The number is right there.
Your character has 247 health. You enter 247 into Cheat Engine, click First Scan, and find either nothing useful or enough results to populate a small country.
At this point, several explanations may enter your mind:
- The value is encrypted.
- The game has advanced protection.
- Cheat Engine is broken.
- God is unfair.
Sometimes the explanation is much more complicated. But, usually, you are simply searching for the wrong representation of the value.
A game may display 247 while storing it as a Float, a percentage, a multiplied integer, a rounded number, or a temporary copy. In other cases, the value may be calculated from several statistics or controlled by a server.
Here is how to troubleshoot it without randomly changing every setting until either you or Cheat Engine gives up.
If you are still learning the basics, start with our Cheat Engine beginner’s guide and our explanation of Cheat Engine value types. Or, maybe you want to jump straight in to the rabbit hole: Cheat Engine AOB Scripting Tutorial: Unlock Hidden Game Mechanics.
Check the Obvious Problems First
Before assuming the game uses encrypted quantum health, verify that:
- Cheat Engine is attached to the correct process.
- The value has not changed before the scan.
- You used Next Scan after the first result.
- The selected value type is reasonable.
- The relevant character, level, or save is loaded.
Many games use a separate launcher. Attaching Cheat Engine to the launcher instead of the actual game is like searching the restaurant’s reception desk for ingredients.
Try Another Value Type
A visible whole number does not have to be stored as a whole number.
The game may display: 100
while storing:
- 4 Bytes:
100 - Float:
100.0 - Double:
100.0 - Percentage:
1.0 - Multiplied integer:
10000
For ordinary health, money, ammunition, or inventory quantities, begin with 4 Bytes.
For percentages, timers, movement speed, coordinates, or values that may include hidden decimals, try Float.
If Float produces nothing useful, try Double.
The Displayed Number May Be Rounded
The interface might show: Health: 83
while the game stores: 82.67
The game rounds the number because players generally do not need a medical report accurate to several decimal places. Searching for 83 as 4 Bytes will fail. Even a Float scan may miss it if you insist on an exact value.
Try:
- Value Between
- Unknown Initial Value
- Increased Value
- Decreased Value
Instead of asking for an exact number, observe how the value behaves.
The Game May Store a Percentage or Multiplied Value
A bar showing 75% might be stored as: 0.75
A displayed value of 12.5 might be stored as: 125 or 1250
Games often use multipliers to avoid floating-point rounding problems, especially for currencies and precise counters.
When the visible number cannot be found, test common alternatives:
- Divide percentages by 100.
- Multiply decimal values by 10, 100, or 1,000.
- Search within a small range when rounding is likely.
The Number Is Too Common
Searching for 0, 1, 2, or 100 may produce an enormous list.
Suppose you own two pieces of a rare crafting material. Searching for 2 is unlikely to be pleasant because that number appears everywhere in memory.
Try changing the quantity:
- Obtain another item.
- Search for
3. - Use one.
- Search for
2. - Repeat until the list becomes manageable.
When the rare item is difficult to gain or spend, test a common item from the same system first.
For example, determine how a common crafting material is stored, then use the same likely value type for the rare material.
The category matters.
Gold may be treated as:
- Inventory
- Currency
- A character statistic
- Profile data
If gold belongs to a dedicated currency system, another common currency is a better comparison than a healing potion sitting beside it in the menu.
Use Unknown Initial Value
When the number is hidden, unreliable, or clearly transformed, stop searching for an exact value.
Choose:
- Scan Type: Unknown Initial Value
- Value Type: your best guess, usually 4 Bytes or Float
Then filter according to behaviour:
- Increased Value
- Decreased Value
- Changed Value
- Unchanged Value
For stamina, the process might be:
- Begin with Unknown Initial Value.
- Sprint.
- Scan for Decreased Value.
- Rest.
- Scan for Increased Value.
- Wait while stamina remains full.
- Scan for Unchanged Value.
- Sprint again.
- Scan for Decreased Value.
The Unchanged Value scans are important because they remove timers, coordinates, animations, and other data that continue moving while stamina remains stable.
You are no longer looking for a number. You are looking for something that behaves like stamina.
The Value Changes Too Quickly
Timers, coordinates, velocity, cooldowns, and regenerating statistics may change faster than you can switch windows.
Useful solutions include:
- Pause the game.
- Pause the target while scanning.
- Use scan hotkeys.
- Search for a range.
- Use Increased or Decreased Value instead of Exact Value.
Do not attempt to out-type a timer. The timer has one job and no social life.
You Found the Display Copy
Games may keep several versions of the same number:
- The real gameplay value
- The interface value
- A cached copy
- A previous value
- A temporary calculation
- A value prepared for saving
You might change your displayed gold to 9999, only for the shop to reject your purchase.
You changed the number painted on the cash register, not the money inside it.
To test this, trigger an event that forces the game to update:
- Spend or earn money.
- Take damage.
- Reload the inventory.
- Change levels.
- Close and reopen the menu.
If the edited value immediately returns, another address probably controls the real game state.
Continue scanning after the update.
The Value Is Calculated
Some statistics are produced from several other values.
For example:
Attack power = weapon damage + strength + upgrade bonus + temporary buff
You may find and modify the final attack number, but the game recalculates it and restores the original result.
This often happens with:
- Maximum health
- Damage
- Armour
- Movement speed
- Carrying capacity
- Critical-hit chance
In that case, search for the underlying components instead. Changing base strength or weapon damage may be more reliable than changing the final number displayed in the character menu.
The Value Is Obfuscated
Some games deliberately avoid storing important values plainly.
Instead of storing health as 100, the game may use:
- An encoded number
- A random offset
- Two values whose difference produces the real result
- A value paired with a checksum
When this happens, losing health does not guarantee that the stored number decreases. Use:
- Unknown Initial Value
- Take damage
- Changed Value
- Keep health stable
- Unchanged Value
- Take damage again
- Changed Value
Use Changed Value, not necessarily Decreased Value. An encoded value may move in either direction even when health falls.
Directly changing the result may also fail if the game validates it against another value. At that point, repeatedly scanning may no longer be the most efficient approach.
The Value Is Server-Side
In online games, the number shown on your screen may only be a local copy. You might change your displayed currency from 200 to 9999, but the server still knows you own 200.
When you attempt a purchase, the server rejects it and sends the correct balance back.
This is not a value-type problem. No amount of switching between 4 Bytes, Float, and Double will move authority from the server to your computer.
Keep Cheat Engine experiments offline and away from competitive or anti-cheat-protected games.
When to Inspect What Writes to the Address
Sometimes you can find the value, but it immediately returns or behaves inconsistently.
Right-click the address and choose: Find out what writes to this address
Then trigger the change inside the game. For health, take damage. For currency, buy something. For ammunition, fire a weapon. Cheat Engine will show the instruction responsible for updating the address.
This changes the question from:
Where is the number?
to:
Which part of the game keeps changing the number?
Use this only after simpler methods fail. Opening the disassembler because you accidentally selected Float instead of 4 Bytes is like dismantling the engine because the car ran out of fuel.
A Practical Troubleshooting Order
When Cheat Engine cannot find a value, try these steps:
- Verify the process and current number.
- Try another value type.
- Test percentages, rounding, and common multipliers.
- Use a common related value from the same game system.
- Switch to Unknown Initial Value.
- Pause or control fast-changing values.
- Check whether you found a display copy.
- Consider whether the value is calculated or obfuscated.
- Inspect what writes to the address.
Start with the simplest explanation.
Most failed scans do not require assembly code, encrypted-value analysis, or sacrificing a mechanical keyboard beneath a full moon.
