Russian Coder Hacks SNES Classic To Add Games And New Features, Harmless Fun Or Dangerous Idea?

The Nintendo SNES Classic is an official novelty item harking to the good old 16-bit days packing tons of games and new features. However, with a few simple steps, hackers can make a few cool changes to the mini console. Aside from adding more games to the unit, players can even do things like adding a reset button to their controller.

With a lineup of nearly 30 games installed in the console, including an unreleased Star Fox game, the SNES Classic is already more than appealing to fans of Nintendo. However, the SNES console’s complete library of games goes beyond more than a mere 30 titles and a lot of players want to be able to play those too. Since there’s no official way to do this, gamers are resorting to hacks, Gamespot reports.

Players are using a tool called HackChi, which allows them to load more games into both the NES Classic and the SNES Classic. The tool would basically connect the consoles to a PC, where players could then add dozens of more games.

In many cases, players were able to add as many as 200 games into their SNES Classic units. Even art boxes could be added, which would make the added titles look more official.

Hacking the consoles could also allow players to add a home button and a reset button to the consoles. Since these are standard fares in modern gaming, it’s understandable that many gamers would want to add these things in the retro consoles.

As Gizmodo notes, however, using the hacking tool to do any of these things is a legal grey area. What’s more, the tool itself was created by a Russian programmer. Considering all the problems caused by Russian hackers these days, it might be worth employing caution when using the tool.