Monkey Island series, Book of unwritten tales series, command and conquer series (exluding 4), and many more (strategy, rpg, adventure).

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the game hacking scene to continue to thrive?
'''Dark Byte''': Keep sharing information and ideas.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?
'''Dark Byte''': Stop waiting for people to teach you. Look up what you need, get ideas, experiment with those ideas, then work them out into something useful.
Also, start with small simple games.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

CzarDragon (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:05:34Z

Demonic722:

==April 18th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': You and RPGod hacked the first well-known Debug Room code (Final Fantasy VII [PSX]), which featured in magazines and gaming news sites across the board. What inspired you to do so?

'''CzarDragon''': My Room Modifier code was actually a failed attempt to modify Cloud's size. He appears large in some rooms and tiny in others so I was using that to narrow my search results.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''CzarDragon''': Enable Home Garage for the Gran Turismo 2 Demo.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''CzarDragon''': Debug Room for Final Fantasy 8.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''CzarDragon''': I have two brothers and one of them obtained a Super Snapshot 5 cartridge for the Commodore 64. My first hacking experience was using that to get Infinite Energy in Chiller. As for fellow hackers, I think Barubary impressed me the most.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''CzarDragon''': Room Modifier for Final Fantasy 7 was in the first batch of GameShark codes I ever hacked. Didn't even have my own GameShark Pro at the time so when RPGod found the Debug Room I wasn't able to check it out right away.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''CzarDragon''': Walk Through Walls or other forms of disabled collisions.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''CzarDragon''': Analog Mode codes were interesting.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''CzarDragon''': The accumulation of disassembled memory dumps.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''CzarDragon''': I don't recall any of them sticking out more than the others.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''CzarDragon''': Probably. I think my records are extremely disorganized.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''CzarDragon''': It's been too long for me to recall which took more effort.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''CzarDragon''': My attempts to add the two temporary characters of Suikoden back in after they leave seemed to just result in crashes.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''CzarDragon''': Sleeping?

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''CzarDragon''': The ability to hack newer systems.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''CzarDragon''': 1 + 1 = 10

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

CYs Driver (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T22:02:38Z

Demonic722:

==April 30th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking codes, you created an in-game memory viewer/editor for Socom 2 (PS2), and Cora, a basic cheat system for PS2. What inspired you to create these?

'''cYs Driver''': Well for the in game memory view there was a lot of talk at the time about people finding uni-terror's (i think :P) old code for Socom 1 that allowed you to view memory in your scope where it told you the distances. But at that time even the big (active) hackers on the Socom scene couldn't manage to port it. I decided i'd give it a go and with my previous C skills i actually found it incredible simple looking through how the socom 1 version of the code worked and it took me all of about an hour to port it over, but of course i couldn't just port it over i had to make it better and add some memory editing features to it :)

For cora, i had been into PS2 dev for a couple of months and was looking at how PS2 link was able to debug your homebrew and basically just started inquiring about how it was able to stay active during my game. Misfire seemed to be the only one with the knowledge and the will to teach me how it was working. At the time the only thing able to get online in Socom 2 was "Codemajic" and i thought i'd give a go at getting a very simple almost proof of concept device working online and so cora was born.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''cYs Driver''': Probably in game coord modifier for 007:Nightfire, it just was incredible fun properly flying about maps able to raise your height with the analogue sticks.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''cYs Driver''': Either in game memory dumping from the CMP team as it just helped hacking on so many levels or all weapons for any of the socom series, Glow sticks were the shit for getting your rave on in game ;)

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''cYs Driver''': Since i joined the scene very late compared to most people doing these questionnaires i didn't have those really famous hackers like CMX to aspire to be like, in the beginning it was probably most of the CMP team (and still is) but now people like stealth and skandalous who basically took me under their wing once they started seeing me hack some fairly decent codes for socom, stealth especially taught me a lot.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''cYs Driver''': I honestly have no idea; it would have been something fairly simple like changing text strings for Socom 2 since it was the first game i started on (heh starting with one of the hard ones)

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''cYs Driver''': On most modern games anything to do with coordinates since there’s no real facility to put breakpoints on addresses and monitor them.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''cYs Driver''': Definitely once again coordinates, they're just so much fun to play with being able to go places you're not supposed to :)

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''cYs Driver''': Probably entering in really long codes into your cheat device that you've just hacked to find that they don't work and you've got to test about 10 more variations of the code.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''cYs Driver''': Leechers.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''cYs Driver''': Definitely Socom 2, i wasn't around for the very beginning of it when people ported some stuff from Socom 1 but there were still so many unthought-of codes for the game that still had to be hacked.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''cYs Driver''': Too many times to remember, the most annoying probably was finding the coordinates for socom 2 but never being able to find where the pointers are kept, stupid DMA.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''cYs Driver''': I actually can't think of any codes that were a nightmare to hack, it's been about 2 or 3 years since i've been hacking any codes what-so-ever. But the most hair-pulling thing i've TRIED was in game dumping, but for an actual accomplishment it has to be Cora, i went through a very sharp learning curve for that, stressful times!

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''cYs Driver''': Dumping libMC2 games, i managed to get my hands on the actual library code at one point and got so close to getting it to work but still just not quite perfect...

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''cYs Driver''': Back in the day when i was most active, i liked to BMX and play guitar a lot but now it's playing guitar, gigging and the girlfriend.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''cYs Driver''': Everyone to stop being so fussed about fame and credit and allowing others to see your work so they too can learn. The only way the current gen systems will be broken is if everyone comes together and shares all the knowledge they have.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''cYs Driver''': Never give up, help each other out and learn your language. I remember people telling me "you still don't understand what the code is doing", but being convinced that i knew it just because i knew what addiu stood for. It took me a while to realize that this meant nothing and you had to be able to read the code as if it was a high level language spotting out the important subtraction which takes off your health :)

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

CodeMaster / CMX (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T21:58:55Z

Demonic722:

==July 12th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': You've written many programs that have been helpful to the hacking community, founded GSCCC (now CodeTwink.com), and hacked quite a few impressive codes. What was your inspiration for all this?

'''CMX''': I first started making cheat codes due to the fact that GameShark had no Infinite Health code for Resident Evil for PSX. It was then I vowed to find my way to connect the system to the pc and communicate with the system to start developing my own cheats.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''CMX''': The code I like the most was my cheat to make any vehicle fall out of the sky for the Grand Theft Auto series on PS2 by pressing just the Select button.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''CMX''': This would be some cheats I made for Halo for XBOX1, we had a blast with the spider-man mode and super duper jumps on Blood Gulch, Sidewinder and other multiplayer maps.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''CMX''': Early on, it was definitely Gavin Thornton and Wayne Beckett. They are extraordinary talents and I looked up to both of them. They helped me with code, ideas, and various other things pertaining to Action Replay/GameShark back in the day. Later on, I grew apart from them at datel and both had quit datel. I then say that to this day, I still look up to the infamous Barubary. He still is one of the sharpest ones I have met that came along with the ride known as GSCCC.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''CMX''': Quite obvious, if you refer up earlier, it was Infinite Health for Resident Evil PSX.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''CMX''': I'd definitely say that any type of energy bar on the screen without a number next to it. Due to you have no idea how many units the developer will use for it. If they used floating points, if it starts at 0 and goes up instead of starting high and going down, etc..

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''CMX''': Any and all assembly language codes. I love reprogramming minor aspects of the game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''CMX''': The long memory dumps. Some systems are better than others, but for the most part, the dumping takes longer than making the cheats for me.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''CMX''': How everyone just turns their back on you because they disagree. Everyone is allowed an opinion, if they deny someone of theirs, what does that say about their character?

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''CMX''': Grand Theft Auto 3 definitely. Rockstar screwed up and left in all of the debug symbols inside of the ELF so that you could see all the neat tidbits on how the game works.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''CMX''': Not that many times did I ever lose the codes. I save files that I edit on my computer almost every 5 seconds or if I type anything at all. I'm very paranoid over lost data. Still, to this day, the cheats on codetwink.com are in a "txt" file on the server instead of inside a MySQL database, as I do not 100% trust them. But ALT, F, S is almost second nature to me now, so I dont lost much data.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''CMX''': Syphon Filter PSX - Walk Thru Walls, it took me about 40 hours of debugging to get it to work 100% properly. (Check out the code on the site, its pretty lengthy.)

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''CMX''': Depends on what you mean, sometimes, people ask for codes that are theoretically impossible to create. Have I ever tried to find some type of code like that? Sure, but it was more for the fun of seeing if I could do the impossible than actually thinking something would come out of it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''CMX''': I own a used video game store now called GameSwap in St. Louis, Missouri. You can buy any of the old games I used to hack cheats for CodeBreaker and other products at http://www.mygameswap.com

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''CMX''': All good things come to an end, PS3 is locked up pretty tight, and on this generation, everyone learned a lot on securing up the system. I expect the next gen systems to be totally locked down, with digital signatures on everything, including the firmware on the drives that load the discs, and/or do away with discs entirely for downloaded content. In either case, hacking could become a thing of the past for consoles.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''CMX''': Never throw in the towel early. The more time you spend, the more you learn. Even if you are banging your head against the wall, when you eventually discover what you are looking for, the sun shines bright and you'll have new methods/ideas for future games.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Ace (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T21:54:49Z

Demonic722:

==April 18th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': You were one of the founding members of GSHI. What did you find unique about GSHI, in the beginning?

'''Ace''': GSHI was a place for hackers of the scene to hang out at and chat about code related stuff without having to put up with the bullshit of the more mainstream sites such as CMGSCCC or CodeJunkies. I'm glad to say it's mostly the same to this very day.

'''Lazy Bastard''': You released the first codes for Final Fantasy V Advance (both U & J versions). What inspired you to do so?

'''Ace''': I'd managed to get a copy of the game early. So I figured why not hack it while it's fresh and let GSHI be the first to have codes for it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Ace''': Definitely my Chrono Cross equip all code. It's so simple, yet very cool.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Ace''': '''Lazy Bastard''''s Sprite Control Modifier. I had a lot of fun using and testing that code back in the day.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Ace''': My biggest influence was '''Lazy Bastard'''. We'd both entered the scene at about the same time.. Though, you knew a bit more so I took notes. :) The person I looked up to the most would be CzarDragon, however. The guy was just so ahead of the pack at the time and a lot of the codes he'd made left me wondering "How in the hell did he do this?".

