The ability to download game patches is one of the worst things to ever happen to console gaming. In the old days, companies like Nintendo and Sega would test their games in order to remove any bugs. Now that patches can be added to console games, developers have become lazy.

Companies like Bethesda have no qualms with shipping out a game in a barely playable state, as they know they can just patch it later.

Bugs and glitches are now a common sight in video games. This isn't always a bad thing, however, as wily players can exploit these issues for their own ends. It is possible to purposely seek out glitches in order to find treasure hidden inside the holes of the game's programming.

We are here today to reveal the video games bugs that can be wielded like weapons and used in your favor.

From the glitch Pokémon that gives away gifts like Santa, to the secret death beam of Samus Aran, here are the 16 Video Game Glitches That Are Actually Helpful.

16. You Can Bounce Off The Walls In Gears Of War

Gears of War 4 - Church Swarm

The ability to hide and fire behind cover took a long time to come to the shooter genre. Some early games gave you a basic version of it, by giving you buttons that allowed you to lean in one direction without moving, but this wasn't an effective tactic.

The Gears of War franchise embraced cover mechanics, to the point where it is one of the defining features of the early games.

One of the most effective tactics in the Gears of War franchise is called "wallbouncing." This allows you to exploit a glitch, where you can move between two pieces of cover at lightning speed. When used in a tunnel, it becomes a lot harder to hit someone who is bouncing between the two pieces of cover.

The presence of this glitch is controversial among Gear of War fans, as many of them think that it gives the players who use it a distinct advantage over those who don't.

15. The Bayonetta Rocket Launcher Combo

Bayonetta

Bayonetta's most iconic weapons are a set of four pistols called Scarborough Fair. She fires two of them with her hands, while the other two remain strapped to the heels of her boots. Bayonetta uses an acrobatic fighting style, which allows her to use all four of her guns in combat.

As you progress through the original Bayonetta, you will unlock more weapons. These include Lt. Col. Kilgore, which is a set of rocket launchers that can be equipped to either Bayonetta's hands or feet. This is the slowest weapon in the game, but also the most powerful.

However, it is possible to vastly increase the speed at which Bayonetta can fire rockets. This can be done by equipping the Durga claws on her hands and Lt. Col. Kilgore on her heels. The Durga has a combo which involves several kicks. If you switch sets throughout the combo, you can fire multiple rockets in a few seconds of intense kicking.

14. The Endless Lives Of Sinistar

Sinistar arcade game

Sinistar was an arcade shooter released in 1983. It quickly made itself known in the arcades, due to the fact that the machine spoke. The villain of the game was an alien monster called Sinistar and he used to yell at you throughout the game. Sinistar possessed some impressive voice clips for its time, which is what people mostly remember it for.

Like a lot of arcade games, Sinistar was brutally difficult. It was possible to make the game a lot easier, but you had to die first.

If you only had one life left and allowed yourself to be killed by an enemy ship, while Sinistar was about to eat your vessel, then the game would count it as two kills at once.

This would cause the numbers to overflow, which raised your amount of lives to 255. This could then give you more than enough chances to finish the game and shut Sinistar up once and for all.

13. Ashley Lays The Smackdown In Resident Evil 4

Ashley Resident Evil 4

Resident Evil 4 is considered to be one of the greatest video games of all time. This is why it has been ported to so many systems and can still be enjoyed on numerous platforms to this day.

Even the classics have their bad points, however, and in Resident Evil 4's case, it is in the sections where you control Ashley. Ashley Graham is the daughter of the President of the United States of America, who is kidnapped during a trip to Spain.

It is up to Leon Kennedy to rescue her and return her to America, which means that you must protect her for large portions of the game. There are a few sections where you have to control Ashley on her own, when she needs to hide and run from enemies.

You can use glitches to turn Ashley into a professional wrestler. If you open a door when a monster is about to open it, Ashley will take them to Suplex City.

Unfortunately, Ashley's Brock Lesnar impression was removed from later versions of the game.

12. The Unstoppable Cyan

Final Fantasy Cyan Artwork

Squaresoft did their best to make all of the playable characters in Final Fantasy VI as unique as possible. This means that all of the characters have unique traits and commands in battle that aren't shared by their colleagues.

However, Cyan might have the worst unique ability in the game. His Bushido command gives him access to eight different abilities, but they all require the player to wait, as the attacks all have charge times. This means that the enemy will be wailing on your party while you wait for Cyan's strongest abilities to become active.

Thankfully, it is possible to use glitches to turn Cyan into the best character in the game. You can do this by making sure Cyan dies while he is transformed into an Imp and has his Bushido Sky ability activated.

