10 Video Games That Punished Cheaters in Hilarious Ways

Cheating in multiplayer games ruins the experience for others, but what about single-player games where no one else is affected? Some developers decided to implement creative punishment systems anyway, turning cheating into an unexpectedly entertaining consequence.

Sim City and the Earthquake Consequence

Sim City offered helpful cheat codes like "fund" that granted an extra $10,000 to spend on your city. However, using it more than eight times would trigger the game to spawn a destructive earthquake that destroyed everything you built. In Sim City 2000, the same code returned but imposed a 25% loan on each $10,000 transaction, making cheaters pay a steep financial price.

The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening Shop Theft

Link's Awakening allowed players to pick up items in shops before paying, creating an opportunity to steal. However, taking anything without payment would brand the player as a thief. The shopkeeper would never forgive the transgression and would attack the player even if they tried to return the stolen items.

Slender: The Arrival's Map Exploit Scare

When players discovered an exploit allowing them to leave the map and bypass enemies in Slender: The Arrival, the developers didn't patch it out immediately. Instead, they kept the glitch and weaponized it against cheaters. The game would detect out-of-map activity and send players falling through the floor to encounter the Slender Man, who would tell them that not even a bug could save them from him.

Heretic's Inverted Cheat Codes

Heretic, released in 1994 by Raven Software, used the same engine as Doom but trolled players by inverting Doom's cheat codes. The IDKFA code, which granted every weapon, full ammo, all keys and armor in Doom, would strip the player's weapons in Heretic and label them a cheater.

Animal Crossing's Mr. Resetti Lecture

Animal Crossing detected when players abused save files to undo failures. When caught, the character Mr. Resetti would appear and deliver an unskippable lecture about playing fairly. Each repeated offense would result in longer and more frustrated monologues, wasting the player's time as punishment.

Star Wars: Dark Forces' Shameful God Mode Code

This 1995 FPS offered a god mode cheat, but activating it required typing "I am lame." While this didn't prevent cheating, it discouraged casual use by forcing players to admit their shortcut.

Donkey Kong 64's Game Shark Detection System

Rare implemented a system in Donkey Kong 64 to detect Game Shark devices, which allowed players to rewrite game code. When detected, the game would deliberately sabotage itself, removing the ability to jump, pick up items, save the game, or withstand any damage.

Banjo Kazooie's Save File Deletion

Banjo Kazooie offered numerous cheat codes, but powerful ones like level skips had consequences. Using high-tier cheats too many times would trigger the witch Gruntilda to warn the player. One more use after the warning would result in complete save file deletion.

The Witcher 3's Cow Glitch Monster

Players discovered that two respawning cows in a stable could be repeatedly killed and harvested for leather to sell, generating unlimited wealth. CD Projekt Red didn't simply patch the exploit. Instead, they released an update that spawned an extremely difficult monster that would only appear if the game detected the cow glitch being used. Defeating the monster would cause another to spawn, ensuring the cheater would die.

Afterlife's Death Star Punishment

Afterlife, a god game from 1996 developed by LucasArts, featured a cheat code called "as you see." Overusing this cheat would spawn the Death Star from Star Wars to destroy the player's creations, a nod to LucasArts' best-known franchise.