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Ace''': Infinite Energy/MP for Final Fantasy VII -- rehacked of course. I rehacked a lot of codes for games to learn the ropes.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Ace''': Definitely Walk Through Walls codes because often they're rather complex. I've still yet to figure these out completely.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Ace''': Anything that requires a bit of creativity to make.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''Ace''': The lack of good software or hardware to hack with. I can't think of anything that doesn't annoy me or come up short of much needed features.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Ace''': Final Fantasy VII, despite me not making much for it. It was cool though to mess with the inner-workings of one my favorite games.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it
somehow?

'''Ace''': Yeah. I had a bunch of stuff for a Chrono Cross Sprite Control Modifier that I'd been working on written in a notebook. The notebook's contents were lost due to water leaking on it from my ceiling during a storm.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Ace''': The few Walk Through Walls codes I've made for various games.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Ace''': There was a keep armor/invincibility code I'd tried making for Super Ghouls & Ghosts many years ago that I never could get right. It was eventually made efficiently by Ugetab, I believe.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Ace''': I like to watch movies and mess around with web programming.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Ace''': Develop software/hardware to hack the newer systems. I don't think Datel and the other companies the scene's used to relying on will pull through for us anymore.. so it's really left for us users to do the work.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Ace''': Be creative with the codes you make. Create something unique and innovative!

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Abystus (Hackers of Lore)

2025-11-20T21:44:12Z

Demonic722:

==September 15th, 2017==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among a lot of other codes, you've hacked a BUNCH of really cool ASM codes for retro systems. How did you pull these off? Any general tips for ASM hacking beginners?

'''Abystus''': Retro systems are relatively simple all the way up until jumping into 32 bit and beyond. Most hacks aren't hard per se, but more of a challenge to fit within the requirements of hardware for the earlier systems. Some hacks that are considered advanced are actually relatively simple once you know the general methods of accomplishing them. As far as tips for ASM hacking, the best tip is to play around with it as much as possible. Play with branches to see what affect they have, and once you determine exactly what they control, examine the code preceding them to see why they took the path they did. Conditionals are the decision makers, and are most likely the most powerful instruction that assembly has to offer.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What's something you did in the scene which you think was pretty cool, but isn't very well-known?

'''Abystus''': I was the first person to make the secret characters playable in Mortal Kombat II arcade while retaining all their special attributes. It did get some attention from several news sites, but it was for such an old game (20+ years) that no one besides enthusiasts cared. It was this hack which set the current record for the most users online at one time for "Pugsy's MAME Cheats" forum.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked? What gave you the idea, and how did you go about hacking it?

That would be "Free Camera" for Mortal Kombat II (MAME). I was doing several 3D free cameras, and thought that it would be cool if I did it for a 2D game. Hacking it was pretty simple, I just found the camera coordinates, disabled P1 joystick input, detached the camera from following the characters, and wrote a custom routine in my assembler to move the camera around based on what directions were pressed on the P1 joystick. After that, I ported it to the remaining MK games and any other TMS processor based games I could find. I've since posted all of them on Pugsy's forums, and they should be included in his recent cheat releases.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time, by any hacker?

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64) - "Kill-Switch for Floor" by Ryan Toluchanian. That in combination with a levitation code was awesome as enemies just fell through the floor to their doom while you levitated around. Once you were happy with your mass killings, you could restore the floor to normal and strut away like nothing happened.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the first thing you hacked for any game?

'''Abystus''': Life Force NES invincibility. I still remember it, because it wasn't just a simple 0/1 toggle, but a 0/2 toggle which was found by using increase, decrease, and equal searches...

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Abystus''': Back when everything was conducted through gscentral.com, I learned the most from a hacker named Kong K. Rool (aka Parasyte). I would say his accomplishments at the time were astounding to me, and the fact that he was willing to help me out at all was greatly appreciated.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Abystus''': They would be hard-coded values, and shared RAM locations which are constantly rewritten and are impossible to search.

'''Lazy Bastard''': On that note, what was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Abystus''': This would have to be the stage modifier for Killer Instinct SNES. The reason it was difficult, is that the value was not stored in RAM permanently. It was a shared location in RAM that held many things and was constantly overwritten, so I had to do a lot of back tracing and breakpoint watching to see at what point in code the value for the stage was written, processed, and overwritten. Using this knowledge, I was able to inject code which would load the value of my choice, and loaded that specific stage instead. I actually had to create this code twice, because the single player game used a different routine than the two player mode to load stages.

'''Lazy Bastard''': That said, was there ever a code you hacked that you just couldn't get to work quite correctly?

'''Abystus''': Sure. I once hacked a hit anywhere code for the genesis version of "The Adventures of Batman & Robin". it worked great until I encountered the first boss which had specific areas that it was vulnerable, and attacks anywhere else would register as being blocked. As you can imagine this boss just blocked all the anywhere attacks, which is a problem for such a code. Even with a pair of fresh eyes (nolberto82), I was not able to resolve the issue and release the code.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Abystus''': Free camera codes would be my current favorite. I find they are a lot of fun to play with after the hack is completed, as they allow you to go places and see things you normally wouldn't be able to.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Abystus''': Mortal Kombat II SNES. I enjoyed hacking things that were once thought impossible, such as playing as the secret characters while retaining all of their special abilities. Overall, I think this may be the game I've hacked most.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack something awesome, but then lose it somehow?

'''Abystus''': Back in the early 90s, I didn't really know how to hack codes, so I used to modify existing GameShark codes in an attempt to create new codes. Using this method, I hacked a code for Mortal Kombat II SNES that made Liu Kang morph into the Dragon from his fatality when shooting his fireball. I somehow lost the code even though I thought I had written it down. I haven't tried to re-hack the code since, but it was definitely an "awesome" code that I wish I still had.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Abystus''': With my family, programming, 3D Modelling, YouTubing, playing RetroPie, and trying to learn new things (I try to do this at least once a day).

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite video game ever?

'''Abystus''': That would be a tie between Killer Instinct arcade and Mortal Kombat II arcade.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Abystus''': An onslaught of new hackers, developers to keep writing emulators with debugging tools, and for some well funded company to release a commercial grade cheat device that is guaranteed protection from being patched out of existence.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Abystus''': Don't stop at learning RAM hacking. ROM (ASM) is not as hard as people play it up to be. The power of ROM hacking is unbelievable in comparison to RAM, and once you go ASM, you never go back...

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

SubDrag (Hackers of Lore)

2025-09-05T14:43:55Z

Demonic722:

==February 16th, 2010==

'''Viper187''': Obvious question first: You're known for not only hacking the piss out of Goldeneye, but also for making a ROM editor in collaboration with others. Why the Bond obsession?

'''SubDrag''': I've hacked a lot of games in the past for N64, like Turok 2 and Banjo Kazooie, but for whatever reason, Bond just was the best, and not just the best, but by far the best to both play and hack. There was also a ton of work done by the community, so I had a large start. The engine's just incredible, and it always keeps my interest. Guess I just realllllly like the game.

'''Viper187''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''SubDrag''': One of my favorites, although it seems more trivial now, was the cut-scene chooser for GE. The Banjo-Kazooie sandcastle cheats were very exciting at the time as well. I think my favorite to play around was the GE image mod, but I wasn't the first to make that.

'''Viper187''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''SubDrag''': My favorite hack of all time was the one that let more GoldenEye levels be played in multiplayer. It's such a random, incredible hack, I was excited for weeks back then, and tried many random codes to get the other levels to load. I still have that gem memorized, 8032332A.

'''Viper187''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''SubDrag''': I would have to say Ice Mario at the time was the "mentor", he really was/still is the best hacker. We worked on a lot of codes/late nights working on stuff. In terms of influence, probably the same. Wreck and Zoinkity really stepped up for GoldenEye though, they really are the reason we've taken it so far.

'''Viper187''': What was your first hack?

'''SubDrag''': My first hack, beyond copying the GS video to get infinite ammo, was to get rid of Lakitu in Mario Kart 64. I always thought that was a pretty fantastic way to get in. I remember posting it on GSCentral and didn't think it got enough attention really. I think it later helped in the Mario Kart multis in grand prix stages, but not sure they used that one.

'''Viper187''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''SubDrag''': It's sort of a different ballgame than when we first started, since you really have got breakpointing, disassembling, but I still maintain the image mod is the holy grail of hacking. It's not easy usually, and takes a ton of work. That was my goal for every game, look for beta objects in it. Still a couple games don't think I ever got a true one, like Turok 2.

'''Viper187''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''SubDrag''': My favorite are ones that expose beta stuff, beta levels, beta objects, beta text, that's pretty much the best. Assembly hacks are most powerful, but they really aren't the most fun, too precise. Also, all those GE codes that were people randomly changing addresses, nowadays you'll never see that kind of stuff. Green explosions, giant guards, headless, weird animations, those were the days. I really like to see how the stuff worked and what was leftover, and working within the original engine to do things that weren't intended. It's pretty satisfying realizing how the game organized things, and then modifying what was done to be something new, but all within the original programming.

'''Viper187''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''SubDrag''': Hacking out, breakpointing complicated things like compression and how a game does rotation are pure hell. I've lost DAYS to both of them. Also when a game crashes a lot in the old days it was very painful, but not as much an issue with save states and emulators.

'''Viper187''': What do you dislike most about the hacking scene?

'''SubDrag''': The worst part was always people getting mad or acting stupid. We really went far and had some great talent, but for some reason, hackers seemed to have egos/conflicts too much, which took away from hacking and always really annoyed me. It's all about the codes! I was always sad when GSCentral broke up. That was a great time.

'''Viper187''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''SubDrag''': GoldenEye is and always will be my favorite. It's the best engine, most leftovers, and such fun.

'''Viper187''': Was there a game that was just the most evil piece of programming you ever had the unfortunate luck to hack codes for?

'''SubDrag''': I'm sure there were, just not thinking of one right now. I tried for an ocarina of time image mod for a long time but never got it, though others did later. The OoT crashing (until they fixed it later with EE0000000 0000) made for some exciting hacks when I got it working once (navi color mod), but was so frustrating. I can't think of anything offhand, just compression/rotation in any game are nightmares.

'''Viper187''': Do you have any specific hacking techniques or peculiarities?

