When I was a child there was nothing more frustrating than playing a level over and over only to constantly be defeated by a labyrinth, enemy or puzzle that was beyond my skill level. I would become infuriated, throw the controller and storm off in a huff. These games would later be relegated to a dark corner of the closet never to be heard from again, my parents money wasted after just a few short days of gaming….or so I thought.

In the late 1980s, the proliferation of 8-bit consoles was unprecedented games like Zelda, Alexx Kidd and Super Mario Brothers had taken the world by storm and every child was anxiously awaiting birthdays and holiday to get the latest game or platform. Each game provided hours of enjoyment and promised to improve hand-eye co-ordination that would later assist in little league, tennis or a myriad of other athletic endeavors.

The issue with these games would arise in one of two ultimate conditions either the game would be beaten and interest in it eliminated or an insurmountable challenge would present itself. In either of the two instances, interest in the game would diminish and gamers would be without games until they accumulated appropriate wealth or the next gift giving event in their life occurred.

Then came the onset of game cheats eft hacks and all those old games would once again become fun new games. Cheats started appearing in gaming magazines such as Gamepro in the late 80s and would later be spread in the playgrounds of local schools. Children would rush home and test out the new cheats with high levels of anticipation. The net result would be a new found interest in an old game.

Around the same point, one intuitive company created a device that would change the face of gaming forever. The device entitled “Game Genie” offered gamers the opportunity to unlock hidden levels, appear invisible to enemies, play games with unlimited lives and a variety of other revolutionary enhancements to their old and dusty games. These minor changes in the 1s and 0s of the game were responsible for giving new life to old games saving parents countless dollars and grief waiting in lines for stores to open. Game genie would ultimately be followed by a series of successors including GameShark, Action Replay and others.

This trend which started in the eighties is still alive and well now almost twenty years later. As games and systems now cost considerably more and the economy is in a considerably worse state, it is essential to get as much mileage as possible out of these old games. Now gamers have a treasure trove of information available to them through the likes of one of hundred of mainstream cheat sites. No longer are gamers tied to third party technology, magazines or the schoolyard when it comes to getting their game enhancing cheats. Users can simply go to google, find a game cheat site and viola, new life and savings from an old game!