Dirty Harry

Dirty Harry
Developer: Gray Matter Publisher: Mindscape Platform: NES Released in US: December 1990 This game has unused graphics. This game has unused music. This game has unused text. This game has a development article

Dirty Harry is a movie(s)-based game where the titular protagonist must take down a drug baron who curiously looks similar to the Marvel Comics villain Kingpin. It's notorious for having wonky controls and a long, confusing first level where it's intentionally possible to get softlocked.

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Development Info

Unused Graphics

Graphics for a motorcycle, one with Harry on it and one without him.

Unused Music

In the game's code lies an unused piece of non-looping music. Its original intended use was unknown. However, in 2025, a cassette of recordings of the original MIDI files were discovered and released by the Video Game History Foundation[1]. Before each song is a voice announcing its title. This song is announced in the cassette as "Failure", strongly implying that the game was meant to play at the Game Over screen. However, in the game, the background music of the stage you are on continues to play instead.

Unused Password

Listed alongside the three passwords in the game is a fourth one: GUNNY, a reference to the U.S. Marine rank of the protagonist of the film Heartbreak Ridge, played by the same actor as Harry in the Dirty Harry movies, Clint Eastwood. No program code actually references this password, so it's unknown what was meant to be its intended effect.