Codemasters original source for Game Genie codes?

[Roni]

anyone have any idea how they first got all the codes they put in the first codebooks? when i was little i assumed they had a huge room full of typewriter monkeys entering random codes until one had a discernible effect. even then the idea seemed ridiculous but i was pretty sure developers weren't just handing source codes for their games to some third-party company.
later i realized that disassemblers could make the job way easier but what kind of gear might they have had access to back in '91 to do that?

[kyuusaku]

later i realized that disassemblers could make the job way easier but what kind of gear might they have had access to back in '91 to do that?

Any personal computer?

If they knew enough about the NES they could have even written an emulator in '91 though even powerful workstations probably wouldn't achieve nearly 60 fps.

Another way would be to use a 6502 hardware debugger. They could have made macros in the control software to halt the CPU, dump RAM, do cheat searching, and put breakpoints on the variable to find the ROM addresses.

[MottZilla]

You were right. Monkeys with type writers is how they did it.

I'm sure they dumped the ROM of games to disasm as well as probably something to dump RAM to find the variables they want to look at. Afterall that's what I'd do if I wanted to make a GG code for a NES game. Ofcourse Break points on the variable are even better.

[Roni]

i was one of those (amateur) monkeys, hoping to one day get hired as a pro monkey.

wouldn't dumping hundreds of games give NOA even more legal ammo against Galoob? did that ever factor in the court case?

[peppers]

Being a professional monkey is overrated, trust me.

[Roni]

was ... hoping to one day get hired as a pro monkey.

i'd rather remain an amateur monkey.

[clueless]

Do professional monkeys get paid to fling their poo?

[tepples]

wouldn't dumping hundreds of games give NOA even more legal ammo against Galoob?

A computer program contains copyrightable elements and uncopyrightable elements. Under U.S. law, dumping a game medium to discover the uncopyrightable elements of its program ended up being ruled a fair use in Sega v. Accolade, five months after Galoob v. Nintendo.