GameShark

GameShark is a brand of cheat devices for video game consoles, both home and handheld. It first appeared in the mid-1990s and grew into one of the most widely used cheat platforms in North America. Players could alter how a game behaved by entering codes that changed specific memory addresses.

U.S. introduction and InterAct Accessories (1996–2003)

The GameShark brand was created by Datel, a UK company that had already made a similar device called Action Replay. In 1996, InterAct Accessories, Inc.—a U.S. gaming accessory company founded by Todd Hays and owned by Recoton Corporation—secured exclusive North American distribution rights and trademarked the GameShark name. InterAct took Datel’s hardware, rebranded it for the U.S., and sold versions for the Sony PlayStation, Nintendo 64, and Game Boy. The devices became a major presence in American retail, stocked by chains like Toys “R” Us, Walmart, and Electronics Boutique.

Recoton bankruptcy and Mad Catz acquisition (2003–2012)

When Recoton went bankrupt in 2003, Mad Catz bought InterAct’s assets, including GameShark. Mad Catz continued releasing GameShark products for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and Game Boy Advance. But as newer consoles introduced stronger security, cheat devices lost their appeal.

Dormancy and legacy (2012–present)

The last GameShark products sold in the U.S. came out in 2012, ending the brand’s active run. Mad Catz itself filed for bankruptcy in 2017, but GameShark had already been dormant for years. Today, the device is remembered fondly by retro gaming fans and collectors as a symbol of late-1990s and early-2000s gaming.

Products

The original GameShark shipped with 4,000 preloaded codes. Unlike the Game Genie, users could save entered codes to the device’s onboard flash memory and reuse them later without reentering. The cartridges also doubled as memory cards, offering storage equal to or greater than the console’s official memory cards.

It launched for the Sega Saturn and Sony PlayStation in January 1996, and was runner-up for Electronic Gaming Monthly’s Best Peripheral of 1996 (losing to the Saturn analog controller). A Nintendo 64 version arrived in late August 1997, which also bypassed regional lockouts so games from any region could be played. A PlayStation 2 version followed in 2002.