If you revive Cyan, then he will immediately launch an endless series of attacks that won't end until all of the enemies are dead, without giving them any chance to fight back.

11. The Accidental Bomb Arrows

Link placing a bomb in Link's Awakening DX.

There are some instances where a glitch becomes so popular that it is added into later installments as a feature. This is especially prominent in the Mortal Kombat franchise, as Midway are always keen to feed fan speculation and make things canon in the sequels.

The Legend of Zelda games also contained a glitch that became an official part of the series. In Link's Awakening, it is possible to fire bombs across the screen like arrows. You can do this by equipping bombs in one slot and the bow in the other.

If you press both the A and B buttons at the same time, then Link will fire a bomb across the screen. This is a useful move that makes short work of many enemies in the game.

Bomb arrows became an item in later The Legend of Zelda games, which goes to show that Nintendo does occasionally listen to their fans.

10. Guile's Handcuffs

Guile Street Fighter II

It is possible to win a match in Street Fighter II by waiting for the clock to run out. If you have more health than your enemy when the countdown reaches zero, then you will win the match. Most battles never come to this, as the average Street Fighter II round has more than enough time for a definitive result to be reached.

Guile has the ability to exploit the clock in the arcade version of Street Fighter II. This is possible through the "Handcuff Glitch." If you try to execute a throw after inputting the commands for a Flash Kick, then it is possible for the other character to become frozen. The other player will then stay close to Guile throughout the battle, as if the two of them are handcuffed together.

The round won't end while this glitch is in effect, however. You can only end it by performing a throw. If a Guile player manages to get the first hit in and then execute this glitch, then they can win the round by waiting for the timer to run out and ending the glitch.

9. Bombing The Capra Demon

A character faces the Capra Demon in Dark Souls

The original Dark Souls game is known for being tough, but fair. This is true, except for the Capra Demon boss. It is the most frustrating boss in the game due to the fact that you have to fight it in a tiny arena, while its two dog minions attack you.

The job of the dogs is to stunlock you so that the Capra Demon can smash you over the head with its giant blades. This means that you have to spend the first few minutes of the fight dealing with the dogs, while avoiding the Capra Demon before the real fight can begin.

Fortunately, it is possible to beat the Capra Demon without even stepping foot inside its boss arena. This is because there is no barrier on the top of the entrance to his area.

You can stand outside the fog door and throw bombs at the Capra Demon from a safe distance. He will have no choice but to stand there while you knock his health down with fire damage.

8. Doom & Straferunning

Doom Romero Level

A glitch doesn't have to be complex in order to be effective. This is the case with Straferunning in Doom, which is simple to perform and yet incredibly useful.

It is possible to give yourself a massive speed boost in Doom by strafing whilst moving forward. This will require you to move in a diagonal fashion, though the player can alternate between directions in order to move in a lightning fast zigzag-like pattern.

This glitch is incredibly useful during deathmatches or for players who are attempting a speedrun of the game. One way in which this glitch can be more easily performed is a customized keyboard/mouse setup, which requires some practice.

Game designer John Romero has confirmed that Straferunning was not an intentional design choice, and  that the developers weren't even aware of it until a year after the game was released.

It was created due to a quirk in the programming, which players are free to exploit.

7. Ketchup Goes Great With Rock Candy

Earthbound

It is possible to raise the stats of your party members in EarthBound with the use of an item called Rock Candy. These are incredibly rare food items that will raise one random stat with each use.

There is a glitch in the game involving Rock Candy, which will let you max out your stats in a short period of time.

In EarthBound, almost all of the healing items are also food. It is possible to use condiments in order to increase the potency of the healing items. This means that you can add ketchup to a burger in order to make it heal more of your health.

If you use a condiment with a Rock Candy, then the condiment will be used up but you will still have the Rock Candy. This means that you can buy hundreds of three dollar Sugar Packets and max out all of your stats.

6. The Yellow Devil Pause

Yellow Devil Mega Man

The Yellow Devil is easily the most difficult boss in the first Mega Man game. This is because it can break itself into pieces and fly across the screen. It will be invulnerable during this attack, while you are forced to make pixel perfect jumps in order to avoid taking damage.

When the Yellow Devil reforms itself, you will be given a few seconds to hit its tiny weak point before it breaks apart and starts moving across the screen again.

It is possible to beat the Yellow Devil in a few seconds, by exploiting a glitch that requires you to use the Thunder Beam weapon. When the Yellow Devil opens its eye for the first time, you can fire the Thunder Beam at it.

