I'm a cheater. Have you ever ruined a singleplayer game for yourself by cheating?

[ZedClampet]

(Note: there was a weekend question about cheating, but not whether you ruined the experience, but the thread is closed anyway)

I've been playing Car Mechanic Simulator 2018 and really enjoying it, but the grind is just getting to me. One of the main aspects of the game is buying junkers and restoring them, and I've been really looking forward to that, but you can't do it until you are level 30. I've played 42 hours so far, and I am level 18. I just want to restore some dang cars. So I looked it up, and there is a cheat code provided by the developer that lets you create a new profile and start at level 46 with $500,000. I debated for 2 days whether to do that because I'm afraid I won't go back to my original game and sort of mess everything up, but I finally decided to use the cheat. I went to a junkyard and bought a couple of clunkers and am now fixing them up.

I've ruined more than a couple of SP games by doing stuff like this. Hopefully, it wasn't the wrong move.

Anyone else ruin their enjoyment of a game by cheating?

 

[Zloth]

I don't remember ever ruining one. I don't use cheats much and, when I do, it's typically via a mod that can easily be removed.

 

[Brian Boru]

I use mods all the time to improve my playing experience. While I loved Civ4, I would have stopped playing after a couple of years because of the UI shortcomings—even tho the UI was excellent, there were still plenty of cracks in such an informationally complex game. The wonderful BAT/BUG/BULL mod collection mean I still play Civ4 to this day.

I dropped Far Cry 5 for many months until the Resistance mod came out. If anyone knows of a way to cheat the Far Cry games from 3 on to bypass the unskippable 20-30 minute intro sequences, please post—they stop me from launching a new game so many times.

When I replay a game, it's not always for the joy of grinding my way to a decent level—it may be just to enjoy exploring the world and characters again. If there's a cheat which allows that, you bet I'll use it.

Anyone else ruin their enjoyment of a game by cheating?

No, can't recall that ever—almost always the opposite, ie enable or enhance my enjoyment.

 

[mikeisekim]

Anyone else ruin their enjoyment of a game by cheating?

Yes, without a doubt. My weakness - unquestioned - is sports games, to which I'm mocked by all my friends lol. That being said, I'm a good ol' self-hating sports game fan. I grew up playing Madden since I was about 13 and have just seen it go completely downhill. I picked up 2K in 2014 and really enjoyed it. Jump forward and I just completely hate the current scene of all of it.

The only modes that devs care about at all are the ones that get pumped full of endless microtransactions. My favorite thing to do in any sports game was to hop on Madden, start a franchise, fantasy draft, and just start fresh. But franchise sucks now, and I don't know if it's gettin any better. 2K was the same except I genuinely loved playing MyCareer - and now you're essentially in grind limbo for seasons and seasons unless you fork up cash.

So, I bought 2K14 on Steam for like, ten bucks, and cheat engine'd myself the most insane, Jordan-meets-Lebron player ever. Won rings every year for like two years, and am just bored of it now lol. I dunno that I'll even feel the same about that game.

 

[Johnway]

99.99% the only reason i cheat is because i'm seriously stuck whether i've got myself in a bind but more likely i haven't a clue what the hell i'm doing. The latter is either i'm missing something, me being absolutely thick and/or poor design.

But there was one time i remember that i absolutely ruined the game and that was Age of empires 2. I wasn't having fun with the game and i was losing patience with it. It was early in the game with the joan of arc campaign as well. The longbows and my inexperience with RTS games in general made me snap and i decided to cheat spawning the cobra car just to see the game through. i did this for several of the missions before i was wondering what the hell i was doing. If i wasn't having fun or playing properly what was the bloody point of playing it?

Fast forward nearly 10 years and i bought the "definitive" edition of AOE2 and i'm looking forward to the QoL changes, better graphics and hopefully with more experience with strategy games (i did beat AoM and AoE 3 since playing AOE2) i thought i should give the game a second chance.

