I got a little off topic there, but as games evolve so too will the notion of cheating. I’m sure it’ll always be a thing that some will favor and some will decry; but just how people institute cheats will surely change with time. The question of “why cheat?” probably won’t.

This is an excellent point. So many of the limits and difficulties of older game design have been removed for various reasons (stronger narrative, better immersion, open access to all skill levels), and it certainly could seem like cheating to our younger selves.

I think an interesting result of this trend is the demand/love for roguelikes and super difficult games that has shown up over the last few years. Games like Spelunky and Dark Souls have reinstated the old game design method of insane challenge, and people seem to be eating it up. Even better, with Youtube providing a platform for people to share their victory over these hardcore challenges, gamers seems to revel in these handicapped/no cheats accomplishmnets.

What a fascinating time to be living in as a gamer who grew up during the 80s/90s.

Just a few minutes ago, actually, I had to cheat to find out how the heck to beat Ursula in “Kingdom Hearts” (Final Mix) (I’ve done it twice before, but now I don’t remember how I did it). I seriously was fighting her for 45 minutes, screaming more and more as my frustration really got to me (oh my gosh, I was so darn mad, and you can barely ever hurt her because she keeps spinning around like a lunatic and those eels keep getting in the way, GRAH!), before I realized my current method was just not working (I should have realized that a half hour ago), so I looked for the correct way to do it. I found out that I needed more magic than I currently had left, so I let her kill me so I could start over with full magic and tried again. Sometimes you just have to cheat, and while I feel naughty for doing it, at least I actually can enjoy the game. There’s no way I’m not beating “Kingdom Hearts”. No way.