A great thing about Shovel Knight is that it as a game takes many of us veterans back to those simplistic yet ever-satisfying days of pixelated side-scrollers that never took themselves seriously, yet always posed a challenge.
While they lacked depth in story and gameplay elements, they more than made up for it with enigmatic cheats and tiny little exploitable secrets.
Shovel Knight recreates this in a manner that would quench anyone’s nostalgic desires to revisit their childhood memories of such entertaining videogames.
If you have already completed Shovel Knight and now don’t know what exactly to do, you’ve come to the right place, as we’ve compiled a set of Easter Eggs, Secrets, and a list of Cheats for you to utilize and entertain yourself while shoveling across the various stages of the game.
Shovel Knight Easter Eggs, Secrets and Cheats
Yacht Club
During the Pridemoor Keep stage, when you go into the secret area to the left to collect Music Sheet #23, hit the top roof above the Music Sheet with your shovel to make it explode and reveal the Yacht Club Developer’s logo.
Kickstarter Reference
Shovel Knight is a game that was funded via Kickstarter, and there is a reference to it when you return Music Sheet #23 (see above) to the Bard in the Village. His word will be:
“My first publicly performed lair theme. You might say it Kickstarted my career!”
The Pridemoor Keep’s track was the first one made available to the public on the Shovel Knight Kickstarter page.
Portraits of Backers
When you visit the Halls of Champions, you’ll notice the pixelated portraits that are hanging on the walls. These are actually the portraits of the people who donated at least $200 on Kickstarter for the Shovel Knight project. This is a sign of gratitude by Yacht Club for their generosity.
Dinner Scene
When you intrude the dinner during the Tower of Fate: Ascent stage, you can pause the game just before the battle to witness the Order of No Quarter personnel sipping on their drinks, tapping their fingers, and biting out of their food.
Earning Money in your Dreams
After the first dream when you’re trying to catch the Shield Knight, future dreams will have enemies appearing in them. The last dream will have lots of enemies which you can kill, and earn gold that will actually still be there when you wake up. The War Horn works wonders here, so use it and collect as much booty as you can.
Tailing Mr. Hat
After you manage to fight Mr. Hat in the Armor Outpost, you can go around specific areas to find him again multiple times. After the battle ends, head outside to find him standing on the shop’s sign above.
Use the airship to drop down on the roof and over him.
Interact with him, and he’ll give you 1000 Gold to leave him alone and scamper off. Head back into the airship and you’ll find him once again. He’ll give you another thousand gold and request that you stop following him, and will jump down the hole.
If you’ve managed to unlock the two-way Catapult, you’ll find him there standing next to the catapult. Interact with him again and he’ll give you another thousand for the final time, and take the catapult to somewhere far out of reach.
Saving the Foes
When you have defeated the entire Order of No Quarter in the Tower of Fate: Ascent, you’ll find them hanging in chains.
If you interact with them, they’ll actually ask for your help, and you can release them by shoveling off the chains from each one, after which you can speak to them to hear their thoughts.
If you’re wearing the golden Ornate Plate, the King Knight will even compliment you, stating that you’ve picked up on his style.
Troupple Trouble
If you try to fish in the Troupple Pond, the great half trout, half apple king will get angered. You can further agitate the giant lord of the pond by falling into the pool.
You will die with no penalty and return to the pier. The Troupple King will emerge and request you to stay out of the waters.
Cheats
There are plenty of cheats in Shovel Knight that one can utilize. In order to use these cheats, you’ll have to create a new game and enter the cheat code in place of your character’s name.
There are over 300 cheats in total in Shovel Knight, and one clever fellow on GameFaqs with the nickname Sparktail25 has managed to compile them in a single Document.
Some of these cheats are unknown, and we’d be glad if you could point them out and let us know.
Here are a few more commonly used ones for those too lazy to click links and search through spreadsheets:
Butt Mode
If you’re looking for some additional immature laughs, you’ll want to try out the Butt Mode. In order to run this mode, you’ll want to start a new profile and use this code as a name: WSWWAEAW.
Your name will change to Butt Butt, and the word “Knight” will be replaced by “Butt” as well, so you’ll face bosses such as Polar Butt, King Butt, and Propeller Butt.
Additionally, words such as Shovel, Mana, and Health will also you be replaced by Butt.
You won’t be able to deactivate this mode for the profile, and Feats will also be disabled. Enjoy the laughs as the village folks tell you, “That’s not a weapon, it’s a Butt.”
Iron Man Mode
This is a super-power cheat that will unlock all the Relics, and Shovel Knight will be wearing the Dyno Mail by default. You will need to enter the following as your name after creating a profile: IM&SGC14.
You’ll start off in the Lost City stage with a three minute timer on the screen that does not stop even if you pause the game. The mode cannot be deactivated on the profile and Feats will be disabled. Good luck!
Jump Mode
For this mode, you’ll need to enter the following as your name in a new profile: J&!JSMP. \
After entering this, you will be able to jump above the HUD, which can actually be quite useful when you need to get through difficult areas located at high points.