 

[MrShadow]

interesting question, i bet a lot more gamers will cheat than they let on.

ive always cheated in console gaming-it was using an action replay card (was known as the game shark card in america i think),which wasnt so much to get ahead but to change the coding, so perhaps if you are playing as solid snake in metal gear solid, you want to dress in a tuxedo without completing it so many times to get it the ethicaly pleasing way,or you are playing grand theft auto vice city and you want to make cars jump.....or it might not be an action replay card and might be within the game itself eg-you are playing goldeneye64 and you want to play certain levels over and over like i used to, so opening up the level select menu was something i did.

i have no problem with other people cheating as long as its done on their own single player account and doesnt give them an advantage over other people or get them ahaed on top player lists,if it doesnt affect other people it shoudnt affect anyone elses opinion towards them.
but for my own self rules, i choose to play through games as much as i can first before using any cheats, i havent used cheats since the playstation 2 era i think anyway but i think cheats can lengthen games if done in the right way and timing plus cheats can definately enrich a game.

 

[ZedClampet]

I use mods all the time to improve my playing experience. While I loved Civ4, I would have stopped playing after a couple of years because of the UI shortcomings—even tho the UI was excellent, there were still plenty of cracks in such an informationally complex game. The wonderful BAT/BUG/BULL mod collection mean I still play Civ4 to this day.

I dropped Far Cry 5 for many months until the Resistance mod came out. If anyone knows of a way to cheat the Far Cry games from 3 on to bypass the unskippable 20-30 minute intro sequences, please post—they stop me from launching a new game so many times.

When I replay a game, it's not always for the joy of grinding my way to a decent level—it may be just to enjoy exploring the world and characters again. If there's a cheat which allows that, you bet I'll use it.


No, can't recall that ever—almost always the opposite, ie enable or enhance my enjoyment.

I mod just about everything. Changing UI and such with mods isn't cheating at all, neither is a mod to skip cutscenes. In Total War Warhammer II, I have an ever-changing range of mods that impact gameplay, but almost all of them impact it for both me and the AI. I can't stand how slow progress is in that game without mods, so I give every faction more growth and income, for instance. But I also have mods that prevent the AI from taking advantage of certain cheats. For instance, if I'm on the highest difficulty and at war with a large faction, it bothers me that taking away their industry doesn't have any impact on them. It makes the game less strategic if they can still field 6 twenty stack armies with every imaginable unit after I've destroyed all but two of their cities. Is this cheating on my part? Sure, but it's the only thing that makes playing at higher difficulties palatable for me.

When I say ruined the game, I mostly mean in situations like I outlined in my original post. Where you have a grindy game, and you skip the grind, for instance.

 

[Pifanjr]

I used to cheat so much as a kid. I often got impatient, used cheats to give myself a ton of resources then get bored when any sense of challenge or progression was gone. The Sims is a good example of this.

Cheats could be fun too though. Unlocking all weapons in Worms 2 definitely did not ruin the game.

When I got older, I only used cheats to get through parts of a game I didn't care for. For example, I cheated the last boss fight of Dragon Age: Origins because I was done with the game but wanted to see the ending. I also cheated the entirety of the first Witcher game because I did not care for the combat, but I did really like the story.

I only rarely use mods and most of the ones I use are minor improvements or some additional content. The only mod I can think of that's pretty much a cheat is the one for Skyrim that made potions 5 times as light because I'm a hoarder and didn't want to have to throw away potions I might need later (spoiler: I never used them).

 

[mjs warlord]

I have all the dragon age games for the pc.
I wont give away any spoilers because even though they have been around a long time somebody might be about to buy them ..... somebody somewhere buys their first pc every day !

In a certain area in the first game i got fed up with being unable to kill off a certain thing.
I reluctantly found a GOD MODE that stopped me from dying but it actually made the game harder because once my 3 party players had died i was on my own. As i was now on my own it took a very long time to kill a certain something.

When i purchased all the other dragon age titles i discovered that i could not die , this made the game very hard to do because unless i could die my party member could not respawn to help me. I can only assume that the GOD MODE cheat from the first game had become embeded into the registry. I know how to get to the registry but i did not risk trying to find the entry because 1 wrong move and the sticky brown stuff would hit the fan. Since then i have never used a GOD MODE in anything.

