Under the Microscope: Hardcore 4×4

In this edition I’ve got some new cheat codes for Hardcore 4×4, the off-road truck racing game:

• One code enables debug mode with a bunch of different functions.
• Some others do some questionably-useful things with the camera.
• And one requires you to name yourself “Steve” in order to get a goofy Easter Egg.

Read on for details! Here’s a video of debug mode in action:

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Intro

Gremlin Interactive developed several Saturn games, but not all of them were released (e.g., Re-Loaded). One of them that did see the light of day was Hardcore 4×4, a.k.a. TNN Motor Sports Hardcore 4×4 in the U.S. and Deka Yonku: Tough the Truck in Japan.

There are plenty of hidden extras inside the game — the PlayStation version even has a secret mini-game (a clone of Asteroids). The Saturn version has several cheat codes listed on GameFAQs and Console Database.

Is that everything? No: I uncovered some previously unknown secrets in the Saturn version. Below are the details!

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Debug controls

During gameplay, hold L+R and then press Start to pause. Keep holding L+R, and then press:

A, B, C,
Z, Y, X
A, Y, C
X, B, Z

You won’t get a confirmation sound, but you should see some numbers onscreen when you un-pause.

There are several pages that you can move through with X and Z. You can apply the page’s effect with A and C. You can also use Y and B to change the camera’s perspective, but it’s hard to adjust things in a pleasing way.

The first page is called “Play Mode,” and if you press C it turns off debug mode, so be careful not to do that immediately. The second page changes the camera such that it follows the other cars:

The “Mesh Zone” page lets you apply effects to the environment. The wireframe and color tile modes look the coolest.

The page called “Lift” lets you cycle through different sprites. There a few “Fog” pages that let you adjust how the environment looks.

Overall: pretty cool! There are more pages that let you adjust various parameters, but none of them are super useful.

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The Steve code

First set the race type to Time Trial and name your driver STEVE:

After that’s done, start a race, and pause the game while holding L+R. Keep holding L+R and enter:

C, Right, A, Z, Y,
B, A, A, B,
C, Right, A, Z, Y

Now when you go backward on the course, you’ll get a picture of a woman’s face instead of the WRONG WAY message:

Goofy! The name “Steve” surely refers to Steve Camber, one of Hardocre 4×4’s programmers. Steve’s face appears in the “Roid” minigame on the PlayStation version:

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The questionable camera codes

Here are two other codes with what seem to be trivial effects. These you can enter on the pause menu without holding L+R:

Camera angle effect: A, Up, B, Up, C, Up
White line: Up, Down, Up, Down, Up, Down, Z

The first code has a subtle effect: if you get into a tight spot, the camera will swing up to show more of an overhead view for a bit. It seems like a camera mode the developers were experimenting with?

The second code just seems to put a white line down the middle of the viewport. This seems to be for camera testing of some sort.

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Technical details

The function loaded at 0601b890 (U.S. version) checks for codes during the pause menu. Here’s Ghidra’s decompilation of part of it:

In a nutshell, there’s a buffer for a history of your button presses at 0603a600. The pause menu handler function checks that buffer’s contents for the expected sequence of bit patterns associated with each button, and for some codes, whether you’re holding L+R.

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Outro

For previous coverage of long-undocumented cheat codes, see my archive.

For my article about another Gremlin game, see Still Loading: Re-loaded.