Under the microscope: Blast Chamber (Saturn, PlayStation)

I'm glad that I don't call this home

Blast Chamber is a 1996 game from Attention To Detail, a UK studio that was active from 1990 through 2002. It was released on both PlayStation and Saturn.

Some cheat sites (GameFAQs, IGN) list an “Infinite Lives” code for the Saturn version, but it doesn’t actually work. The PlayStation equivalent does work, however. What gives? I decided to see what’s going on.

My investigation found that both versions game recognize five cheat codes. None of the Saturn ones have been published properly (to my knowledge), and three of the PlayStation ones are new. Here’s the full list:

Details are below!

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Unlimited time

From the mode select screen, go to Games and select Solo Survivor. Then return to the mode select screen and enter this sequence:

• Saturn: Left, Right, Up, Down, X, X, X, X

• PlayStation: Left, Right, Up, Down, Square, Square, Square, Square

You’ll hear a sound effect if you got it right. Press Start to begin playing. The timer won’t count down while you’re playing anymore:

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Unlimited lives

This code is also for the Solo Survivor game type. Enter this sequence at the mode select screen:

• Saturn: X, Left, X, Right, Y, Down, Y, Up

• PlayStation: Square, Left, Square, Right, Circle, Down, Circle, Up

You can now die while playing a chamber without losing any lives:

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The ending FMV

Enter this sequence on the mode select screen:

• Saturn: X, Y, Left, Right, Up, Down, X, Left

• PlayStation: Square, Circle, Left, Right, Up, Down, Square, Left

After the sound effect, do this:

• Saturn: Hold L+X while selecting the Options item.

• PlayStation: Select the Options item and then select the Time Command Demo item.

The ending FMV will start playing:

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Unlimited high jump

Enter this sequence on the mode select screen:

• Saturn: Y, Left, X, Down, Left, Left, Down, Down

• PlayStation: Circle, Left, Square, Down, Left, Left, Down, Down

Now the “high jump” powerup will be unlimited. Normally it expires after several seconds:

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Chamber select

This code is for the Solo Survivor game type. Enter this sequence at the mode select screen:

• Saturn: Left, Left, Y, Y, X, Y, Right, Up

• PlayStation: Left, Left, Circle, Circle, Square, Circle, Right, Up

After the sound effect, do this:

• Saturn: Hold L+X while selecting the Chambers item.

• PlayStation: Hold L1+L2 while selecting the Chambers item.

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Technical details

This game uses the standard PlayStation button-to-bit-pattern mappings, so it’s easy to locate already-known code sequences. The “Infinite Time” code on GameFAQs becomes:

Left:   0080 0000
Right:  0020 0000
Up:     0010 0000
Down:   0040 0000

Square: 8000 0000
Square: 8000 0000
Square: 8000 0000
Square: 8000 0000

Searching for sequence of bytes in a memory snapshot takes you to 8008f710 (NTSC-U version). Tracing references to that address leads to a table of pointers at 8008f7b0, which has one entry for each cheat sequence.

The Saturn version of the game uses the PlayStation button mappings, but with big endian byte ordering. The table of pointers is located at 0021aa38 in Low Work RAM (NTSC-U version).

The function that reads this table (at 0020ae30 on the Saturn version) has logic that looks like this:

for cheat_index in range(5):
    if cheat_effects[cheat_index] != 0x01:
        matched = 0
        for i in range(8):
            if cheat_buttons[cheat_index][i] == button_history[i]:
                matched += 1

        if matched == 8:
            cheat_effects[cheat_index] = 0x01
            play_sfx(0x02)

This sets flags if your input history matches the cheat sequences. The game then checks those flags to see whether to apply the effects.

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Outro

I’ve looked at cheat codes for other games from Attention to Detail: see my article on The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga and my note about Sydney 2000.

Send me suggestions for other multi-platform games to examine! I’m particularly interested if cheat codes are known for one system but not another.

There will be more Rings of Saturn this week! I’ll have writeups on some cool Easter eggs in PlayStation games to share very soon.

Logo by Ashlyn Anstee