The legend escalated when a user named “Sir_Galahad_2002” posted a screenshot of his post-battle screen showing negative 34,000 casualties and a single surviving unit of peasants with “1000% experience.” He swore he’d never seen such a result in hundreds of hours of vanilla play. Others alleged that using the trainer repeatedly corrupted not just save files, but the trainer itself—its file size would shrink by a few kilobytes each time you triggered the Wrath of God.

Back in the early 2000s, before Steam achievements and anti-cheat systems, PC game trainers were small programs that modified memory values—giving unlimited money, instant troop recruitment, or god-mode for units. One infamous trainer for Medieval: Total War became the center of a strange urban legend among fans.

Here’s an interesting piece of gaming folklore tied to Medieval: Total War (2002) and its so-called “trainers” (cheat tools).