The VC Advantage: Take a key for coming in!
The Internet has made it easy to find cheats for games, but we miss the tips pages from game magazines, when the discovery of a new code could inspire you to go back to an old game. These codes aren't exactly new, but oldness is the essence of the Virtual Console! We're bringing back the classic codes every week on The VC Advantage.
The Ghouls 'n Ghosts games are famous for being extraordinarily difficult. They punish you with dastardly enemy placement and unavoidable attacks in the middle of jump arcs, providing a need for memorization unseen in modern gaming, outside of the shmup genre. Nobody has ever completed a Ghouls 'n Ghosts game, and leading scientists estimate that it will be over four million years before humanity develops a Red Arremer-sensing lobe in the brain, leaving us ill-equipped until then to aim javelins at flying demons.
Don't be fooled by Internet bravado. Anyone claiming to have completed one of these games is lying, in an attempt to overcompensate for the fact that they break into embarrassing crying fits thirty seconds into the first level. With those poor souls (pretty much everybody) in mind, here are codes for the two available Ghouls 'n Ghosts games on the VC.
Ghouls 'n Ghosts (GEN):
Slow Motion: Dialing down the tempo may be just what you need to help you time your jump over fifty zombies. Alternately, it could just make the animation of your armor flying off that much more agonizing. Either way's good. To access slow-motion, at the title screen, press up, A, down, A, left, A, right, A. Once you're in the game, pause, hold B, and then release pause.
Invincibility: At the title screen, when the message to "Press Start Button" appears, press the following buttons: A, A, A, A, up, down, left, right. A sound will indicate successful input, at which point you should hold B and press start, then hold C and press start.
Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts (SNES):
Level Select: In the options menu, leave the cursor on "Exit." On controller 2, hold L and start, and then press start on controller 1.
[Codes via GameFAQs, Neoseeker, image via Insert Credit, from the cancelled Ghouls 'n Ghosts Online]
