What Was the “Game Genie“ Cheat Device, and How Did It Work?
什么是“Game Genie”作弊装置，它是如何工作的？
First released in 1991, the Game Genie let players enter special codes that made video games easier or unlocked other functions. Nintendo didn't like it, but many gamers loved it. Here's what made it special.
Game Genie 于 1991 年首次发布，允许玩家输入特殊代码，使视频游戏更轻松或解锁其他功能。任天堂不喜欢它，但许多游戏玩家喜欢它。这就是它的特别之处。
Genie in a Bottle 瓶中精灵
Game Genie is the brand name for a series of video game enhancement devices developed by Codemasters and sold by Galoob in the U.S. The first Game Genie model worked with the 8-bit Nintendo Entertainment System and launched in the summer of 1991 for about $50. Game Genie devices for the Super NES, Game Boy, Sega Genesis, and Game Gear followed.
Game Genie 是由 Codemasters 开发并由 Galoob 在美国销售的一系列视频游戏增强设备的品牌名称。第一款 Game Genie 型号与 8 位任天堂娱乐系统配合使用，于 1991 年夏天推出，售价约 50 美元。随后是 Super NES、Game Boy、Sega Genesis 和 Game Gear 的 Game Genie 设备。
Galoob
Like a genie of legend, the Game Genie made your wishes come true. To use one, you first plugged a game cartridge into the Game Genie unit and then plugged both devices into your console. Upon powering up, you saw a screen where you could enter a series of alphanumeric codes. These codes injected data between the game cartridge and the system, changing how the game worked and effectively reprogramming it on the fly in a minor way.
就像传说中的精灵一样，Game Genie 让您的愿望成真。要使用一个，您首先将游戏卡带插入 Game Genie 单元，然后将两个设备都插入控制台。通电后，您会看到一个屏幕，您可以在其中输入一系列字母数字代码。这些代码在游戏卡带和系统之间注入数据，改变了游戏的运作方式，并以微小的方式有效地对其进行动态重新编程。
Galoob
Using those codes, you could add amazing new features to games (such as invincibility or the ability to fly), or simply make them easier to play. Each Game Genie model shipped with a booklet full of codes for popular games, and Galoob published updates over time in magazine ads and on paper fliers that were free to take at retail stores.
使用这些代码，您可以为游戏添加令人惊叹的新功能（例如无敌或飞行能力），或者只是让它们更容易玩。每个 Game Genie 模型都附带一本装满流行游戏代码的小册子，Galoob 在杂志广告和纸质传单上发布了随着时间的推移的更新，这些传单可以在零售店免费购买。
Galoob
The Gift That Kept on Giving
不断给予的礼物
Video games were fairly expensive in 1991, with the average NES game retailing for around $30-$50 in the U.S., which is about $60-100 today when adjusted for inflation. Many gamers only bought (or received) a few games a year. If you spent that kind of money on a very difficult game, it often felt like a ripoff if you couldn't play through most of it.
电子游戏在 1991 年相当昂贵，美国 NES 游戏的平均零售价约为 30-50 美元，如果经通货膨胀调整，今天的零售价约为 60-100 美元。许多游戏玩家一年只购买（或收到）几款游戏。如果你把那种钱花在一个非常困难的游戏上，如果你不能玩完大部分游戏，通常会感觉像是敲诈。
At the time, most new games were very difficult (by modern standards), with many borrowing the gameplay philosophy of arcade games designed to extract endless quarters. Players who didn't want to sink endless time into mastering a game often relied on cheat codes to access later levels that they might not get to see otherwise.
当时，大多数新游戏都非常困难（按照现代标准），许多游戏借用了街机游戏的游戏理念，旨在提取无尽的四分之一。不想花费无休止的时间来掌握游戏的玩家通常依靠作弊码来访问他们可能无法看到的更高级别。
In that environment, Game Genie felt like an unlimited fountain of cheat codes in a box. Using the Game Genie, you could give your in-game character the power to get past tougher parts of a game or simply warp automatically to later stages. This gave your older games new value, making them fun to play---even if you had previously completed them without cheating. It was like a gift that kept on giving.
在那种环境中，Game Genie 感觉就像一个盒子里无限的作弊码喷泉。使用 Game Genie，您可以赋予游戏内角色通过游戏中较难部分的能力，或者简单地自动传送到后期阶段。这为您的旧游戏赋予了新的价值，使它们玩起来很有趣---即使您之前在没有作弊的情况下完成了它们。这就像一份不断给予的礼物。
But the Game Genie wasn't seen as a gift by everyone. Just like today, there was a group of players who played competitively for high scores, and some of them looked down upon the Game Genie as a cheating device. Nintendo may have feared as much, too, since it ran contests in Nintendo Power magazine based on player-submitted high scores.
