Konami
A player has found a hidden Konami Code variation in Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness 25 years after release
A new use of the Konami Code has been found for the second Castlevania game on Nintendo 64, hidden in the code for 25 years.
Nowadays it is not common, but in the past it was very popular to use cheat codes in video games. Many titles had tricks that allowed you to skip levels, obtain infinite ammo or unlock everything from the start. In fact, there are some very popular tricks, such as the word BEWAREOBLIVIONISATHAND in Turok 2, the many GTA San Andreas cheats, and of course, the legendary Konami code, available in Contra and many other games that have adopted it.
Well, it turns out that 25 years after its release, two speedrunners have discovered a new variant of the Konami code in Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness that hadn’t been found before. Curiously, the input for this isn’t exactly the Konami Code, which famously is “Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, Start”. Ever since its inception, it’s been used in many games throughout history, but with this specific variation, it makes use of the N64 controller to make it cleverly distinct.
This version of the code increases the number of times one must press the buttons, as well as switches the use of a D-Pad for the controller’s C-buttons, its shoulder buttons, and the Z button in the back of it. If used correctly, the cheat unlocks all of the characters, all of their outfits, and the hardest difficulty setting.
If you have Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness and want to try the cheat for yourself, just enter the following sequence of buttons in the main menu.
- C-up
- C-up
- C-up
- C-up
- C-Down
- C-Down
- C-Down
- C-Down
- C-Left
- C-Left
- C-Right
- C-Right
- C-Left
- C-Left
- C-Right
- C-Right
- L
- R
- Z
A controversial Castlevania
The legendary Castlevania series was riding the height of its success when Konami decided to make the jump to 3D with a pair of games exclusive to Nintendo 64. The first, Castlevania 64, offered an action-adventure with high doses of exploration, intense battles against cinematic bosses, and really challenging platform sections. Meanwhile, its sequel/expansion included two more characters with their respective campaigns and redesigned levels.
The first of them arrived in January 1999 and just a few months later, in December, Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness, was launched. As of today, none of these installments are available on current platforms, since they never left Nintendo 64, and sadly both were received negatively by the fanbase, leading to them being considered bad games. But as time has passed, more and more players have started to see what was great about these games.