This is actually a great product, as it teaches two important lessons: for children the invaluable skill of lock-picking, and for parents the value of not wasting money by simply putting the controllers somewhere out of reach.

I wonder how many kids simply realized that their parents forgot to take the game cartridge out before locking it and played with the lock still on the system because they didn’t feel the need to change the game that was in there.

When NES games had harder puzzles than the locking mechanism 😂

My dad used to tear out the ethernet ports from the wall. So as a 10 year old I looked up a diagram and re wired it. You can't stop a gamer from gaming.

Thanks LPL! I've been waiting 38 years for this video. Now I can finally defeat Zelda. No stopping me now, MOM.

LPL is the Game Genie to Masterlock’s whole franchise

This reminds me of a custom lock that was installed by Dad on the power supply of my Amiga 500 when my schoolwork suffered. It just disconnected one power lead. Wasn't long until I had the power supply screws loosened and a jumper wire was used to re-connect the circuit whenever I wanted to play. That was part of my introduction to electronics that lead to a rather successful electronics career.

Mum thought she was keeping my brother and I off the internet by taking the computer power cord with her when she left the house. (Yes, really.) We quickly figured out that the kettle had an identical plug.

The same result was attained by just locking the gamecarts away. But this system taught children how to decode these, and probably how to decode their mate's bike locks at school too.

Reminds me of the time I was forbidden to play on my 286 so I gave my parents the "key to the computer". All this key did was locking the case but I told them that it is impossible to start the computer without this key 😂 It worked. Good old times 🙂

I’m just imagining some middle aged dude watching this video and running straight to his parents’ house, cackling all the while because he will now FINALLY be able to unlock that NES on the shelf that’s been silently mocking him for 40 years…

My parents had the ultimate control. They simply didn’t buy us a gaming system. 😂

one thing parents who used this forgot, is that one thing that kids have too much, is time. it was a matter of trying every combination until the correct was reached.

The NES launch price was $180(well $179.99) It had probably been discounted to $90 by 1990 though(when the Homework First lock was introduced)

“I asked Mrs. LPL to change it for me. You’ll have to take my word on that.” With your reputation, I absolutely believe you on that. For a parental control lock device, my dad would have just taken the controllers, the games, and/or the power cable and let me just look at the console. It was a little extra jab to my punishment to have see something I couldn’t play. Granted the NES came out a year before I was born, so this punishment method started to apply during the N64/PS1/Dreamcast era.

Yes, we did figure it out. A neighbor’s single mother thought it a foolproof way to keep my friend from accessing the game console until after she came home from work. We did exactly what you did once, and knew the combination. “Mom” was none the wiser, as the lock would be reattached and those who were present would vacate the premises before she came home (roughly 2.5 hours after we were home from school). The irony: the lock picking gamer is a clever contract game programmer and app builder. Maybe mom knew exactly what she was doing! … Not!

My mom used to require me to get permission to have her type in the password for me to get on the Internet back in the day. She would come and hide the keyboard from view while she typed in the password. One day a friend and I set up a camcorder (old VHS style) from a different angle, hid it between some clothes in a closet, and recorded her entering the password. Played it back and got it right away. I still remember that it was "blue123" -- and Master Lock thinks THIS is going to keep kids out of their cutting-edge gaming systems??! HA! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Nice to see that Master Lock was always consistent in quality.

That was on par with the average bike lock at the time. It was easier to just pick your own bike lock rather than trying the combo. And more amazing is the easily pickable bike locks did help discourage bike thieves.

I remember my parents used to lock the family pc (in those days PCs had keyboard locks) so I couldn't play games unsupervised. This was great for my education, as I learned how to bend a paper clip into a makeshift lockpick.

My parents method was that more effective: “If we catch you playing with this before your homework is done you’re going to lose the entire gaming system.” And they backed up their words with action. All it took was one time.

Oh my god Lockpicking Lawyer crossed with Gaming Historian? Love it.

Wow a GamingHistorian / LPL crossover? I didn't think I'd ever see that. For those curious, Norman's channel is brilliant. Very underrated and always enjoyable to watch.

Norman setting the intial combination the lock had to 1337 makes me smile (it's shown on the letter).

Weird to think that for a couple of minutes at least, this lock functioned as the LPL Entertainment System :)

Specialized locks like these are always cool because they are often just too easy to bypass

Mom used to stuff my things into a suitcase with a padlock. Never underestimate a kid with time and determination

As a kid I would have had more endurance in developing lock- picking skills than in doing my homework 😂

My youth predates the NES - I was an upperclassman in highschool when the Magnavox Odessy was released and the Atari 800 came out while I was in college - so I never had to deal with this sort of thing, however when I was in college, the sophisticated electro-mechanical calculators were protected by a single cable lock to keep students from removing them from the Math/Physics library. (The LA36 printing terminal that was connected to the PDP-11/40 minicomputer, one of around 20 scattered around campus was not secured). The cable lock used a key, and students quickly figured out that a paperclip could be used to pick the lock if one wished to crawl under the table. There was no likelihood that any student would want to steal one of the quite obsolete and very heavy calculators, but practical jokes centered on removing the calculators and strapping other things in their place were common. I was always surprised that nobody in the administration ever bothered to replace the cable lock with something more secure, and when someone stole the cable lock itself, it was not replaced. I half remember that those calculators were retired during my senior year, but it was a *long* time ago.

