Preserving your video game legacy in the days before credit rolls

Decades ago, the completion of a video game didn’t result in a 10-minute roll of developer credits — instead, players were usually presented with a simple congratulatory message and the name of the company that released the game. Determined to have their legacy implanted somewhere in the products they worked so hard to complete, some developers took to embedding messages or credits of their own into the very ROM code they were hired to create, proof of which can be seen at The Cutting Room Floor. Cabel Sesser, co-founder of OS X and iOS software development company Panic Inc., compiled a collection of these hidden gems on his personal site, which range from developer contact information and ASCII art to full-blown rants from coders upset with their games.