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The secrets in games you were never meant to see

Added: 10.04.2015 10:50 | 28 views | 0 comments

You remember the bits at the end of Police Squad where everyone would freeze frame except for one guy? That's exactly what the passenger in the back there must feel like in the HD port of Crazy Taxi. With all the conversion staff's names making the credits roll way longer, the old 'beckoning to the camera' shot stays on the screen way too long. A passenger hops in, then starts tapping Gina on the shoulder asking why they're not going anywhere. Eventually, she drives off. Into a wall.

Clearly, we were never supposed to see that bit. The original credits sequence was a finite length, so all the 'strings' were hidden behind the scenes. But it got me wondering: What else can we all see in games that we were never supposed to? This is my pick of the forbidden fruit...

Note: A previous version of this feature was posted in April, 2014 but has since been updated.

The developers of Skyrim made a secret room full of awesome. But sadly for console gamers, this room is only accessible in the PC version of the game. I say sadly, because it's amazing. It's got EVERYTHING in it. All the weapons and enchanted versions of them. And all the armour too. In fact, one box in the room contains so many items, you need a massively high-spec PC just to open it. The list alone will crash lesser machines.

How to get it: You need to open up the 'console' prompt by pressing ~. Type in "coc qasmoke" (without the quote marks) and you're in! You're now stuck there forever unless you also use the console to teleport to a different location because there's no exit door. So type "coc rivertown", for example, and you'll arrive at Rivertown, over-encumbered with all your new loot. Yes I know that was Oblivion's wording. I used to be an adventurer too, you know. Before I took... (*gunshot*)

Apparently, there are several pies hidden throughout Dragon Age: Inquisition. Whether you're supposed to find them or not is debatable. The developers responsible have said they didn't expect anyone to find them quite so soon. Graham Kelly, environment artist at BioWare Edmonton, said on YouTube: "It is.... The Lord of the Pies. I may or may not have hidden some of his smaller flock around the rest of Skyhold."

How to get there: Sometimes the scenery doesn't load correctly in Skyhold, allowing you to step through a door and fall through the stonework, where you end up in a glitchy area underneath the castle. There, you can see the Lord of the Pies, biggest of all the hidden pies in the game. Yes, really. Look, it's wearing a top hat. It vanishes when you get too close. It's got its own music, too, which does suggest you're meant to find it… but there's no way to get there 'officially'. It isn't meant to be seen... although I think the team hoped it would be.

Restricted Area demos of unfinished games are always goldmines for anyone seeking extra tidbits of information that hasn't officially been revealed. There was a trick in the original Saints Row demo that allowed you to use a car to get past the demo's boundary… and you know what? The Final Fantasy XV demo suffers from the exact same problem!

How to get it: Simply jump into the path of a car as it drives through the demo's perimeter barrier. Do it correctly, and you can get out of the intended area and into the (unfinished and incomplete) world beyond. And there, you'll find a dinosaur and a titan, among other things you weren't supposed to see just yet. The dinosaur even has animation data. When you're excited about a hidden dinosaur's animation data, a chime should ring and a trophy unlock. "Final Fantasist – you really can't wait for the new game, can you?"

There are loads of extra areas dotted around Destiny. They're not supposed to be accessible, but if you know where to go and what to do, you can glitch through walls and into new areas. Many are simply empty, full of half-finished scenery. But some areas are actually functional. There are enemies, collectibles (dead ghosts you can actually revive) and even never-before-seen foes like this Ultra Captain.

How to get it: While it's a glitchy process, you can follow videos like if you want to get there for yourself, but keep in mind that tricking your way into non-official content runs the (small) risk of Bungie thinking you're a hacker and blocking your account. It's entirely likely this is actually content that was held back for release as part of a future DLC package, so you'll surely be able to play it 'properly' soon. Still, look at that Ultra Captain. Oooo.

This is brilliant. Gothic 2, like pretty much every RPG, gives the impression of a greater world beyond the boundaries of the game through its lore and conversational references. But then, should you manage to somehow get outside of the wall that surrounds the playable area, it's all revealed as being a sham by this single notice. By a 'mighty alien dwarf', which likely refers to a development team member of relatively minor physical stature.

How to get there: Follow the long river down from the old ruins and the stone dragon until it ends at a wall. This wall can be climbed (with practice and regular saving). Once you're over, there's not much to see or do, although there is a cave full of ostensibly dead NPCs. They're actually living NPCs who have travelled from the Valley of Mines to the Khorinis. During the transition, the game's programming 'kills' the first instance and sends it to the cave, before creating a new instance of the NPC that continues to live. You can loot the old versions' corpses. Waste not, want not.

A secret, looped version of the totally normal water level 2-2 is not very exciting. UNTIL you give it a name like 'World -1', which gives it such amazing mystique, it will go down in legend as one of the greatest secrets ever seen in a video game. Maybe that works for everything? Maybe I should call myself 'Minus Justin Towell'... There, my charisma and legendary stats have just skyrocketed. Incredible.