I feel like masterlock is really befitting of their name, since they've constantly managed to make locks that even the youngest master (under the historic definition) could eventually get into. I remember buying a cheap masterlock just for practice picking when I was just getting into it, and the raking tool in my cheap set was able to put the pins in the right position to unlock it before I even started raking them.

The NES might have been 90 bucks in 1991 a few months before the snes launch, but that bad boy was 200 dollars at launch in 86.

The first lock I ever picked as a kid was a Tubular lock that came on our first PC back in 1993. It was designed to not let the computer boot up, but as you can imagine it was more of a selling gimmick. My mother would lock it while she was at work to prevent me from playing games when I should be doing chores. little did she know that only a missing paper clip kept me from opening it. If I had my trusty paper clip I could pick it in seconds and enjoy hours of gaming. To this day she never figured it out. 😂

I absolutely would have figured this out in the 80's or 90's. I learned how to pick simple locks with paper clips while at my mom's office, along with other less-than-savory skills which would benefit me years later. Thanks for sharing this!

There was a new in package “Homework First” NES lock at a local flea market for years. When it finally disappeared, Norman’s old video about it showed up making me wonder if it somehow made its way to him. Now I have to wonder if it made its way here. :) I’ve also seen a similar device for PlayStation 2 but it worked with the power jack and was easy to bypass.

I almost feel like reading the letter from The Gaming Historian took longer than it did for you to decode the lock itself.

When I was in high school, my parents got something called a "time machine" for my 360. It was essentially a signal interrupt mechanism that the AV signal passed through. You had to put proprietary coins into it for pre-arranged time allowances. My parents gave us kids coins for doing chores and homework. The back had a very basic tube lock, and I very quickly figured out how to pick it with a single paper clip. It was the first lock I ever picked. I'd take the coins back out and never got greedy, and so was never caught. My parents only found out when I told them a year or two ago. I swear, devices like these are really better for providing educational scaffolding for children to learn life skills than they are for their intended purpose. . .

When I was a kid I loved picking combination locks. If my parents would have bought this it would have worked about 10 seconds as well.

I almost choked on my OJ when he said Norm sent the lock. My worlds are colliding in the best possible way right now

This product is the origin story of the lockpicking lawyer and nobody can change my mind.

The Nintendo accesory you didnt want for christmas.

As a child who's only friend was the NES and later SNES... 100% I would have figured that out. I would have brute forced it until I got it or found some other way to defeat it. Sooner or later I'd have a system and never be locked out of that sweet, sweet video game brain chemicals.

This reminds me of when I was grounded and my mom took the power cable to my desktop as a means to make sure I couldn't play on it without having to take the entire thing. Little did she know that the power cable for a pc and a monitor is the same, and I had 2 monitors XD

I remember using this same exact method on those cheap bike locks from the 90's when we were kids. The dials on those things left HUGE gaps between each other to let you know you were on the right track.

Most combination bike locks back in the 1980s were defeated by exactly that technique. When we were 10 years old, we used to pick each other’s locks and ride each other’s bikes 😂

LPL and Gaming Historian is the crossover I never knew I needed

Norm genuinely has one of the best video game channels. Happy to see this unlikely collab

My first experience with lockpicking was my parents locking my PS1 controllers inside one of those document lockboxes.

Ever since the Video Game Historian posted his video on this lock, I've been waiting for LPL to do his video. Awesome!

This is the lock that taught me how to pick this kind of combination lock. My uncle got it for my cousin, but in typical fashion for my family never actually used it so we would just goof with it.

In terms of just documenting and preserving gaming history, this is very very cool. I know there are preservation groups for games but stuff like this should be included in my opinion.

two of the best creators on youtube!

I would have loved this as a kid. I used to pick locks on all my parents candy machines, so this would have been a fun challenge for me back in the day. LOL

I never knew something like this existed but I’m not shocked at all. Back in the Nintendo days, there was always some 3rd party product trying to attach itself to the success of the Nintendo. From controllers, to locks, to gloves that protected your fingers from getting blisters. It was a wild time.

I can imagine some parent thinking they really outsmarted their child with this one

Oh yes, I'm certain children could figure this out. My whole life I'd imagined lock picking something like this to basically consist of pulling on it and feeling when the wheels fell into place. It never worked for me on combination locks, but sure enough, here's a lock where that's exactly how it works.

“Train up a child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it.” ‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭22‬:‭6‬ Literally, parent your child and they’ll listen.

LPL has taught me that master locks are basically good for paperweights and that's it

Master Lock never fails to depress.

I found this channel because of this video. I'm such a video game nerd, lol So thank you and have a nice day.

Wow. Never expected Gaming Historian of all people to be sending you locks. Good stuff!

That Lock is just a bonus level before gaming :D

This is a case for, those who would not try to crack the lock, would do their homework. And those who definitely want to play before or instead of homework... well, they don't have much of a challenge.