Skyrim for pc..... After using it for a very long time i found a console code that was supposed to list all the quests and missions that i might have missed , DO NOT DO IT...... all that happens is it starts to go through what you want it to do but before it finishes the game crashes back to the desktop.

 

[Colif]

Yes but I can't give many examples.

I used to cheat in SIms to give myself more time and no need to work or sleep... but I sort of didn't see point of that game anyway. Why pretend to live someone elses life and go to work... i had to do that anyway. I prefer fantasy that I can't do in real life.

Most old games you didn't get the cheats until you almost or have finished game.. Many on N64 just added to the fun. Different ways to play game, big head modes, things like that.

Is it cheating that Torchlight 2 lets you equip lvl 100 gear at lvl 20 if you have the right stats? Maybe but its the fun sort of cheating. It means if you can juggle your equipment just the right way and don't forget that the ring with +30 skills on it is what is keeping everything else on. Shame Torchlight 3 took all that fun away.

Cheats that give you best everything right away lessen the joy of getting them at end of game... can make the game pointless. Been there.
installing win 11 beta just ruins fun of getting a new version in October.... wait, did I say that, is that cheating

 

[Brian Boru]

1 wrong move and the sticky brown stuff would hit the fan

In the Reg window, click on "Computer" at the top of the 'folder tree' on the left.
Menu > File > Export > go thru the dialog routine.

If you mess up a change, just do…
Menu > File > Import > the .reg file you saved
…and you're back to square 1.

Each operation takes maybe a minute.

 

[Colif]

Playing in registry... well, I guess Russian Roulette is a game as well, so why not.

All it takes is to forget to make that back up first.

Suggesting people play in registry sure has popped into my head a few times on other forums, just to get rid of some people, but I never have as well, they can always come back and point... and I don't want to explain it. Some people think windows is theirs and how dare it do anything without asking, and I just wish there was a version of windows that did require you to decide actions, as I expect it would take a week to boot up once... if you got that far.

 

[Brian Boru]

play in registry

Don't do that! On the other hand don't let people scare you away from carefully editing it either. The Registry has been a major FUD target since it came into existence. It is nowhere near as daunting as people would have you believe.

All it takes is to forget to make that back up first

Which obviously applies to any piece of software or document. Gotta require a certain degree of common sense from the user. Anyone who isn't making at least monthly images of their system disk is going to crash n burn sometime, cos that indicates they're not taking any care in general. With a backup, messing the Registry isn't a calamity.

Editing the Registry is certainly far easier than say building a PC, yet we help people do the latter all the time. Back it up, be careful, done—don't let anyone scare you away from it if you are sensible and careful.

 

[Colif]

99% of the problems I have solved on Tom's don't require looking in there at all so I only suggest it if its only fix.

 

[DXCHASE]

I use trainers in SP games that i dont want to take too long to play. The most recent one was Mechwarrior 5. I just wanted to have unlimited missiles and health so i could just bomb the crap out of everything, it kinda ruined the fun but i at least was able to beat the game in 2-3 sittings.

 

[OsaX Nymloth]

I haven't used cheats in years - and even then it was to do stupid **** like spawning a tank in GTA just to mess with it.

Once I had to use cheats to get through the end fight in an RPG that was just... well, quasi impossible to win for me and I invested way too much time to not see the end.

So in general, I will avoid cheats and never really think about it. But I will think of ways to exploit the game systems, sometimes even dig around game files wondering what I could find - but never using that to anything but experimenting.

Which is funny considering I am kinda using "cheats" (or dev tools) daily at work. But that's totally different thing.

 

[mainer]

No. If I'm really loving a game, I don't want to ruin it for myself. Never used the console for "god mode", or to give myself all weapons, unlimited ammo, that sort of thing. The only time I've used a console is if I'm playtesting a mod, or bunch of mods, to move myself to a specific location to see how the mod(s) affect on the game. If a game become too oppressive, or boring even, and I find myself in front of my PC and saying, "Man, I really don't feel like playing that today", then I'll just move on to something else, all the while lying to myself that I'll go back to it eventually (and usually never do).