但 Game Genie 并不是每个人都认为是礼物。就像今天一样，有一群玩家为了高分而竞争性游戏，他们中的一些人看不起 Game Genie 作为作弊工具。任天堂可能也同样担心，因为它根据玩家提交的高分在 Nintendo Power 杂志上举办比赛。
"I think there is some truth to [the idea that Nintendo feared] it would de-value the games if you could cheat to the ending easily," says Frank Cifaldi, Founder and Co-Director of the Video Game History Foundation.
“我认为 [任天堂担心] 如果你能轻易地欺骗到结局，它会使游戏贬值，这是有一定道理的，”视频游戏历史基金会创始人兼联合主任 Frank Cifaldi 说。
But in-game cheating wasn't the only controversy surrounding the Game Genie. The product itself felt like a cheat to Nintendo, which sought legal remedy in court.
但游戏中的作弊并不是围绕 Game Genie 的唯一争议。该产品本身感觉就像是对任天堂的欺骗，任天堂在法庭上寻求法律补救。
Trouble With Nintendo
任天堂的麻烦
Galoob originally intended to launch the Game Genie in the summer of 1990, but Nintendo got wind of it first and took Galoob to court on copyright infringement charges, claiming that the Game Genie made unauthorized derivative works of its games.
Galoob 最初打算在 1990 年夏天推出 Game Genie，但任天堂首先得到了风声，并以侵犯版权的指控将 Galoob 告上法庭，声称 Game Genie 制作了其游戏的未经授权的衍生作品。
Perhaps more irritating for Nintendo was the fact that the Game Genie was an unlicensed device, unapproved by Nintendo, and Galoob intended to do an end-run around Nintendo's strict NES licensing scheme.
也许更让任天堂恼火的是，Game Genie 是一款未经许可的设备，未经任天堂批准，而 Galoob 打算绕过任天堂严格的 NES 许可计划进行最终运行。
Galoob
Nintendo managed to get a court order to stop Galoob from marketing the Game Genie for about a year, until a U.S. district court in San Francisco issued a ruling in Galoob's favor. (It ruled that in fact, the Game Genie did not create derivative works.) The NES Game Genie finally entered the market in the summer of 1991, and it sold well enough to inspire similar products for other consoles such as the Super NES, Genesis, Game Boy, and Game Gear. The Game Genie never became a licensed device for Nintendo consoles, but it did gain approval from Sega for its consoles.
任天堂设法获得了一项法院命令，阻止 Galoob 在大约一年内营销 Game Genie，直到旧金山的美国地方法院做出了对 Galoob 有利的裁决。（它裁定，事实上，Game Genie 并没有创造衍生作品。NES Game Genie 终于在 1991 年夏天进入市场，它的销量足以激发 Super NES、Genesis、Game Boy 和 Game Gear 等其他游戏机的类似产品。Game Genie 从未成为任天堂游戏机的许可设备，但它确实获得了世嘉对其游戏机的批准。
Codes Galore 代码丰富
Some of the best fun you could have with a Game Genie back in the day was in trying to come up with your own codes for your games. If you were persistent enough, you could find ways to modify your games in bizarre and amusing new ways---such as making Mario "ice skate" everywhere or use a fire flower while still staying small in Super Mario Bros.
过去，使用 Game Genie 可以获得的一些最大乐趣是尝试为您的游戏想出自己的代码。如果你足够坚持，你可以找到以奇异而有趣的新方式修改游戏的方法---例如让马里奥到处都是“溜冰鞋”或使用火花，同时在超级马里奥兄弟中仍然保持小规模。
Benj Edwards / Vintagecomputing.com
In the mid-to-late 1990s, players began sharing their own homebrew game codes online, and even today you can still find websites like GameGenie.com that list thousands of Game Genie codes.
在 1990 年代中后期，玩家开始在线分享他们自己的自制游戏代码，即使在今天，您仍然可以找到像 GameGenie.com 这样列出数千个 Game Genie 代码的网站。
Ultimately, Galoob never released Game Genies for consoles past the 16-bit era, but in later years, devices like the Pro Action Replay and the GameShark picked up where the Game Genie left off, allowing players with newer consoles to keep squeezing new life out of their existing games.
最终，Galoob 从未为 16 位时代的游戏机发布 Game Genies，但在后来的几年里，Pro Action Replay 和 GameShark 等设备从 Game Genie 停止的地方开始，允许拥有较新游戏机的玩家不断从他们现有的游戏中榨取新的生命。
Today, most games are much easier and more forgiving than they were back in the Game Genie era, so the need for cheat codes isn't quite as pressing. But the Game Genie paved the way in putting more power into players' hands.
今天，大多数游戏都比 Game Genie 时代更容易、更宽容，因此对作弊码的需求并不那么迫切。但 Game Genie 为将更多权力交到玩家手中铺平了道路。