Great punch out!!, the 1994 SNES game released as a sequel to the 1987 NES original, like its predecessor is a single-player game. Playing as Little Mac, you fight your way through a series of cartoon boxing opponents, and each and every fight is just you versus the computer. Or was it, until now!
When I was playing around with the game recently, Cheats not listed “casually found some new cheats” for Great punch out!!. Using the same two-button combo method as the already known cheats, they found two new ones, the first of which allows you to simply select one of the game’s fighters – even those from Super Circuit – for a one-off fight:
This is pretty cool and makes you wonder why that was never an option in the first place (at least as an unlock after you beat the game since it’s in such a viable state). However, the second discovered cheat is way cooler because it allows someone to plug in a second controller and control the opponent:
But wait! It gets even better! As IGN Senior Editor Kat Bailey soon found outnot only do these cheats work with the version of the game available on Nintendo Switch, but the second player can even perform the opponent’s special moves:
This isn’t the first time in decades that a secret has lain dormant in a classic video game, but I can’t remember the last time the secret was this accessible – the cheats are pretty simple! – and so important at the same time. This doesn’t unlock a single level or boost your stats, but basically adds a whole new game mode while doubling the player count and bringing the boxing game into the multiplayer arena after spending 28 years as a single player experience.
Note, however, that this isn’t the first time we’ve been able to play a Punch out!! Play multiplayer as the Wii game had a two player mode, although it was only against a Little Mac clone, not against the game’s roster of weird and wonderful AI characters. And as the name suggests, Unlisted Cheats itself is an account dedicated to uncovering secrets that nobody seems to know about, often hidden in the game code itself.