'''SubDrag''': I had a technique for image mods, which was basically hack a size mod, then poke around nearby, and always follow pointers. I don't believe I've ever failed to hack a size mod for a game, my specialty. I also had particular methods for different codes, knowing when to do 8-bit, when 16-bit, etc, and checking for pointers, etc, guessing what would be a pointer, what wouldn't. There's more too.

'''Viper187''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''SubDrag''': One of my greatest codes I ever made let me control the horse in Ocarina of time, not Epona, I had it on another horse. But it crashed before I could write it down. One of my ones I didn't lose, but thought I did, using PC connection parallel port to gameshark, I tried to hack instant warp for BK64. Was down to about 5 codes, turned them all on, and game froze. I was annoyed because was a while hacking in, but happened to turn off codes, then suddenly I reappeared in game. Apparently just kept trying to warp and got lucky there.

'''Viper187''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''SubDrag''': If we're ignoring the entire "GoldenEye Setup Editor" and clipping C++ code for it, it's been too long, I just can't remember. There were some though that tested the limits. I think the worst is when your shark breaks, which always happens, or you can't boot and you were so close to the code.

'''Viper187''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly?

'''SubDrag''': I never got the OoT image mod and always wanted it. JFG I never got a non-ASM image mod but wanted it. Same with Turok 2, except never got it. Some have definitely eluded me over the years. It's rare, but it happens.

'''Viper187''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''SubDrag''': That's a large portion, but I also like to watch movies and tv shows, eat out, go walking I guess. Not as much stuff as I'd like really, wish I had more time.

'''Viper187''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''SubDrag''': It pretty much fell apart when sharking was no longer easy and mainstream, and people stopped hacking (always wished that didn't happen). We all tried on GameCube, but it was too hard and wasn't easily accessible, and the games really crashed a lot when hacking and such a pain to restart, not as fast as 64. I maintain hacking died (or was last great) with the N64. It seemed to make a comeback with DS and GBA, due to almost mainstream again, but those games just aren't as good or fun to hack, and with the DMCA in place, I'd love to see XBox 360 games like EDF hacked, and would love to, but unless it's accessible, legit, and without mod chips, the good ol' days are long dead.

'''Viper187''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''SubDrag''': Really, just do what you enjoy. I loved my time hacking, really loved it, waking up and posting/reading new codes on the forums. They were great days, met a lot of good people. To hack you just need passion for it and some smarts. The rest you'll learn through others and through a lot of work on your own.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Skiller (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-18T15:29:55Z

Demonic722:

==April 22nd, 2009==

'''LiquidManZero''': Can you Let us know a bit about you?

'''Skiller''': I am Canadian :P, Calgary Alberta. I have a Kid on the way with my Girlfriend, she also has a 10yr old. I’m 27 been hacking since 2005 but was doing code converting before that since 2004. Started out with my own Site and joined the was invited into the CMP sometime just after hacking GTA SA. I don’t know how many codes iv hacked but i know iv hacked well over 300 games

'''LiquidManZero''': What’s your favoured game type or game?

'''Skiller''': the games i play are RPG but I’m open to hacking anything

'''LiquidManZero''': what are your Goals (Hacking)

'''Skiller''': id have to say I’d like to hack any games that’s not been hacked. If there are codes that are missing i will try to get to them to. Hell throw even the Barbie games at me and all turn them around with some hacks :P

'''LiquidManZero''': What made you Move from User to Hacker

'''Skiller''': Well let’s see id have to say the Armax forums did .. i seen all them users not getting what they wanted .. And i was one of them since Armax was the only device i could find at the time. And it was extremely painful to wait for their slow asses to do something. So i started out by converting learning my way around the Cheat devices. Then with the help of Pyriel i moved into hacking games. I own allot to him even though I most likely made him Angry allot with the stupid questions he stuck it out to help me.

'''LiquidManZero''': What is your favourite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Skiller''': I’d have to say the Taito Legend Games codes iv done do to no one even trying to hack them games.

'''LiquidManZero''': What is your favourite code/hack of all time?

'''Skiller''': Hotcoffee Do to how much that was thrown around :P . It just goes to show what we can do, as in you can’t hide stuff someone will pick your game apart if they know what there doing. Yes it sucked that R* was Hung out for that one. But hey its one of the most Controversial codes. Second to this would have to be the Save and Live dump codes.

'''LiquidManZero''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (Doesn’t have to be the same person for both)

'''Skiller''': Pyriel, CMX.. I first ran into Pyriel back on the old AR forums. I quickly learned my way to converting in that forum. Wanting to know more i started to bug Pyriel. Getting feed back if I asked the right questions.

'''LiquidManZero''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Skiller''': Thinking back i hacked a 3 codes for the Sims game for inf Bladder and 2 other stats.. But never really counted that as a hack. I would have to say my First hack was to so with SMT: Nocturne Inf HP code

'''LiquidManZero''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Skiller''': I would have to say walkthrough walls codes or Debug menu codes. Both are tricky and hard to find

'''LiquidManZero''': What is your favourite type of code/hack?

'''Skiller''': Ones that people don’t thing of like 2 i hacked for the GTA games (Aim of Death, Superman code, GTA LCS or VCS) just want to know they were made on the Psp version by 2 others as well i wanted to try and make them on the ps2

'''LiquidManZero''': What is your least favourite aspect of hacking?

'''Skiller''': How its done we don’t have the true tools to do what we need to hack some systems easily. I like the Challenge the more challenging the game is the Better i feel when i get the Code hacked . :P

'''LiquidManZero''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Skiller''': had to be a Megaman Collection game.. I was hacking the Scratch Pad not normally where we would be hacking . Ps2 scratch pad being hooked to using a Custom subroutine that Equals some fun

'''LiquidManZero''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Skiller''': Many times.. Damn you DMA :P

'''LiquidManZero''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Skiller''': that hard thing think of.. I’d have to say it’s a tie with the Hotcoffee Nude code and the Taito Games codes Hotcoffee nude took 2 of us to hack :P

'''LiquidManZero''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Skiller''': Inf health for Dues EX < - - Still trying to get this to work right.. Notice no cheat device has this or Bio code. And i know why. :P

'''LiquidManZero''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Skiller''': Spending time with my Girlfriend, movies, Wrestling, Rollerblading, and training.

'''LiquidManZero''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Skiller''': We have to become more of a Team then being so spread apart. We have to Come together as a Unit.

'''LiquidManZero''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Skiller''': it might be hard to get yourself started but think about what u can do down the road. We all start somewhere it’s up to you how you want to finish.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Ugetab (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-18T15:25:42Z

Demonic722:

==April 25th, 2009==

'''LiquidManZero''':
How did you get into game hacking, and what do you recall as being the earliest thing you hacked?

'''ugetab''':
I'd say the first overall console game hacking I did involved a flash of inspiration several years ago that the same program I used to hack Castle of the Winds saved games could be used on Emulator Save-States, and I spent a lot of time on it from there.
As for the earliest thing I hacked, I'd only be guessing, but I suspect it was Final Fantasy 3 SNES, using UGE to edit Save-States.
Nothing new, just stats and such.
I didn't actually touch Assembly Hacking until IAmStillHiro1112 showed me to GSHI, where I believe it was Gradius Invincibility I made.

'''LiquidManZero''':
What or perhaps who would you say was a major influence starting out? Also, is there anybody you would say you looked up to at the time?

'''ugetab''':
I can't really cite any person influencing me to start trying to make codes. I saw that other people made codes, wanted to do it, then tried to do it myself when I came upon a method of code finding that fit my mentality. I can't claim any hero-worshipping in any field that I can think of.
IAmStillHiro1112 and GSHI convinced me to take the leap from just doing what I had figured out on my own to actually trying to learn about how to do things from other people.

'''LiquidManZero''':
What would you say is the hack you are most proud of having done?

'''ugetab''': I took some time to think of this before, and oddly enough, I believe it would be any of the multi-code-set All Item codes, like for Star Ocean, or Rudra no Hihou. I've done harder codes, and even better codes, but for some reason, All Item hacks top my list of personal achievements.

'''LiquidManZero''':
What of other people's hacking do you consider to be the most interesting?

'''ugetab''':
I'm generally impressed with some of the larger-scale hacking efforts that I can't seem to achieve, like time intensive translations, or information intensive code rewrites for PSF hacking. As far as actual codes go, CzarDragon's FF7 Debug Room code was quite interesting to me as far as what it allowed. I suspect I'm not really aware enough of the specifics of other people's codes to be impressed with their function.

'''LiquidManZero''':
What's your favorite type of thing to hack?

'''ugetab''':
I generally like to find back-dooring techniques into any problem I come across, particularly the types of codes that seems infeasable or codes others have tried and found hard to make. I had fun hacking Quake 2 powerup codes and imagining Viper187's eyes bugging out when he brought it up as an example of tough N64 hacking, and I pointed out the codes to him. In general, I've found I like to figure out music routines in exchange for easy access to the music itself, and I usually go after nick-nack codes like the # of Cats modifier in Chrono Trigger. I suppose I'm not too different from other hackers in my hacking choices.

'''LiquidManZero''':
What would you say is the most difficult sort of hack, and what gives you that impression?

'''ugetab''':
The most difficult hacks are those that rely on a large number of distinct memory addresses, and more than 2 or 3 assembly routines to accomplish. Making dynamic music modifiers for a game called Rocket Robot on Wheels, as well as a few other examples that I can't think of, make me believe this to be the case. A Gameboy game called Rayman has code and memory usage so convoluted that I haven't even gotten 1 song going right when I've tried ripping it.

'''LiquidManZero''':
What's the most unpleasant thing about hacking?

'''ugetab''':
I think it's that you end up getting so little out of it besides the code, or rip, or whatever if is you're trying to make. Sometimes you could care less if someone notices you did something when you're doing it for yourself, but filling requests for people gets old quick if they're just killing their time and yours, and don't think much of your efforts. Code thieves are also pretty bad, but I don't have to deal with them often enough to think it outweighs an overall attitude of requesters.

'''LiquidManZero''':
What game was the most entertaining to hack?

'''ugetab''':
I'd have to peg Final Fantasy 3 SNES as the most entertaining, because of how it's structured, combined with how many small details there are to abuse to get more interesting codes. It's straight forward when you get to the assembly, which seems to create some challenges by itself.