Took you more time than modern masterlock

That’s a cool piece of gaming history

Thank you so much! I've been stuck playing Action 52 for the last 25 years!

Great starter kit to get your kid interested in lockpicking. I'd say well worth the twenty dollars

I remember when I was a teenager, my parents would try to lock me out of the workshop, to keep me from doing electronics projects at certain times in their house with a generic Kwikset KW1 key-in-knob set. It wasn’t long that I realized that the latch wasn’t properly set when the door was closed, so I was able to shim the latch to get in.

this is about as productive as that one time my mom tried the same thing by bringing my computer's power chord with her to work. to this day i dont remember how i figured out the treadmill has the same plug.

If only 80's kids could've seen this video

The way I was brought up, parents didn't need a lock, they said no, we listened, because if we didn't , they would just take the game away. No way they would spend 20$ on this. Cool retro look back, LPL !!

Ahh. The good old days. The early 1990s were the best.

I certainly learned to open locks of this type around the age that this would have been relevant. Something with a key would have provided more challenge. Though, if it stood between me and my Nintendo, I'm sure I'd learn how to pick locks a lot earlier too. One of my friends had a BIOS password on parents' computer for much the same purpose, and I managed to get through that one with some educated guessing and brute force trial and error. Kids have a lot of time and really like games. You have to get way more sophisticated.

A nice way to keep the console open and let dust and moisture peel away the mechanical connectors for the cardridge.

You know the video is going to be short when Masterlock is involved.

Who else did a double take when he said that it was sent by Gaming Historian? That channel is awesome too

Decoding cheap combination locks like this from the 80’s is how I got into lock picking as a kid. I had a terrible memory and a number bicycle lock. The first time I forgot the combination, I figured out how to pick it. From then on out I just picked the lock instead of bothering to learn my combination.

A lock purely formed around "plausible deniability", how novel.

A LockPickingLawyer-TheGamingHistorian crossover?! That’s another one off the bucket list.

“Master lock” _mcnally has entered the chat_

My parents trick was to take the power brick out and hide it in our safe, we managed to get a another power brick (one of my friend had a dad with more drastic measures involving shooting with a .38 in the console and through all the cartridge they had after my friend failed his school year (not his fault, he was diagnosed with dyslexia later on), so we saved the power brick that was still there untouched and undamaged.

Collaboration with Master Lock 😭😭 that’s all you have to say. I’ve been playing video games starting from intellivision to the PS4 and this is the first console lock I’ve ever seen and to be partnered up with the equivalent to the red ring of death but with locks is as sad as it is funny.

LPL and Gaming Historian.. just two of the greatest channels on KZfaq 🤯😁

“You’ll have to take my word on that” You’re literally the only lawyer I trust.

Parents are going to be pissed. Kids are going search for this to be able to play games

My Dad bought a very similar product back in '81, but for the VCR. but after a few minutes, I'd learned to decode it. (Almost as quickly as I realised how to make phone calls without using the keypad or wheel dial on the landline phone!) 😂😂😂

This style master lock was also on some of their bike locks back in the eighties. I figured how to unlock it the exact same way you did so we would take a friend's bike and lock it back up in really random places! Locked one to the front door handle of the school one time. Fun times.

Just threaten to annihilate the console with a hammer if the kid doesn't get straight A's. That's the best parental control.

I forgot the combo for the padlock for the yard at work. This is how i got in without calling my boss at 2 AM. Thanks LPL

Four decades ago, when my parents told me not to do anything until my homework was done, I took them seriously because I knew they’d check and there’d be repercussions for not doing as I was told. Then again, back then we didn’t even lock our doors.

Been locked out of mine for 28 years since my dog ate my homework.. Thanks LPL!!

Decoding locks is a wholesome skill every kid should learn.

My dad had a simpler solution: He was obsessed with taking away power cable, so that I would not be able to power up my PC / Console. But that idea worked very short, once I figure out that many devices use same power cables... XD

I was a kid back then. We had different parental controls, it was go outside and play. There was no arguing with that, you didn't want the consequences.

@LockPickingLawyer I was a kid back then, and I figured it out using this method. I remember when my mom came home and saw me playing, she was mad as hell. First thing she did, was take the lock back to the store, and got a refund by making me "pick the lock" in front of the manager. Second thing she did, was take the power brick, and put it in her room and locked her bedroom door. Only when I finished my homework did she get the power brick from her bedroom and allow me to play.

I will always take you for your word. You radiate the energy of a genuine person and I've been a fan for a long time. Thanks for being you.

Honestly, I think the bottom of the NES is slippery enough that you might be able to slide the lock off. 😋 Great video as always, LPL.

Now we know how LPL honed his skills when he was a teen with a NES 😂

I successfully picked my first lock yesterday! It was a cheap "Globestar" padlock but it was still my first one....

Never seen that before. I’m pretty sure Super Mario Bros or Zelda would have been enough motivation as a kid to figure that lock out. Lol. Thanks for the nostalgia 😊

Gaming Historian is one of the best games channels on YT. Proper nice chilled and informative history vids that are always superbly put together. Got a similar chilled vibe to the LPL.