Polyphony’s Gran Turismo 4, released in December 2004, is a video game we have been playing for almost 20 years, and we have all been playing it, this entire time, without realising that it has cheat codes.
But it does! Twitter user Nenkai posted the revelation over the weekend, showing that there are four cheats players can use, each one relying on a combination of button presses, just like in days of old.
The catch is that 365 days need to have passed on the game’s internal calendar before they’re made active, which might explain why it’s taken so long for them to have been discovered (as speculated, that figure likely means the cheats were actually dev tools, which is...actually what most old cheats were).
If you’ve got the game and want to try them out yourself, they are:
- 10,000,000 Credits (GT Mode Screen): Select, Left, Right, Right, Down, Up, Up, Left, Down, Up, Right, Left, Down, L1, R1, Select
- Pass any license (License Selection Screen): Select, R1, Select, R1, Select, L2, L2, R2, R2, L1, Select, L1, Select
- Gold any specific license test (License Test Selection Screen): Select, Select, R1, R2, L2, L2, Select, L1, R1, Select, R2, L1, Select
- Gold any event (Event Course Selection Screen): Select, L1, Up, Up, Select, R1, Down, Down, Select, L2, Select, R2, Select
Just so you know, using the cheat doesn’t seem to have any negative impact on your progression whatsoever, with Nenkai adding “I’m sure some are also wondering, prizes are also correctly given with the last cheat code; 24 hours races can effectively be skipped provided you’re past 365 game days.”
Developers of modern video games, I know why you don’t put codes in your games anymore (most have weird online stuff that relies on maintaining the sanctity of the experience), but it would be nice if you could find ways to put cheat codes in your games in the 21st century. Breaking games was fun. Unlimited currency is the best. Thank you.