'''LiquidManZero''':
Did you ever hack a good code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''ugetab''':
I've lost codes and addresses pretty often, but I don't usually let them stay lost. A side effect of not being able to let go of a situation effectively. I did lose a set of PAR-based No Random Battle codes for Shin Megami Tensei, but I ended up replacing them sort of recently with a Game Genie version that used less codes. I also lost some codes due to a laptop killing the drive, and because no computer BIOS is able to recognize the drive, and because replacing the board didn't fix it.

'''LiquidManZero''':
What was the most difficult hack you've ever accomplished?

'''ugetab''':
It's really hard for me to remember what would be considered the hardest successful hacking endeavor. My way of getting codes usually makes it so the hardest codes are the ones that take the longest time.
In that respect, I think the first Super Mario RPG SA1 code I did, 'Always Speed to Finish Line with 1 Cookie' qualifies as the hardest due to having to figure out so much stuff over so much time.

'''LiquidManZero''':
Were there any codes that you attempted to hack but didn't work right?

'''ugetab''':
The first thing that comes to mind is that I could never get Seiken Densetsu 3's Instantly Kill Enemies code to work correctly. It didn't work in trap rooms, and other things worked wrong because of it, such as boss fights.

'''LiquidManZero''':
In your time off from hacking, what sort of things do you do?

'''ugetab''':
I do some hacking with OllyDbg and IDA that evolved from my use of emulator debugging, and do some computer fixing in general, mostly on the software side of understanding. I still like to do emulator-related activities a bit more on average though.

'''LiquidManZero''':
What do you think is required for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''ugetab''':
New emulators/features, new people with new ideas, and new reasons to try to invent ways to use emulators. It's just got to be fresh from one perspective or another. Tired of playing? Hack. Tired of codes? Rip music.
Tired of music? Do a TAS. Tired of TASing? Try to find what everyone's going to want to do after they're done trying to TAS games.

'''LiquidManZero''':
A final question. If you had one thing to say to all hackers, what would it be?

'''ugetab''':
You succeed in hacking when you approach multiple problems through success and failure as though the benefit of achieving the outcome you want outweighs the cost of learning how to deal with the problems.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Pyriel (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-18T15:21:51Z

Demonic722:

==April 19th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking many great codes, you created OmniConvert. What was your inspiration for doing this?

'''Pyriel''': Need. OmniConvert grew out of MAXConvert, which came about because of MAXCrypt.

After seeing how the Action Replay Max codes were structured, it was pretty obvious that manual conversions would be tedious, and that most code users would not be willing to do manual conversions, period. I wound up coding MAXConvert more out of curiosity than anything. Another hacker had been working on it, and I had given him some of my crypt routines for other devices. After a few months, there was no tool, despite a lot of chatter and apparent work, and I became curious as to just how difficult it could possibly be. So I took a few hours one night, looked at the code types, and produced a quick and dirty routine to reject all the incompatible types and to convert the simplest types. After that, it seemed like it would be a waste of effort not to put it all together. I spent a few weeks working through the finer points, pulling together code, and getting it all to work together. Once I had a working tool, I showed it to GMO and a few others. I was reluctant to release it at first--I did not want to step on the other guy's toes--but GMO convinced me. That led to MAXConvert version 0.5 being released, with apologies to the other coder.

About a year later, MadCatz started using one of the additional encryption keys hidden in the GameShark/Xploder software. I suspect someone took a look at the MAXConvert source, and discovered that it only handled one key. (I do like to pretend that it took them so long because they failed to notice it was open source and had to reverse engineer the software to find the deficiency.) I had done maintenance releases up until that point, but that resulted in me spending four or five days reversing the additional algorithms. Shortly thereafter, GameShark started using the only algorithm I had not put into the tool, which led to some backlash from their users. It was absent from MAXConvert because the GameShark itself did not contain the decryption algorithm, and could not use the codes.

At the beginning of 2008, I decided to update MAXConvert to include the CodeBreaker version 7 encryption. It had been about two years since the last release. I had been waiting because both tools, CB2Crypt and MAXConvert are open source, and I was sure somebody else would take the initiative and merge the two. When no one stepped up, I decided to do it myself. To make the project interesting, I decided to make it also create single-game code save files (.cbc, .p2m, etc.) for popular devices. The project essentially turned into a complete rewrite, and I wound up incorporating a lot of new features and improvements. Quite a few of them are things that will never be known unless you compare the source of both tools.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Pyriel''': I think my favorites would have to be the Super Modifiers for Disgaea 2. They are not the most difficult codes I ever hacked, but I thought they were fairly elegant. You can place the cursor on any item, skill, or specialist and modify it and its attributes with a few button presses.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Pyriel''': Anything that circumvents protection is high on my list. These codes are wallflowers to most people, but they are some of the most difficult things to come up with. The Valkyrie Profile game, Star Ocean, games that use checksums and hashes and clock checks to constantly block cheating; the codes that work around protection on games like that are difficult and tedious to hack, and very rarely get the credit due them after the codes have been out for about a week.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Pyriel''': Initially, I think GMO influenced me the most. He was pretty prolific, and produced quite a few guides. They left out some of the intricacies, but I would have had a hard time finding a place to start without them. I started console hacking on the PS2, which was not the simplest system to cut your teeth on. At the time, I think PS2Dev.org was nonexistent, so information was scattered and spotty. Any little bit of technical information, undetailed or not, was helpful.

I looked up to Nachbrenner when I first started, even though I have never spoken to him. He knew what he was doing, and seemed to have worked quite a bit out in a relative vacuum. I found that impressive.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Pyriel''': I hardly remember. It was for Suikoden III. Beyond that, it could have been an item modifier, a skill modifier, etc. Who knows any more. I can tell you it was exceedingly simple by my standards now, though.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Pyriel''': That is a tough one. Any code can be difficult if the developers have worked hard enough to make it so. In general, I would say protection circumvention is generally difficult to accomplish. If the developers have taken the time and trouble to protect the game from cheating, then you already know life is going to be difficult while you hack that game. Provided the protection is something other than laughable, that is. I ran into one game that "encrypted" its persistent (save) data segment by XORing every byte with 0x1F or something ridiculous like that. You can hardly call that protection. Genuine and devilish tricks to block cheating can be a pain, though.

Hackers can be '''Lazy Bastard'''s, too. Nippon Ichi games checksum their data segments when loaded. It can sometimes be tricky to get around, but it is generally relatively trivial. It takes a few hours, perhaps, to circumvent the protection the first time (without a trainer). Since they typically use the same check with a few minor modifications in all their games, it becomes much easier to locate and disable subsequently. Nevertheless, Datel and MadCatz still resort to putting button activators on all their codes to bypass the checksum by forcing the user to punch random buttons for infinite money, etc. With a trainer, it would probably take fifteen minutes, tops, to find and disable the check.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Pyriel''': I like the complex subroutines. Anything that breaks away from the game's programming to create some complex or highly customizable set of effects is endlessly amusing to me.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''Pyriel''': Top of the list would be how time-consuming it can be. However, I am obsessive about solving puzzles, so others might find it eats up less of their time.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Pyriel''': I am tempted to say Nippon Ichi games in general, but they are too easy. The games' executables are not labeled or anything like that, but the coding style often makes hacking somewhat effortless. I would have to say Suikoden III. It was the first game I ever hacked. The thrill was still there, and I spent quite a bit of time learning on it. I think I eventually employed almost every technique I ever devised on it, and I have revisited it multiple times over the years.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Pyriel''': All the time. I used to post at CMGSCCC a lot, and the webmaster often forgets to back up the board database. I lost quite a few codes to crashes there, combined with thoughtlessly reformatting the drive on my laptop. Some of them may have been on memory cards I misplaced or cleaned up as well.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Pyriel''': Probably the encryption on the P2M files for the GameShark. I messed up one line of code somewhere, and it resulted in the seed table being scrambled improperly, but only once every thousand or so times. The damage only became apparent when you created a file of sufficient size, and even then it might only affect ten bytes or so out of several kilobytes. It took me forever to chase down that bug.

As far as codes go, I really have trouble remembering. Possibly the protection and indirection on Sega Genesis Collection. Nobody else who had tried could get that game to allow codes without it throwing up an error screen and halting the game. I eventually managed to circumvent that and devised a method that could be applied to all the Genesis games it could load, but each one of them was structured slightly differently, and you had to find a stable, usable pointer before any codes at all would work. Then I had to learn Motorola 68K assembly (emulation framework) for some things, and was mystified by the game programmers' using BCD data in some places. It was screwy.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Pyriel''': Yeah. My biggest hair-puller of this sort was the Live Memory Card Dump Code. I was working on Suikoden IV at the time, and it loaded large amounts of code from compressed files on the DVD. I had a way of getting small amounts of data to dump, but I was finding it tedious. So, I decided to try writing a code to call the memory card routines and write a file when a specific combination of buttons was pressed. I had the code mostly working. It did everything it was supposed to do, except it did not work. I added error-code displays to it, but the error codes are not exactly well-documented for unlicensed peons, so that helped very little. Eventually, I had to go away on business, and set it aside for a few weeks.

When I returned, I found that someone I had described the idea to had taken it to someone else who had gotten it working for some games. What had been produced was virtually identical to what I had done, but still did not work on Suikoden IV. I cannot recall the details, but something about the state of the hardware and something the game was doing made it impossible for this simple process to work correctly. I imagine this is the reason some games just will not work with the live dump code.

If I had switched games, I probably would have discovered my code worked as well as it could. I would have saved myself several weeks of mulling over it when my mind was not otherwise occupied. I also would not have been beaten to the punch by someone who unceremoniously borrowed my idea, but such is life.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Pyriel''': My day job is in IT. I also volunteer with, and am occasionally employed by local, live theaters. I volunteer as often as I can with any group that can give me work that does not involve a desk (Habitat for Humanity, hurricane clean-up). I take classes whenever my work schedule permits. Sooner or later I will probably have a degree in everything interesting to me, though it will probably take until I reach 80. I read; I mess about on the guitar; I drink and rag on my friends; and I occasionally play golf because everyone else in my family is into it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Pyriel''': My interest in video games has been steadily declining, and I have not given this a lot of thought. The main thing is that the protection on the current generation of consoles, and any future generations must be overcome. Without the ability to load unsigned and unlicensed software, hacking will simply die off on consoles. Eventually it will be restricted to PC games and emulators, and that would be pretty boring.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Pyriel''': Hopefully the current hackers have learned this already, but to everyone else: Do not be afraid to break stuff. This is something I eventually tell everyone who asks me how to hack. Hacking is not about conceiving your ultimate goal, and achieving it straight away, no matter how good or experienced you are. You have to experiment. You have to break things. This is software (typically), so you will not being doing any permanent damage.

