by Andrew Post

Created on: May 18, 2008

The very name "cheat code" implies that video game players are breaking some kind of unwritten ethic when they use them. The thinking is that you ought to be man (or woman) enough to beat a game using the rules that the designers set down and by your own wits and skill, not with some nifty programming sidestep that gives you an unfair leg up.

In deference to that unwritten rule, I use cheat codes only when I've already beaten the game without them. The only time I would violate that rule is when the game itself is substandard, disappointing or one-dimensional without them. Take, for instance, any number of cut-rate first-person shooters out there. One of my favorites is called "Turok: Evolution." You play as Tal-Set, a Native American (Indian?) warrior intentionally abducted into another dimension by a shady wizard to wage war on an evil race of lizard-men bent on planetary domination. Along the way, this Indian (Native American?) picks up and learns how to use everything from rocket launchers to laser guns to nukes. Going up against all manner of futuristic enemies like plasma-propelled spaceships and massive herbivorous dinosaurs with missile launchers strapped to their backs, Tal-Set defeats all his foes and assumes the mystic mantle of Turok, protector of the otherworldly realms.

Sounds weird, right? Well, it is. And unfortunately, it's got a gameplay style to match. No matter how long you hold down the button, Tal-Set will only chuck his grenades about 20 yards, which nixes him out of any future with the NFL. Tal-Set is also insanely sensitive; even playing on the normal difficulty, I could only get about midway through the game before I came up against a certain level that I just couldn't beat. Tal-Set would take one too many hits and keel over and then I'd have to start the bloody level all over again.

Enter the cheats. Literally.

Easily accessed from such philanthropic Internet sites as IGN and Gamespot, the cheats for "Turok: Evolution" include invincibility (this makes the player impervious to damage of any kind, except falls), invisibility, unlimited ammo, and all weapons (every weapon in the game, or at least on that particular level, is suddenly granted to the player). Armed with advantages like that the game was absurdly easy, but more importantly, it was vastly more entertaining and fun to play. True, it wasn't much of a challenge, but on the whole I don't play video games for the challenge. I play them to relax...and to whack a few humanoid reptiles'

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