However, I have done things that some people might consider to be cheating, like Googling the solution to particular nasty puzzle. For example, the Astarium Constellation puzzles in Dragon Age Inquisition. Most of them were either simple or of moderate difficulty, but there were about 3 or 4 that were just brutal, and I found myself spending well over an hour getting close, but not solving. Frustration. So I would look online for the solution, break out my old graph paper notebook from the 1980s, copy the pattern, go back in game, solve the problem. Cheating? It might be considered that, but the question was: "Have you ever ruined a single player game for yourself by cheating". So for me, no I didn't, I just eased a bit of frustration.

I also mod games allot. Not every game I play, but many, and even those that I do mod, I usually play at least part way through just to get a feel of what I actually would like to change. But I don't mod to make myself godlike, or give myself overpowered weaponry; much like how I view the console commands. In general (basically thinking about Bethesda-type games), I mod for graphics, textures, weather, UI improvements, bug fixes, AI enhancements, QOL improvements, survival modes, companions; and in some cases combat-type mods to make the game more challenging. None of that is cheating in my opinion, and it certainly doesn't ruin the game for me, it makes it more immersive.

Sometimes I mod to change the story a bit. Take, for example, the ending of ME3, well known by all of us as a bit controversial, I modded it so that Shepard undeniably lives, and that the Citadel party is the end (as it never seemed appropriate to have a party while everything was being destroyed). Scenes are altered, omitted, or added, and certain dialogs deleted; but the ending was sweet. Reapers destroyed. Shepard lives. Cheating? Some will say yes, but for me it made the game better.

 

[ZedClampet]

Just to update on my original post, I ended up not restoring those cars on the cheat profile and going back to my original profile. I've been grinding out the levels and am almost there. I finally figured out the easiest way to level and have been doing that--over and over lol

 

[Brian Boru]

do stupid **** like spawning a tank

Oh yes, now I remember doing a bit of that in Civ4—setting up a custom game and giving myself a mech infantry unit instead of the starting warrior! I probably setup the game to have Monty and Axelgrinder the Grate beside me—sweet revenge to go wipe 'em out with extreme prejudice

 

[ZedClampet]

Apparently I cheat a lot and didn't notice it until I made this thread

Last night I started a new game in Scrap Mechanic and after playing for a bit, changed a Lua script to disable raids. Played normally, if you have a farm, you get raided by robots every night at midnight. Time moves too fast, and I decided I didn't want to worry about getting back to my base every night. There's plenty of other fighting anyway, tons of it, actually. But having to constantly check the time is annoying to me.

 

[Aquariusgirl]

Apparently I cheat a lot and didn't notice it until I made this thread

Last night I started a new game in Scrap Mechanic and after playing for a bit, changed a Lua script to disable raids. Played normally, if you have a farm, you get raided by robots every night at midnight. Time moves too fast, and I decided I didn't want to worry about getting back to my base every night. There's plenty of other fighting anyway, tons of it, actually. But having to constantly check the time is annoying to me.

But did you win with that cheating?

 

[Zloth]

Cheaters NEVER win!

 

[stan51]

I only used chets in cs go once, but they really annoyed me in this game because unfortunately in cs go there are a lot of cheaters but now I don't play cheats anymore because it makes no sense 0 enjoy the game

 

[Zimbaly]

Game genie, game guides, hex editor for old dos games...... I've been bad. =\

 

[JarlBSoD]

The times i cheat in games before i have finnished them atleast once is few but it has happend, what usually happens is that i play a game, finnish it and start a new run and to skip some stuff (like smithing in Skyrim) I use console commands etc, or playing fallout 2 with a suberbuffed character etc. It has happend that i have cheated in a game just go get through it because i find the game to be pretty boring and i just want to complete it, but in general I don't cheat much, unless you count immersive mods.