Something you don’t see anymore, cheat codes are kind of a huge part of the Grand Theft Auto experience.
But that raises the philosophical question: Are cheat codes a bad thing? And, if they are, is that why we don’t see them anymore?
To be clear, any veteran gamer from the day can tell you about how integral cheat codes were to the gaming life.
Some NES games were basically impossible without them.
Aside from that, they could also change the game in new and dramatic ways, sometimes making an otherwise lackluster game fun and memorable.
Grand Theft Auto, however, has always had cheat codes and has often advertised them quite early.
It’s an essential part of the game.
Yet there are those gamers that might think using a cheat code somehow shortcuts the experience of playing the game.
This viewpoint is understandable when you compare the relative difficulty of games made now with games made back then.
Whereas sometimes cheat codes were necessary to overcome bad game mechanics or programming, now it is a totally optional thing.
And GTA is a bit of a grind.
If you don’t have the time to put into that kind of thing, then cheats are a natural way to enjoy the chaos of the game without spending hours earning everything.
As the online mode has proven, that chaos is also an essential element to a GTA game.
Many of us have spent hours playing GTA only to take a break and start doing things a little off the beaten path in the game, sometimes using cheat codes.
Who hasn’t wanted to see how far they could get in a rampage or self-made minigame.
This is pretty much the crux of GTA’s gameplay and the selling point for all of the online modes: It is the definition of a sandbox title.
Looking at it from this standpoint, there’s no way that cheat codes in GTA V could be a bad thing.
They’re an essential part of the game no matter how you look at it.
The day that GTA becomes a grindy RPG is the day it largely loses its audience.
Cheat codes help the game maintain its quirky, off-kilter approach while keeping things fun and even adding a touch of the arcade.
In a broader sense, there’s really nothing wrong with using cheat codes, but most games made now are so much different from the era in which cheat codes rose to prominence. This is in terms of both quality and even difficulty level selection.
Rather than overcoming some flaw in the game, cheat codes now are an add on or an extra. Heck, you could even argue that they are throwback to and earlier era.
But they’re definitely not a bad thing, not in GTA V or otherwise. Everyone games in the way that best suits them. Some people use cheat codes, other people don’t, in the end both people are gamers.
