Boing Boing

Boing Boing

The keystroke that hid your game behind a fake spreadsheet

Ellsworth Toohey
Jul 16, 2026
∙ Paid

boss key — Vintageibmmt / Public domain (Wikimedia Commons)

Before multitasking made it easy to control-tab away from a goofing-off page (and when people work in offices with other people), PC games shipped with a boss key — a single keystroke that instantly hid the game and threw up a screen meant to look like real work. Press it, and your dungeon crawl…

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