"Hacking" is a process whereby you incrementally discover more facts about what you are attempting to modify, emulate, what have you. It is not a cookie-cutter process you can follow to get exactly what you want in some arbitrary number of steps. Your immediate goal is always to establish at least one more fact, and eventually the accumulation will permit you to do exactly what you want to the game, or whatever you happen to be hacking.

As you work, you will probably find that you learn more by failing, and by breaking things, whether inadvertently or deliberately, than you do by succeeding. I could provide an example of what I am talking about, but I hate to get mired in that. This is the sort of concept that is hard to teach. It is a way of thinking and reasoning. It is applying the scientific method, if you will.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Pyriel (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-18T15:21:36Z

Demonic722:

Macrox (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-18T15:07:53Z

Demonic722:

==May 6th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': What would you say you're most well-known for?

'''Macrox''': The most well known thing I've done is really one of several things, depending on who you ask. It ranges from the Hacking Text co-author/editor, Castlevania 64/LOD Cut scene and Level/Location Modifiers, Indy 64 Walk thru walls codes, Clubhouse Games always get perfect strike or bulls eye, and finally Walk in Cut scene hack for Turok 64. I am also known for being a "liaison" for beta testing devices and getting samples of those devices from InterAct and Datel.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Macrox''': Definitely the Cutscene/Level Mod codes of Castlevania 64/LOD.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Macrox''': Wow, this is a hard one to answer. I think it must be the Indiana Jones 64 Hi Res King Solomon's Mines Codes. Not one in particular but the whole set as the trainer kept crashing due to to delicate hook in memory slot I had to use.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Macrox''': The first person who got me hooked was Kong K Rool aka Parasyte. Later on the work of Viper's activators and Subdrag's Size Modifiers made a big impact on my work. My inspirations and main associates are Para, Shadow Knight aka Rune, Viper, Crocc, Kenobi, Subdrag and FNG from Datel.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Why, and where, did you first enter the hacking scene?

'''Macrox''': My interest in code hacking goes back to patching codes in PC games. I am probably one of the oldest if not the oldest hacker on the underground scene. I have hacked codes for SNES, N64, GB, GBA and NDS. I also was a mod, admin and co-owner of the old GSC, which I joined in the late 90's. I believed in the site being a family site unlike some of my past associates. I thought this way because I often had parents write to me asking how they can help their kids. That caused a rift between my associates and I....something I now think a fight I could not win. The world is much changed from when I was a kid....and there is not much I can do about that.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Macrox''': Star Wars Shadow of the Empire Timer code during battle of Hoth.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Macrox''': Wow...well Walk Thru Walls is the one that comes to mind. I have been very lucky to hack many of these for a few games using the memory editor.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Macrox''': Cutscenes, Level Modifiers, Unlocking "locked" items.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''Macrox''': The very long tedious hours to sometimes complete a hack. I spent many hours hacking the Castlevania 64/LOD and Indy 64 codes. I also spent a lot of time hacking Clubhouse Games for NDS, Tomb Raider Legends and Underworld.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''Macrox''': Immature message board posts. I firmly believe that they are a great tool to exchange info but they are also a magnet for silly, useless posting of garbage.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Macrox''': The most fun was Paperboy 64. It was sheer fun and it was very automatic for me to dump all the codes.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Do you have any specific hacking techniques or peculiarities?

'''Macrox''': I believe in hacking a code perfectly. I test all my codes over and over to make sure they work and will not corrupt a game save nor ruin the game play in the natural course of the storyline. I am passionate about my hacks. I may not have all the patience in the world...but I have a lot of energy and endurance. AKA....I might swear while I hack but I don't give up. I found some of my toughest hacks by use of the memory editor in the trainers....I cannot emphasize enough how powerful that is. In fact, the N64 Gameshark and the CodeBreaker for Gameboy had the best damn memory editors I ever worked with.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''Macrox''': YEAH! The stupid flashlight from the second Turok 64 game. Viper and I spent a lot of time hacking that thing and we never in the end got it. I consider that the grail of hacking.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Macrox''': You are not going to believe this...but it was the Always get a Bulls Eye in Clubhouse Games for NDS. There was more than coordinates to hack...the physics of the throw was also a very important factor.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Macrox''': Yes, I do regret I was never able to finish the Moon Jump Hack in Indy 64, nor find that miserable flashlight with Viper in Turok. The Moon Jump in Indy 64 hurts the most as I was one of the originators of the GLEE method of the hack. Greater than, Less than, Equal, Equal and repeat again search hack = GLEE.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Macrox''': I like to read and I am an electronics junkie. I am always on the lookout for new gadgets. I also like to watch the NFL especially the Steelers. I have a love for Old School of Pro Wrestling...not the garbage that is on today. My profession is in Physics. Much more than that I cannot reveal due to the sensitive nature of my work. I enjoy weight training and I am steroid free. I am still pretty strong and big for being over 50. I credit that to my early training where I was inspired by the old time wrestling champ Bruno Sammartino who I have had the occasion to train with in my youth. I, for the most part have now retired from hacking. I did recently come back to do a few DS games in the Tomb Raiders and several others.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Macrox''': Trainers for the new systems or better emulators with ASM hacking capability. Without these...only the older systems will continue to be hacked...and only by those interested in old systems.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Macrox''': My parting words to young hackers....never stop learning nor be afraid to learn new things. I was able to finally learn ASM hacking by talking to Para, Viper, and Kenobi. Also, be sure to have a life outside hacking codes. You don't realize just how quickly time passes. I remember when most of these code hackers were only in the early teens and now well into their twenties.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Is there anything else you'd like to add?

'''Macrox''': Yes...the remarks of Rune on certain blogs about me being difficult and such to him on the old GSC...I did, like him, what I thought was right for GSC...I harbor no ill feelings to him or those days...let bye gones be gone.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Barubary/Myria (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-18T15:04:42Z

Demonic722:

==April 16th, 2019==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among many other things, you were a pioneer in Final Fantasy V hacking (including and especially for the translation) and had the same distinction for PSX hacking and reverse engineering (including writing tools related to Yaroze EXEs and showing up in the credits for just about every early PSX hacking tool project). What inspired you to get involved in these things, and how did you go about them?

'''Myria''': In the mid-1990s, the American gamer community heard about how many Japanese games didn't come out in the U.S. Final Fantasy 3 turned out to not be the third Final Fantasy. We also learned of the various changes that the localization process had made to the games - making games easier, censorship, mistranslations... All this was spreading thanks to the Internet.

Through IRC channels for "The Unofficial Squaresoft Home Page" (later "The GIA") fans, I met other fans of FF games and of emulators. Some of them were involved with ROM hacking.

With the simple ROM hacks that had been floating around after the start of emulation came talks about translating games that weren't released in English. Several groups formed, including RPGe. I told them that I believed their approach to be flawed - that they needed to not just change game data, but code as well, in order to make an effective translation. Some of us formed a subgroup for translating FF5 this way, and we were successful.

Around the same time as the FF5 translation, PSX RPGs had taken off. Final Fantasy 7 was released in North America right around when I was wrapping up my part of the FF5 translation. I got a PSX to play FF7.

I later heard about how you could connect a PSX Game Shark to a PC through a cable, and I used it to mess with PSX games. I quickly learned MIPS assembly language, making such silly things as a walk-through-walls cheat code for FF7. That led to other endeavors, such as patching out mod chip protections.

I actually wasn't very important in the PSX "scene". I think what got me credited a lot was the little tool I wrote to convert games created with the Yaroze home development kit into executables that could be burned to CD and booted on modded PSX consoles. It wasn't very important, so I don't know why I was mentioned a lot as you say.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code or hack that you made?

'''Myria''': I can't talk about my favorite one, which I made for my employer =) But in things I did outside of work, I like most the part I had in the Luma3DS project: figuring out how derrek's boot ROM exploit worked, then doing the large brute-force required to execute it using a bunch of GPUs.

Among ROM hacks, I really loved the Breath of Fire 1 retranslation hack I never finished. I did some crazy things in that hack. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdLge5735vI

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code or hack of all time?

'''Myria''': It's really hard to answer that. There are a lot to choose from. There are many ROM hacks now that are incredible in scope with a ton of work put into them. Whether it's Kaizo Mario or the various randomizers out there, some really talented people have done amazing things.

The Breath of Fire 2 retranslation hack stands out as some of the best overhaul work someone has done to a game as a hack. It's what inspired me to try to retranslate BoF1.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Myria''': Ted Woolsey influenced me the most. In fact, I credit him with pushing me toward my career.

I learned how much he had mangled the translations, particularly the character names, and was angry about it. The lead character in FF6 is Tina, not Terra. A reason I got into translation hacking is that I wanted to fix things - by force. This led to me learning reverse engineering.

My Internet name, Myria, is partly a snub toward him. I loved the Breath of Fire series, so I took a name from it - one of the names that Mr. Woolsey had changed in BoF1 for no apparent reason.

In terms of hacking scenes, probably the PSX hacker "nagra". He was a lot better than me. I like to think that we're about equal now, but back then I looked up to him.

'''Lazy Bastard''': How did you get into hacking? Did you have any formal education or related work experience, or did you learn on your own?

'''Myria''': I had been messing with computers since age 6 or so. I had used GWBasic and QBasic, and later C and a bit of assembly language. I was entirely self-taught up until college, but I probably would've been a successful programmer without college.

Note that I did the FF5 translation while I was in high school.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code or hack?

'''Myria''': A DOS blackjack game my parents played had manual-based copy protection where you had to enter a code from a dark red sheet. I noticed in a hex editor that all the codes were inside the .exe file, so I changed all the codes to zeros and changed the prompt to say "type 00000 to start the game".

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code or hack to hack, and why?

'''Myria''': Hacking modern systems is getting really complicated. The hardware is complicated, the software has exploit mitigations, and they use cryptography such as digital signatures. There may come a point not that long from now where systems are too secure to have a realistic chance to break. iOS is quickly approaching this, for example.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code or hack?

