Skip to main content

Seth Rogen sets Twitter ablaze with secret ‘Duck Hunt’ trick

Duck Hunt Duck control

Older video game players likely have memories of the classic Nintendo Entertainment System title Duck Hunt, which was bundled with Super Mario Bros. in many of the console’s retail packages. It could be an incredibly frustrating game, but actor Seth Rogen just revealed a trick that has us wondering how we didn’t already know it.

Recommended Videos

Rogen posted on Twitter his tip for the game — if you have a second controller plugged into the system while the first player is using the NES Zapper, the second controller can control the duck itself.

Please enable Javascript to view this content

Hot tip that’s 25 years late but I didn’t have Twitter back then: in Duck Hunt on Nintendo, the second player controller controlled the duck.

— Seth Rogen (@Sethrogen) September 17, 2018

No more struggling to line up the perfect shot. No more rage-induced game sessions as the dog mocks you in laughter for failing to make contact. You can finally blast that duck into smithereens and call yourself a master marksman.

The “secret” isn’t actually an unknown, as there are YouTube videos demonstrating it — one of them was published exactly one decade before Rogen’s post, though that was probably just a coincidence and in no way evidence of a classic video game tips conspiracy theory.

Still, several other Twitter users were amazed by the information, including fellow comedian Ron Funches, who is himself a big video game fan.

https://twitter.com/RonFunches/status/1041756848179752962

Rogen pointed out to those in disbelief that the instruction booklet for the game actually mentions the ability to do this, but many kids back in the ’80s simply tossed the booklet aside in order to immediately play the game. Today, we wouldn’t have this option, as most games no longer come with a booklet at all. In the case of Switch games, the only thing included in the tall game case is a game card about the size of your thumbnail.

Duck Hunt and the NES Zapper made use of technology that is incompatible with most modern television sets. Whenever the trigger on the Zapper was pulled, the screen would go black for a single frame with only the duck’s position being illuminated by a white square. If the Zapper detected this square — hence the term “light gun” — the game would register a hit. It isn’t on par with the motion technology we have today, but it got the job done.

Gabe Gurwin
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Gabe Gurwin has been playing games since 1997, beginning with the N64 and the Super Nintendo. He began his journalism career…
Where to find the cartographer in Emerald Stair in Avowed
Environmental shot of Galawains Tusks Slumbering Fields in Avowed.

You will probably have a good grip on all the tips and tricks needed to beat Avowed by the time you reach the second zone, Emerald Stair. However, no matter how many abilities you have or how good your gear is, finding a missing person with just a vague hint never gets any easier. We already helped Sanza find a missing cartographer in Dawntrail, but he has lost another in Emerald Stair and needs us to track them down. Like last time, the Avowed won't tell you where to go so we explored the entire region to show you exactly where to track them down.
Where to find the cartographer in Emerald Stair

The first cartographer quest at least gave you the general direction to find them, but this time we are only given the name of the area within Emerald Stair. The area in question is called Naku Tedek and is the isolated island on the south end of the map.

Read more
Directive 8020: release date, trailers, gameplay, and more
A woman in cryosleep in Directive 8020.

The team at Supermassive Games made a name for themselves with one of the best horror games Until Dawn. Since then, the team has produced new narrative horror games almost every year, with their next upcoming video game revealed to be Directive 8020. Between Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet and Saros, there are a lot of upcoming PS5 games set in space to look forward to. However, none promise to blend horror with a narrative driven by player choice like this. Supermassive Games haven't approached sci-fi horror in their games yet, so let's make all the right choices to learn everything about Directive 8020 and hopefully survive.

A ton of games have been announced this year, so keep up to date with our lists of upcoming Xbox Series X games, upcoming Switch games, and upcoming PC games.
Release date

Read more
A Steam page slip-up just told us more about Elden Ring: Nightreign
Fighting enemies in Elden Ring Nightreign.

ELDEN RING NIGHTREIGN – REVEAL GAMEPLAY TRAILER

Elden Ring: Nightreign, the hotly-anticipated multiplayer title, might have DLC that features additional playable characters and bosses. The information comes from a single, now-removed line of text on the Steam page. Given the speed with which FromSoftware deleted the sentence, it's likely the information wasn't meant to go public yet.

Read more