Action Replay type cheat devices in Japan

It's a little odd to think about. That I can't name any specific product of this nature released to the Japanese market. The popularity of systems like FC, SFC, GBA, etc, you'd think would have an impact. Numerous owners of those consoles' western equivalents have fond memories of Game Genie or similar, yet I don't recall even the scarce Famicom shape GG reaching Japan. Heck the infamous Pokemon craze had no effect I know of.

Or am I just ignorant of the facts because I can't read Japanese to browse forum discussion there?

 

The Playstation had the Action Replay as did the Saturn, but not aware of any cheat devices pre these.

 

hey Lum, i have always wondered the same thing.

i have always looked for a megadrive action replay jap version but i have never seen one nor a super famicom version so i guess it was just marketed for the west

 

My GOD! It means to have to play a game without cheating! Whatever will you do????? :-0

 

Sling it to one side and find a game that's easier :lol:

 

I guess Japan's small enough relative to other counteries, to where travel hassles on visiting events for Mew at THE most gripping height of Poke-mania really was no big deal. Haha.

 

There are other reasons than cheating to use a cheat device for. Shockingly some people use them to make the game harder.

Others use them to access debug functions or yes cheat such as the case in catching Mew in Pokemon Red/Blue. Clearly you meant sarcasm but to take it as such also disregards a possibility of other uses for what amounts to a memory modification device.

 

No clue... I never used one. But cheers to someone using it to make a game harder!

 

Yeah the topic was just an observation. Perhaps there really is *that* little interest or potential market in Japan for these devices. In that case my curiosity has been answered.

 

I could tell by the remark being 1/2 step out of reality.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/954798-legacy-of-ys-books-i-and-ii/48459399

 

They exist but the sites are mostly in Japanese so you wont find them with english google searches. There were a whole pile of them for retro right upto newer consoles but datel wasn't the only maker as they were made by other companies too, Japan loves to hack & cheat as much as anywhere else. They were pretty popular over there, hell even nowdays you can find data auction on YAJ where they have unlocked everything in a game & are selling the data lol

The Japanese wikipedia page on them has a pretty complete list of consoles that got AR in Japan
http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/プロアクションリプレイ

Interestingly the famicom did have one too but it looks like it was released well after the era of the famicom had ended as it comes with a weird famiclone called the famulator, looks pretty funky like they shrunk a famicom down to pretty much a cart slot with pads hehe.

 

Neat. I'd worry for the sanity of whoever tries to hunt down an AR for Japanese Master System. Assuming they exist like that article suggests. PAL SMS ARs are rare enough these days. :gravedigging:

 

I took the time and browsed through the only issue of infamous Backup Katsuyou Technique I have lying around at the moment.

It's nr. 37 from June 1994 and features some cheat devices for SFC. Click here and here for scans of the pages.

Similar to what Assembler said, they are explicitly presented as HK/Taiwan products. They do mention a version of the X-Terminator 2 with Japanese menu though.

Also featured are the Doctor Joypad, a Macro Joypad with RAM-cart, and Datel's Programmable Universal Adapter.

On a side note: Backup Katsuyou Technique was renamed Game Labo after this issue where the scans come from and later shifted in content from hard- and software hacks to codes for cheat devices. So, AR, Game Genie and others definitely had (have?) their niche in Japan.

 

I could never beat Gynoug without cheating.