'''Myria''': Game overhauls, where a huge amount of the game changes, showing the hacking / reverse engineering prowess of the creator.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Myria''': It's not a game per se, but the 3DS was a really fun console to hack. There were so many bugs - just look at the firmware version history - and so many fun ways to mess with the system. It also had a great library of games to play when not hacking.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Myria''': Mostly lately, I'm watching speedruns and playing randomizers.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Myria''': We need young people to become interested in these things like I was. Also, we need to hope that console and computer companies keep making mistakes in security, because it's quite possible that future computers will only let you do things these companies let you do.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code or hack you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Myria''': Parts of FF5 I couldn't get right with the skills I had in high school. I did silly things like using a lookup table to divide by 5 because I couldn't figure out how to do that in math.

I tried to find a way to make a DVD that could boot unsigned code directly on the original Xbox, but I never found a way. There didn't seem to be any exploitable bugs in the filesystem driver, nor any flaws in the digital signature checking code. Perhaps when quantum computers become viable, I could lay that one to rest.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Myria''': Try to keep what you're doing legal. I had a close call with the Feds, though not over anything I've described here.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Bungholio (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-18T14:57:38Z

Demonic722:

==May 2nd, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among many other things, you hacked quite an impressive list of codes for Shadow of the Colossus. What inspired you to do this?

'''bungholio''': I wanted more than just infinite health and infinite grip, the have all items codes seemed to randomly cause the game to freeze or get stuck at some loading screen, and time trial mode on colossus 3 was giving me blood boiling rage.
I also read many people requesting for some way to explore the game. I was trying to find anything to help with that, like a way to climb any surface, moon jump, no clipping, or a position modifier. I didn't find any of the things I originally wanted. I've encountered 2 different people that have ran the game on an emulator and found position modifiers, and their results were very close to each other, but for some reason the codes didn't work on the actual game. They both ended up in the 01dddd?? range, and I jokered:
41dd0000 40000001
00000000 00000000
Even with pointers, I would have hoped that would have instantly transported me somewhere. No luck, and I've encountered a few codes that messed with your ability to jump but were not useful in any kind of way either.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''bungholio''': 1-Hit Kills for Shadow Of The Colossus. It felt good to fire 1 arrow at that 3rd colossus in time trial mode and kill him, considering how many times I tried to kill him within the time limit and lost. The only thing that could have made it more satisfying is if that game had some incredibly loose ragdoll physics for him, and that arrow would have pierced his skull and thrust him back against a wall where his lifeless body would hang high and dangle like a stake in Painkiller does to enemies.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''bungholio''': At the moment, that debug menu code Skiller found for Dark Cloud 2. That's how a debug menu should be, it's crammed full of useful stuff. Those should be in every game. I was trying to do the same for Dark Cloud 1 before, it had the same labels but it didn't seem to work. Because of that, I didn't even bother trying to do the same thing for Dark Cloud 2 because I would have assumed it wouldn't work either. It's just another assumption that made me miss something great.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''bungholio''': Everyone at the codemasters-project forums. I was a royal pain in the butt the second I registered there. I'm surprised I didn't get permanently banned within a week for all the questions I asked. I probably gave Pyriel high blood pressure for all I know.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''bungholio''': Infinite Health for Quake 2 version 1.1 for the PS1. I used an emulator and playstation emulator cheater. It was a good learning experience, I didn't even know how to count in hexadecimal and didn't know what bits were until after that.
For the PS2, it was for Resident Evil Outbreak File #1 version 1.1. I saw a code at the bioflames forums for version 1.0 to move so fast that you could go through walls. I don't think I even had the patience to request for it on the cmgsccc forums back then, I just made a topic in the general section asking about converting codes from different versions or whatever, and then solved the problem myself that same day. I became very impatient very fast, and decided to try and find it myself. I didn't know what to do, I just took the code and kept increasing the address by 4. Before I found it, I kept getting other interesting effects that I started writing down and messing around with. I probably found the character type modifier as my very first code.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''bungholio''': Probably codes that deal with collision and infinite double jumps. With my screwy way of doing things, there isn't much of any "hard to hack" codes, just "not likely to find" codes. Wherever you find any player data, there's usually player health, whatever else data like MP or money, which items and how many, position data, possibly collision data, animation stuff, appearance stuff, whatever player statuses, and maybe some other interesting things.
The hardest specific codes I can think of at the moment are those things I originally wanted to find for Shadow Of The Colossus.
The codes I encounter the least though are infinite double jumps and collision disabling codes. They never seem to be with the rest of a character's data, except for the "Walk Through Walls" code for both Resident Evil Outbreak games. I have noticed that the ones I found are both usually very close together though. With Jak and Daxter, infinite double jumps were just a little higher than where the no clipping code was. For Okami, they had the same exact pointer, I just checked the referrers and separated them both. That might just be a coincidence.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''bungholio''': Almost anything, I don't really discriminate. I like codes that can help me do things easier and faster. An RPG like Disgaea can make me incredibly impatient, it takes forever to level up and do all that you want. With Pyriel's codes I can max out everything in a single battle, and with a few of my own I can go to whatever level and view whatever story sequence I want or just beat the game and view different endings.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''bungholio''': Nothing really stands out, other than how much time it takes and then the time it takes to test them.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''bungholio''': I don't know. I've never bothered checking for anything other than a way of moving data from my memory card to my computer, which was the thing I relentlessly asked about when I first registered at the codemasters-project forums. I'm probably missing out on some really good things for all I know.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''bungholio''': Both Resident Evil Outbreak games. I found one thing after the next, there were many codes right next to each other. For some reason, I just really like those games, even though I hate those long loading screens between every room. Every time I'm at a long loading screen, I always remember that moment in Scrubs where Turk messed up Dr. Kelso's scores for Pac-Man or whatever that game was and then Dr. Kelso yells at him "Do you know how long it took me to do that!? PEOPLE DIED WAITING!!!" or whatever. I wish I had a hard drive for those games, they take forever to load.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''bungholio''': Not a chance. For every last little thing I'm doing, I'm typing it down in a text file named after the game. I never lost a thing, and never will. Everybody should be doing that. When you're done, just copy and paste it to whatever sites you want to.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''bungholio''': With my odd way of finding codes, there's no such thing as a "hair-pulling" hack. There are just some that take a little longer to do than others. The longest was that Current Colossus Modifier code for Shadow Of The Colossus, the longer one of the 2.
1. I set something to 0, and noticed my sword wasn't aiming at the correct colossus. I figured out which exact address it was and thought I found a simple code to skip to any colossus I wanted to whenever I wanted to. "00" led to colossus 1. I went to it and there was nothing there.
2. I set more stuff to 0 and went to colossus 1 and it loaded. I found that turning off a specific bit allowed a specific colossus to appear. That fixed it for all of them. I thought I was done. Then I noticed the door to colossus 16 wouldn't open.
3. I noticed I couldn't get through that big door to fight colossus 16. I had a normal save outside that door. I set a bunch of addresses to 0, and then I couldn't get through the door. I eventually found turning a certain bit on allowed the door to open.
4. I went and fought an earlier colossus I had already normally defeated. I noticed it's dead body was on the ground while I was fighting it. I wanted to get rid of it. I set a bunch of addresses to 0, and noticed their bodies appeared even for ones I hadn't fought yet. I found that turning a specific bit on removed a specific colossus corpse, destroyed it's specific statue, and made it appear on the map. I realized that coincided with the bit to open the big door before colossus 16 and that I had already found all of the digits before, so that saved a lot of time. I thought I was done, I was about to submit it. I killed a colossus and then immediately went back to it, and it died instantly yet didn't trigger that little animation sequence that happens when those black threads fly into you. I could have submitted it and told people they couldn't fight the same exact colossus 2 times in a row, but I thought "screw that" and decided to see if I could fix that little problem.
5. I tried another bunch of addresses as 0, and one of them seemed to have slightly fixed that problem. Instead of dying when I went back to them, they were now just roaming around. Once again, I wanted to see if I could get it perfect. It seemed to be some very specific digit that I didn't bother figuring out what it was, too lazy.
6. I set another bunch of addresses to 0. That fixed it. Turning off a specific bit reset a specific colossus. Then I noticed the little intro movies for some of them weren't playing. I decided to try and see if I could fix that too.
7. Same thing, I set a bunch of addresses to 0. Once again, turning off a specific bit allowed a certain intro movie to play.
8. Everything seemed perfect, then I noticed the music for colossus 8 seemed like it was too early. Another bunch of addresses set to 0, and I found that. Just turned off another bit.
That whole thing took a lot of time over almost a month. It wasn't even necessary, if you want to fight a specific colossus, just go to time trial mode. I did it just because I could I guess. Big waste of time. I'm nearly 100% certain I could have even removed the armor from colossi 11 and 14 just to save some people some time since they seemed to have been affected by the 0's, but I was sick of it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''bungholio''': I couldn't get that "Instantly Kill Any Colossus" code to work for Shadow Of The Colossus. I was probably even close, but lost patience. That's the one and only one so far. It wasn't too necessary, 1-Hit Kills are good enough.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''bungholio''': Watch TV and work. I have 3 dogs I love to pick on too, dogs are great friends to have.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''bungholio''': Being able to emulate games and use some plugins or software to find codes helps a lot. People sharing whatever knowledge and tools they have helps. I don't know. I would really like to know what console and game makers have against cheating. I can see why they would hate it for online games, but singleplayer? They shouldn't have anything against that. The only thing I ever saw mentioned about it was some junk about people messing with art. Who cares? Anybody could call anything art, even a car they designed, but I'm still going to change my car however I want to. If that's the only argument, they need to pull the sticks out of their asses and learn to allow it. Nothing is being stolen and profited from, no crime is being committed. Who cares? Some people will find a game to be too easy and boring, and others will find it so unbelievably frustrating they would love nothing more than to pick up their TV and break it over somebody's head. Codes can fix that problem, they make things better. If people want to skip through a game as fast as possible and miss playing it the way it was designed, that should be the gamer's choice. It's the gamer's loss. Why is our freedom to have fun the way we want to being completely removed?

