History Of The ‘Konami Code’

We all know “Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A” by heart. The “Konami Code” has to be the most famous of all video game cheat codes. My first experience with the code was playing Contra. To be honest with you, there was no way I was beating the game without it. I try to play games as legit as possible, but on occasion we need a little help around the challenge of some games. 1Up.com discovered how the code originally came to be.

“In an interview in issue 14 of Japanese game magazine Dorimaga, Kazuhisa Hashimoto, who programmed the Famicom port of the game … “The arcade version of Gradius is really difficult, right? I never played it that much, and there was no way I could finish the game, so I inserted the so-called Konami code (laughs).”

1Up took the time to assemble a list of all games using the famous Konami code. The strange thing is that some of these titles aren’t even Konami releases. I knew the code worked for many games, but was actually not aware that the list was that long.

• Batman Returns (SNES)
• BeatMania (GameBoy)
• Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance (GBA)
• Contra (NES)
• Contra: Shattered Soldier (PS2)
• Cosmic Epsilon (Famicom)
• Fighter’s History (SNES)
• Final Fight 2 (SNES)
• Gradius (Arcade)
• Graduis (NES)
• Gradius Galaxies (GBA)
• Gradius Gaiden (PS1)
• Gradius 2 (NES)
• Gradius III (SNES)
• Gyruss (NES)
• Kid Clown (NES)
• Konami Collector’s Series: Arcade Advanced (GBA) (Frogger, Time Pilot, Kung Fu, Rush n’ Attack, Scramble, Gyruss)
• Life Force (NES)
• Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (PS2)
• Mortal Kombat 3 (SNES)
• NBA Give-N-Go (NES)
• Nemesis (GameBoy)
• North and South (NES)
• Operation C (GameBoy)
• Ordyne (TurboGrapfx-16)
• Racing Fighter (GameBoy)
• Silent Hill 3 (PS2)
• Smart Ball (SNES)
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars (PS2)
• Tengen Tetris (NES)
• TMNT Fall of the Foot Clan (GB)
• TMNT 3: The Manhattan Project (NES)
• TMNT IV: Turtles in Time (SNES)
• Top Gun: The Second Mission (NES)
• Wario Ware (GBA)
• Zone of the Enders: The 2nd Runner (PS2)
• Zombie Nation (NES)