If you keep pausing and unpausing the game, then the Thunder Beam will repeatedly hit the Yellow Devil. This will allow you to kill the Yellow Devil before it breaks apart and starts flying across the screen.

5. Yuffie Does Not Conform

Yuffie Final Fantasy VII

Final Fantasy VII has numerous glitches in its programming. It is second only to Final Fantasy VI in terms of dangerous bugs that can mess up your game.

However, there are some glitches in FFVII that can be used to your advantage. One example of this is exploiting how Vincent's Death Penalty works in order to kill Emerald Weapon in a single hit.

There is another glitch that involves Yuffie's ultimate weapon, which can help you max out all of the playable character's stats. Her ultimate weapon is a shuriken called the Conformer. This weapon ignores the damage penalty that is normally imposed upon the Morph command.

If you use the Conformer, then you have a much higher chance of morphing an enemy into an item. This makes it far easier to farm the stat increasing items, which can only be regularly acquired through using Morph.

The Conformer will finally give you a reason to use Yuffie in your party.

4. MissingNo Can Give You Infinite Items In Pokémon Red & Blue

Pokémon Red & Blue were some of the glitchiest games ever released on a Nintendo system. The version we got in North America was actually the updated one, as Pokémon Red Green were the original games in Japan, and they were a total trainwreck.

The most famous glitch in Pokémon Red Blue is MissingNo. This is a Pokémon that is created entirely from random data, which is caused by asking the Old Man to teach you how to catch a Pokémon and then surfing along the coast of Cinnabar Island. As this area has no wild Pokémon data, it will cause the game to create a whole new creature out of random data (usually from the player's name).

One of the benefits of encountering a MissingNo is due to how generous it is. Upon encountering a MissingNo (or any glitch Pokémon), the sixth item in your bag will have its quantity increased by 128. This means that you can have as many Rare Candies and Full Restores as you want.

3. Falling Off The Rainbow Road

Rainbow Road N64 Mario Kart

There are some glitches that can turn you into a godlike being and others that can help you complete a game in record time. The most important glitches are the ones that ease your pain, as is the case with the one that will allow you to shave a lot of time off the terrible Rainbow Road in Mario Kart 64.

By far the worst Rainbow Road in the Mario Kart series is the one from Mario Kart 64. Nintendo abandoned the awesome track from the original Super Mario Kart, which required great skill in order to finish, in favor of a boring slog that remains the longest track in the series.

The N64 version of the Rainbow Road has barriers on the sides and only a few obstacles, which makes it long and boring. It is possible to shave around thirty seconds off the Rainbow Road by driving through a gap in the barrier before the first turn.

If you hit it just right, then you will land on a further part of the track instead of the abyss. This will allow you to finish this awful track more swiftly.

2. Fire Emblem Has Mine Control

Artwork for Fire Emblem Blazing Blade

The early Fire Emblem games are all brutally difficult. This is because they have permadeath, which means that any character who dies in battle is lost for good.

You may find yourself short of a few party members if the enemy gets a few critical hits in. This can lead to a lot of save scumming for people who don't like to lose their allies in battle.

Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade has a glitch that makes the game a lot easier. It is possible to place Mines on the ground, which will damage an enemy unit if stepped upon. These will also allow you to control the enemy for a single turn.

To do this, you need to reset the game while the enemy is taking damage from the Mine. If you continue the game, then the enemy unit will be yours to control. You can then make them discard their weapons or place their best items in the final slot, which will guarantee that these items will be given to the player as a prize when the unit is killed.

This glitch allows you to acquire numerous unique enemy items that cannot be found any other way.

1. Samus & Her Murder Beam

Samus fighting Ridley on the Super Metroid box art

Super Metroid is one of the greatest games on the Super Nintendo. It is also one of the most difficult. Samus has to contend with armies of respawning aliens and the harsh environment at all times. The player rarely gets a chance to relax, as they explore the dangerous planet Zebes.

One of the ways in which you can make Super Metroid easier is by exploiting a glitch that will allow Samus to use all of her beams at once. This is referred to as the "Murder Beam" by fans.

In order to use the Murder Beam, you need to acquire all of the other beam weapons in the game.

If you perform a complex sequence of actions that involves equipping/unequipping the beams while jumping, then you will be allowed to fire a shot that has the properties of all five beams at once. This will allow you to deal massive amounts of damage and take out bosses like Ridley and Mother Brain in only a few shots.

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Have you exploited any of these helpful video game glitches? Tell us about your experiences in the comments!