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''bungholio''': The same thing that applies to anything throughout life: Try, try, and try again. Keep trying. If you are trying to make your own codes, you'll probably fail a lot. Try something old with an emulator and some good plugins, Viper's Renegade, Cheat Engine, or something else for a start. Don't tackle ASM head on without the slightest crumb of knowledge about it, it will frustrate you a lot. Try my dumb method: check all of the addresses around other people's codes, they probably missed a lot of things, unless I already got to the game first. Wherever there is one code, there's almost always a bunch more right next to it. Also ask people for help, keep prying at them, you are bound to get something out of them even though you might not have a clue about what they are talking about. Anything is better than nothing. I know almost nothing about ASM, and I have found many codes, and I didn't have a nice computer with an emulator and stuff to make it easy. It might be easier than you'd expect. Give it a try. If everybody had my personality where you would just blindly check nearby addresses of other codes, there would be many more codes. I couldn't stress "many" enough without making it all caps, huge font, and shiny colorful bold letters. A lot of games would probably be picked bone dry with nothing left and nobody would request a thing for it because they would have everything they would ever need. Try it people.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Kenobi (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-10T21:13:44Z

Demonic722:

==June 13th, 2009==

'''Lazy Bastard''': You've written many programs that have been helpful to the hacking community, reverse-engineered many cheat devices/systems, to include encryption algorithms and code types, and hacked quite a few impressive codes. What was your inspiration for all this?

'''kenobi''': Well, I used to work for video games magazine, and as such I had to finish games very fast, or make walkthrough in a short time. I was also pleased by the ability to take screenshots directly from the RAM (with a quality greater than any capture card). That's how I started using hacking devices, and hacking codes. Then I wanted to learn more, understand how the devices/games were working, and I started learning asm and reverse engineering. Meanwhile I started programming in Delphi (simple but powerful language, perfect for my little basic skills), helped Forgotten with VBA development (under the nickname pokemonhacker) which was a great way to understand how the GB/C/A hardware was working...

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''kenobi''': The NGC AR hacks (adding new features to it - or correcting bugs) were the one I liked the most, because (IMO) they were really useful.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''kenobi''': Zeld's MPH aimbot seems pretty amazing. He must have been a nice challenge to achieve. I'm not sure I would have done it if I had tried.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''kenobi''': It's Parasyte for both. When the GBA Pokémon's games came out, there was that "encounter any pokémon" code that everyone wanted. So I started looking for it, and doing so I heard about an AR code (Type 6) that was kinda "rewriting the game ROM". I couldn't understand how it worked (as you can't rewrite ROM), so I searched on google and asked on Kodewerx (well back then it wasn't Kodewerx already) if anyone could explain it to me. Parasyte started some very detailed explanations. From there I didn't stop asking questions, and learned a lot from him. Then I tried to follow his "share to the community" path by releasing documentation and tools (unfortunately I can't release codesource as I'm a very bad programmer and all of them look awful). His ability to explain things in a very clear way, his amazing knowledge and his talent impressed me a lot. I'm very glad to have met him, and to have worked on some projects with him !

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''kenobi''': Honestly I can't tell for sure. It could have been some PSX game... The one I remember the most is a code for Wild Arms 2. I was playing it in japanese, and there was 7 stones you had to touch in the right order to open a door. I couldn't find the right order in-game (and 7*6*5*4*3*2 is a bit too much of combinations to try), so I started searching for a code. After some tries I found the address where the value that told if the stones were touched in the good order was stored, and I was able to continue and finish the game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''kenobi''': Tough question, as it all goes with your skills, the game you're hacking and the tools you have (a simple health code can be a nightmare on some games). But I'd say usually hacking asm codes that change the way the games behave (could be wtw/walk on water/save anywhere/...) can be the most difficult to hack, because you have to "master" the asm, and a lot of backtracing is involved. So a few people can do them, and fewer people actually try to do them.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''kenobi''': I love those hacks that enable debug features (especially when it means having access to "test rooms" or "debug levels"). Unfortunately too few games have debug stuff left (or they are too well hidden). I also like codes that render some games less painful to play (could be a code that let you move faster, or display the text instantly).

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your least favorite aspect of hacking?

'''kenobi''': The time it takes :/ That's why I kinda stopped releasing stuff. I still watch the scene, but I don't participate a lot anymore.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you like least about the hacking scene?

'''kenobi''': Honestly nothing, I love it as it is.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''kenobi''': GBA's Pokémon without a doubt. Not only was I amazed how such a "simple" game could have so many codes done, but hacking it helped me understand the internal behaviour of the game. It was very entertaining, and there was some kind of competition between hackers with was very stimulative (there was a hardcore hacker community that was very active (meowth, filb, loadingnow to name a few)).

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack an awesome code, or find an address in memory that would've yielded an awesome code, but then lost it somehow?

'''kenobi''': Nope, I don't believe so. However I know I sometime find codes (or addresses), then forgot to write them down, and then I have to find them all over again.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''kenobi''': Well I can't remember of a code that I would consider as the most difficult. I know I had a hard time trying unsuccessfully to find an item code for DKR on the DS, but once I got my pointer tool ready finding it was a breeze (the game was using "pointer in pointer"). Apart that I'd say that in general it was the reverse engineering (of cheating devices) and the programming (gcnrdgui, wiirdgui, vba) that were the most difficult (but the most rewarding).

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''kenobi''': I honestly guess there are plenty. I remember trying to hack a health code for a DBZ game, and I couldn't get anywhere.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''kenobi''': Well I have a full time job, which doesn't leave me a lot of free time. But I do the usual I guess : TV, movies, books, family... Nothing fancy.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''kenobi''': No idea. I mean, I don't think something must happen. It goes as it goes... As I kept meeting/seeing people "new to the scene" with a great knowledge and a real talent, I'm confident in the future of hacking.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''kenobi''': Be curious, try to understand how things work, read the documentations, and if you don't get it, ask (I bet a lot of people will be more than happy to teach you). Oh, and be prepared to spend a lot of your free time on it!

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Parasyte (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-10T21:03:24Z

Demonic722:

==April 17th, 2009==

'''Parasyte''': Hi Jason ['''Lazy Bastard'''],

First, thanks for even taking the time to do something like this. I figure, at the very least, it will be entertaining to read what some of the more well-known hackers think of their own contributions and those of their peers.

Video game hacking is not very "big" or mainstream, but I believe there is a lot of collective knowledge out there on the subject. If up-and-coming hackers gain anything from these interviews, I would call it an instant success. If we interviewees gain anything from it, then it all comes full-circle. Brilliance.

My answers follow below. (Note that I've swapped questions 11 and 12, which I think makes more sense in context.)

Jay ['''Parasyte''']

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among many other things, you created GCNrd and built KodeWerx. What inspired you to do each of these things, and how did you go about them?

'''Parasyte''': GCNrd (Nintendo GameCube Remote Debugger) was a project that has its roots firmly planted in the GameShark Pro 3.0. That was the first product I've seen with the capability of taking full control over a game console and the software running on it.

Within the first few days after I released GCNcrypt 1.0 (a program capable of encrypting and decrypting GameCube Action Replay codes), I made a forum post about wanting to create a "proper" hacking tool for GameCube, and explained how it could be done with the BroadBand Adapter (which at the time was used exclusively for uploading small homebrew programs to the GameCube through the Phantasy Star Online game).

Those statements were little more than just a boast; I didn't have any TCP/IP stack-level programming experience, debugger development experience, or anything even resembling a program that I was trying to explain. But nine months later, GCNrd "v1.00b" (meaning version 1.00 beta) was publicly released! It was probably the first GameCube homebrew code to use the BBA directly, and definitely the first [non-commercial and widely available] program to boot GCN game discs and do general debugging work on the hardware.

Of course, it had bugs. Many were fixed by the next (and currently final, as of April 2009) release, v1.10b. There were bugs that couldn't be fixed at all due to the architectural design of the debugger. I did start on a complete rewrite, aimed for a "v2.00" release, but I had to stop working on it, and now my GameCube is locked in my closet!

There is still some hope, though; GCNrd was my inspiration for a new debugging paradigm, if you can believe that! Maybe some day (when my current debugger project is stable) I'll continue working on the "GCNrd v2.00" code base and fully port it to the modern debugger protocol (which is currently unnamed).

Kodewerx is best known for its forums. We have many active members, most of whom focus on Nintendo DS hacking. The website also hosts my personal strangeness and some of the programming projects I've developed or helped to develop over the years.

One such project, "EnHacklopedia," is an unfinished, but thoroughly detailed document covering many aspects of video game hacking. It was released under a Creative Commons Share Alike license, which we've seen put to good use [for example] when it was transferred to a wiki hosted on GSHI. There are at least two other mirrors of the complete document, as well.

The Kodewerx website also hosts a wiki, Mercurial revision control system, a Bugzilla bug tracker, and even a blog. These things have not yet been used to their full potential, unfortunately. So far they have been my own personal playground to experiment with. I'm hopeful that as some of these projects come to fruition, these services will become more and more useful to the people who use those projects.

Kodewerx was initially formed circa 2002, as a revolt against the "original" GSCentral. At the time, I called it "Codewerx," it was very small and unhealthy. In October 2006, the second great revolt against GSC took place, and the site was reborn. This time with a real domain and a slightly new name (due to domain availability, honestly).

The forum gathered attention quickly. I think mostly it was the attitude of the time. In the first year, we had to break a lot of rules. We caused a lot of trouble, made some waves. But it got Kodewerx recognition. And here we are; still growing. If that first year was any indication, you might even call Kodewerx a "sleeping giant." Make no mistake, here be dragons.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked?

'''Parasyte''': "Jesus Mode" for Super Mario 64 is probably my personal favorite of all the codes I've hacked. It wasn't well tested though, and neither was the same code for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time v1.0 (which is badly broke outside of Kokiri Forest). I'd like to fix it, and I'd also like to port it to other versions of the game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time?

'''Parasyte''': That would probably the so-called "Super Code" for Resident Evil 2 (PSX) which I believe was originally written by Wayne Beckett for the Xploder cheat device. The "Super Code" title doesn't really explain what it does, in an unfortunate case of marketing gimmicks.

The code allows a player to enter their in-game inventory and give themselves any item and any quantity of that item in any inventory slot, using the L1, L2, R1, and R2 buttons on the controller.

It was a fairly small program, but turned into a monstrosity of a code. Even with Xploder's (at the time) advanced code type allowing a large string of data to be written into memory at a specific starting address (which eliminated about 2/3 of the code's final size). When converted to GameShark/Action Replay, the code was a huge nightmare just to enter into the device.