How to get it: Jump backwards through the wall (yes, it is possible) at the end of World 1-2 and enter the first pipe. Having circumvented the regular Warp Zone message, you are sent to the wrong level. Minus World, baby!

This strange area is full of what looks like a playschool's recreational apparatus. Coloured blocks with numbers on them, walls at various angles... it's all just part of the developers' creation process, allowing them to test out new moves for Sonic and set his jump height and acceleration instead of loading a whole level every time. Trouble is, they didn't take it out.

How to get it: There is a convoluted method of jumps too complex to list here, but the simplest way is to play the PS3/360 HD port and pick up a Chao Garden Key while playing as Eggman in his final stage. At the end of the level, you'll find yourself here. Simple!

Sonic isn't the only platform character to have a test level left in his game. Mario 64 and Mario Sunshine both have them too. This one is the second of two in the DS version of Mario 64, allowing you to test out your jumping, character hats and everything else. But all it does is make me realise how flaky DS' polygonal 3D is. Crikey, that's primitive. Hooray for 3DS, eh?

How to get it: On the PAL version, use an Action Replay to input this code, then hold Select while you load an existing save file:
94000130 fffb0000
02097360 00000000
d2000000 00000000

Pre-release versions and developer/journalist hearsay suggested there was another multiplayer level hidden away in Goldeneye on N64. It was then totally denied by Rare, but that didn't stop people trying to find it. Eventually, they did--and it only took six years! Well done, all concerned. But Oddjob is still banned. Shame the level is barely textured, hardly playable and essentially broken. See and hear it in 'action' .

How to get it: You'll need an Action Replay cartridge and the following code:
8005883E FFFF 8005883F FFFF 80058840 FFFF 800588A5 FFFF
800588A7 FFFF 800588AA FFFF 800588AC FFFF 800588AF FFFF
800588B1 FFFF 800588B4 FFFF 800588B6 FFFF 800588B9 FFFF
800588BB FFFF

Before you get all excited, this has long-since been patched out of GTA Online. But, for a time, gamers could revisit the snowy landscape of North Yankton in online multiplayer simply by tricking the game into keeping the area loaded from the prologue mission. It appeared in the sky in the south-east corner of the map, but was totally accessible with a helicopter.

How to get it: As I say, you can't get to it any more. Meh. But explains the sequence of trickery that was required, which is still well worth a look. If only to see (ahem) the world's biggest beaver.

A city filled with the wrong graphics, the wrong collision detection, glitchy (surprise) visual stability and floor that often isn't the floor, actually acting like water instead. Obviously it's completely broken and was never intended to be a place you could visit during normal play. But you can!

How to get it: The trick is to get out of the Safari zone while its step limiter is working. Get into the Safari zone, try to leave but then say you want to stay. Then save your game, reload it, exit the zone, tell the guy at the desk you don't want to play, then head to Cinnabar Island (or some others) and surf until your steps are up. Boom! Glitch City.

Maybe at this point, we should be more surprised to see 3D games that don't have a test room ostensibly hidden away yet easily activated with an Action Replay/Gameshark. But still, it's amazing to see familiar Kiddy Link running around colourful boxes like a kid who's gone on holiday but wants to spend the entire time climbing around in the play area. "Come on, Link, we're going to the beach! You love the beach! Oh fine, stay here then, ya little sod..."

How to get it: Fart on a donkey, whistle Saria's Song while staring into the center of a waning moon and then hold Z while the game loads. Nah, I'm just kidding. Get an Action Replay and input the code ZY1N-AGX5-MMCY0 94HP-XPKH-WQXF7 3Z3C-ZZVX-C21YN 1X90-8QQU-REZG3. Though that is just one test level. There are loads more .

OK, so it doesn't have any textures aside from the racers and it may be whiter than a polar bear who hasn't seen the sun all winter, but that is the Mario Circuit from Double Dash on Gamecube. It's just one of several unfinished tracks hidden away in Mario Kart DS' code. But you can actually drive on it, which is pretty awesome.

How to get it: You guessed it! Action Replay time. Use the code 023cdcd8 00000002 020484a0 d0002a00 020484a4 e0052321 and there it is.

I just *had* to end the article with this one, even though we've had an entry from Mario Kart already. There is no way anyone anywhere would see this by chance. Those numbers and letters up there are used as memory filler (all memory needs to hold data of some sort), but if you squint a bit, you can see that they act as ASCII art and show the Super Mario Bros sprite version of Mario.

How to get it: Um... you just have to look at the picture above. I'm not sure you needed this section on this slide, to be honest. But you're very welcome all the same.

Yeah, that weird white-eyed child is a deleted boss from Mother 3. The developers removed it probably because it shouldn't be viewed by anybody, ever. Having trouble sleeping? Looking at that thing will not help. Having trouble staying awake? Problem solved! Ye gads...

And if you're looking for more, check out .



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