Here’s how the manual for Nicktoons Racing describes the game’s story:
The Nicktoons™ characters have come together after receiving a mysterious invitation to race for the Krusty Krab Big Bun Award. Each of the Nicktoons™ characters was challenged to try and claim this neat prize. Mysteriously, the letter was signed by the "Mystery Rider." No one knows who the rider is, only that he or she drives a sleek black car.
You can play as the Mystery Rider (who turns out to be Plankton) by completing the cup races. But can you skip all that?
Answer: yes! I found a cool “unlock everything” cheat that unlocks the Mystery Rider, among other things. I also found some additional Easter egg cheats. Below are the details on these cheats, how they work, and how I located them in the game data.
Unlock everything
Enter this sequence on the main menu:
Left, Right, Left, Right, Up, DownYou’ll see the Difficulty item become available if you got it right. Normally you have to unlock the Medium and Hard modes:
The Bonuses item will be available in the 1 Player game:
The bonuses will also be available in the 2 Player game:
And of course you can play as the Mystery Rider:
Throwing Gak
Enter this sequence on the main menu:
Triangle, Square, Triangle, L1, R1, R2, L2Now when you press Square, Gak will appear on the screen:
I don’t think this does anything special; it’s just a goofy Easter egg.
Show version info
Enter this sequence on the title screen:
Right, Right, Left, Left, Right, RightSomething like a version number will appear in the corner of the screen:
I think this is just an Easter egg, too.
Technical details
When you’re on the title screen or the mode select screen, the function at 800251ac (NTSC-U version) listens for cheat code input.
That function reads from the table at 800455b4, which has:
4 bytes: Which screen index to check for the cheat on.
40 bytes (10 groups of 4): The sequence of buttons (by index) that make up the cheat code.
The main menu screen’s index is 1, so the entry for the “unlock everything” cheat starts with 00000001:
800455e0 0100 0000 # Screen index
800455e4 0a00 0000 # Left button
800455e8 0b00 0000 # Right button
800455ec 0a00 0000 # Left button
800455f0 0b00 0000 # Right button
800455f4 0800 0000 # Up button
800455f8 0900 0000 # Down button
800455fc 0000 0000 # Nothing
80045600 0000 0000 # Nothing
80045604 0000 0000 # Nothing
80045608 0000 0000 # NothingThe button mapping is peculiar to this game.
Once you enter a sequence correctly, the function at 80024780 is called with the index corresponding to the cheat’s entry in the table. The function applies the effect that goes with the cheat.
Interestingly, the game has data for a cheat sequence that it never actually uses. One table entry is for screen 18, the controller Options screen. The buttons are:
L1, R1, L2, R2, Square, Circle, L1, R1However, that screen doesn’t actually run the function that listens for cheat input. It would set a flag at 80046738 if you could enter it, but nothing checks for that flag.
Outro
For past cheat code discovery articles see the archive. And to get new ones, be sure to subscribe:
How many of the characters from this game will end up in Sonic Racing CrossWorlds? You can hear us speculate on the Sonic Weekly podcast.