But the program itself was very impressive to me in the late 90's. I studied it for a month (this was before I understood any assembly) and still couldn't wrap my head around it. Over the next few months, I learned the C programming language, and then went back to study the code. By that time, it all made sense. That gave me a deeper respect for what it really was.

A few years later, the original Resident Evil was redesigned and re-released for GameCube. I felt obliged to recreate that code as an homage (and because it's just a cool code to have!) This time, I called it an "Inventory Modifier." I used the C-Stick to change the item/quantity in the highlighted inventory slot, but it was basically the same.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Parasyte''': Barubary, a veteran from the old school ROM hacking/translation scene. The same guy that taught or inspired Code Master (CMX). I've never personally talked to Barubary. His PSX hacks were inspiration enough.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was your first code/hack?

'''Parasyte''': The first one I remember "creating" was for Super Mario 64. By changing the address on the Level Select code, I found one which made colorful horizontal bars appear along the bottom of the screen. I later found out that it was a basic sound level meter. The exact same meter was available in Mario Kart 64, and could be enabled through a debug menu on the title screen.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Parasyte''': The most difficult type of code to hack is the kind that no one has created before. There are no tutorials to guide you through it, no pre-existing knowledge of the basic process... Basically, you end up inventing a methodology to get from point A ("how the heck do I do this?") to point B (success!) When it involves writing and hacking assembly, the complexity usually rises exponentially.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Parasyte''': Anything that is fun to play with, or that's interesting from a technical standpoint. Codes that cover both of these aspects are rare, but definitely have the best payoff.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Parasyte''': So far, Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes on GameCube. I managed to create a lot of interesting things for that game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Parasyte''': Dreaming up big ideas, yelling at dumb people and making them feel bad... You know, the usual.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Parasyte''': The same thing that happened to software development: an open source revolution. Video game hacking has always been too commercial and too proprietary to be of any use to anyone outside of single, short-lived console life spans.

Digital signatures and encryption are becoming more prevalent in video game consoles these days. Independent (unlicensed) cheat device manufacturers are becoming extinct. This will continue until console modification becomes the only [necessary] way to cheat and hack your favorite games. This area of video game hacking has always existed, but has also been just as commercial (though very much black-market).

It's like Lieutenant Gordon said in Batman Begins: "Escalation; you buy armor, they buy armor piercing rounds." Eventually, a breaking point will be reached and things will change.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Was there ever a code you just couldn't get to work quite correctly (something you hacked/attempted to hack)?

'''Parasyte''': Yes. Several. Off the top of my head:

* Walk Through Walls, Super Mario 64 (N64)
* Walk Through Walls, Metroid Prime (GCN)
* Jesus Mode, Metroid Prime (GCN)
* Moon Jump, GoldenEye 007 (N64)
* General Purpose GameBoy Emulator, Pokemon Stadium 1 & 2 (N64)

The existing "Moon Jump" code for GoldenEye works, with one caveat: You must first fall from a ledge to get airborne. I wasn't able to get that working while just standing still, the last time I tried. Of course, I have some new tricks up my sleeve since then. Maybe I will revisit all of these one day, if someone else doesn't get there first.

The GameBoy emulator in the Pokemon Stadium games only allows Pokemon Red & Blue to be played, but it is capable of running many GB games. I just haven't found a way to get the emulator to load any other games from the GB Transfer Pak.

See also, "Unhacked/Impossible N64/PSX Codes" sticky threads on the Kodewerx Forums for an extensive (but not exhaustive) list of codes that hackers have been unable to complete or even start on. The reason for lack of any other console is mostly due to the difficulty of determining the "possibility" of hacking some codes. They just have to be requested and attempted enough times to be considered extremely unlikely by people who know what they are doing.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Parasyte''': Never be afraid of failure. You will fail; you will fail more often than you succeed. If you fear that, you will never do anything worthwhile, and you will never innovate.

Be prepared to fail, but don't get discouraged by it. Just change your plan a bit, and try again.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Thanks again for participating; I think this will be quite a good new section to GSHI, and will be of some 'historical' significance as well.

'''Parasyte''': And thank you. It's been nice to reminisce on some of the things I've done. Yes, it will be of historical significance. Don't worry about that in the least. I just hope I've been verbose enough to keep the interview interesting, without getting to the point of rambling or making a dull read for the audience.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Demonic722 (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-10T20:58:57Z

Demonic722:

==September 14th, 2017==

'''Lazy Bastard''': Among many other codes, you've hacked a veritable trove of Walk Anywhere and Walk Through Walls codes. These are generally considered a difficult type of code to hack consistently. How did you pull these off? Any general tips for other hackers?

'''Demonic722''': I learned the basics from EnHacklopedia and from there, I've had to experiment. Some games required extensive tracing, some games didn't. I even got lucky a few times and found a few of them with RAM searches. It really depends on the game and the tools you have available. We didn't and still don't have the luxury of a trace logger in the nds scene so finding the code can be very tedious.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What's something you did in the scene which you think was pretty cool, but isn't very well-known?

'''Demonic722''': Nothing comes to mind. Aside from the codes, a few programs and taking over the nds usrcheat project, I don't think I have anything else I could contribute right now.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack that you hacked? What gave you the idea, and how did you go about hacking it?

'''Demonic722''': Ah, that's a difficult one, but I'll go with my "Enable Movement in the Inventory" code for Animal Crossing: Wild World. I wanted to create a code that was a little more distinguishable from other hacker's codes for this game. One day, I happened to stumble across the address I needed during one of my RAM searches, but it came with a few caveats that I had to work out.

The code pretty much replicates the functionality of the inventory and player movement in Animal Crossing: New Leaf. It also adds some additional features like walking while talking to NPCs, reversing the screen in the inventory view so you can move with the stylus, etc.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite code/hack of all time, by any hacker?

'''Demonic722''': Text to Item by Virus and Toenailed for Animal Crossing: Wild World. That code revolutionized the game and made it possible for other text related codes. It was enjoyable both online and offline. Jesus Mode for Super Mario 64 by Parasyte is a close second, but I've never used it personally and Zeld's aimbot for Metroid Prime Hunters.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What was the first thing you hacked for any game?

'''Demonic722''': I honestly don't remember, but I have a hunch it was a simple code to turn the player's house lights on and off in Animal Crossing: Wild World.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Who would you say influenced you the most in the video game hacking scene? Who did you 'look up to' when you first entered the scene? (doesn't have to be the same person for both)

'''Demonic722''': I will have to say elixirdream influenced me the most. That guy was always releasing tons of codes for newly released titles and is probably the top contributor to the usrcheat project. I looked up to dragonboy269, a fellow hacker from game-hackers.com. He got me started on game hacking and taught me a great deal of what I know about assembly. He would give me the source code to his public and private assembly codes and I used to study and learn from them.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think is the most difficult type of code/hack to hack, and why?

'''Demonic722''': Anything that hasn't been done. You must think about what to hack and how to hack it since there won't be a tutorial that works for most games readily available to you. There's also those difficult assembly codes like walk through walls/anywhere or anything else that bypasses a restriction. The complexity of those codes vary since every game is unique so different methods may have to be used to achieve the desired effect.

'''Lazy Bastard''': On that note, what was the most difficult, 'hair-pulling' hack you've ever accomplished?

'''Demonic722''': I can't remember the most difficult, but two games are coming to mind as I'm typing this: Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Blue Rescue Team and The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of The Dragon. It took me quite a few attempts to get that 100% recruit code working for PMD: Blue Rescue Team only because my original approach was way too flawed and would have required even more tracing. I had to take a few days off before I tried again and eventually chose a different address to back trace from. For Spyro, I'm convinced those games are coded like shit just because. It's either write the codes in assembly or find a way to write a proper pointer code that works, but will most likely lead you to tracing the assembly anyway because none of the pointer tools for nds searched more than two levels of pointers.

'''Lazy Bastard''': That said, was there ever a code you hacked that you just couldn't get to work quite correctly?

'''Demonic722''': I won't say that I hacked it, but rather, tried to hack. The Infinite HP and MP codes for Fossil Fighters: Champions on the Nintendo DS. I simply had no patience because the tools we had then and now did not make hunting down the code an easy task. I could never get NO$GBA Debugger save states to work and that's an essential feature every emulator needs. That wasn't even the most frustrating part, though. Tack on some DMA and face values and you got yourself in an even shittier situation. I haven't tried again since the time the game released. However, if I remember correctly, elixirdream cracked it and he even sent me the code, but I lost it. I think it was a 7-8 tier pointer code.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite type of code/hack?

'''Demonic722''': Walk Through Walls/Anywhere because I like accessing areas I'm not supposed to.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Which game did you find the most fun to hack, and why?

'''Demonic722''': Animal Crossing: Wild World is the clear winner here, though, I've enjoyed a lot of my assembly codes for various games. It's just one of those games where you couldn't possibly run out of things to hack for it. There's still some things I have yet to explore in that game.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Did you ever hack something awesome, but then lose it somehow?

'''Demonic722''': I lost a lot of my codes, assembly sources and documentations about 5-6 years ago due to an improper backup. Anything I didn't release during that period will remain unreleased. I don't think that fresh Windows 7 install was worth it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': Aside from hacking and gaming, how do you like to spend your time?

'''Demonic722''': Programming, watching movies and hanging out with friends.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What is your favorite video game ever?

'''Demonic722''': My favorite video game ever is Animal Crossing: Wild World. I have so many memories on that game from the people I've met online to the codes I've hacked for it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': What do you think must happen for the video game hacking scene to continue to thrive?

'''Demonic722''': More documentation. There are people out there with vast knowledge on certain topics, but won't provide any clarity for whatever reason. Also, I'm sick of those developers who leave the scene with closed source, free software. If you have a popular program and you're thinking about leaving the scene, unless that program is perfect in every shape and form, please do us all a favor and open the source so someone can make potential updates to it.

'''Lazy Bastard''': One last question: if you had one thing to say to current, aspiring, and future hackers, what would it be?

'''Demonic722''': Keep pushing. The only thing that's stopping you is you.

[[Category:Hackers of Lore]]

Demonic722 (Hackers of Lore)

2025-06-10T20:58:36Z

Demonic722: /* September 14th, 2017 */