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The 10 Best April Fool’s Jokes

The 10 Best April Fool’s Jokes

Nobody likes getting punked. Well, some people do, but they’re wierdos. Anyway, April Fool’s Day is that time of year when everyone gets to tap into their inner @$$hole and play horrible jokes on people they actually care about – or maybe people they hate. Even video game companies like to play April Fool’s Day pranks. And why not? They sell entertainment. What better way to do so than to shame your patrons into believing something and then smashing their hopes all to bits? Here are some of my favorite video game-related AFD pranks.

Here’s Pokemon in Your Eye

Here’s Pokemon in Your Eye

Last year, one of my favorite April Fool’s pranks came from none other than internet giant, Google. There was a little information leaked that if you found a Pokemon anywhere on Google maps (which was true, you could actually do that for a time) then you could secure yourself a spot as a Pokemon Master at Google. Yep. It was widespread that if you were of a certain number to find these Pokemon on Google Maps, you could secure yourself a gig with the company. Alas, only half of the joke proved to be true.

Take It Easy

Take It Easy

This one was propagated by a fellow video gaming website. Gamespot put out on their site that Dark Souls II was actually getting an “easy mode.” The crazy thing is that a ton of gamers actually bought into it and started blogging and tweeting and pretty soon, the news was all over the interwebs and more and more gamers got pumped about the fact that they were going to be able to play this game without getting their head stomped in every time they logged on. But the truth is that there never was, nor will there ever be an easy mode for Darks Souls II – or likely any other game by From Software.

Ghosted Menu Screen

Ghosted Menu Screen

For those of you who were online around April 1st of last year playing Call of Duty Ghosts , you may have noticed that your online matchmaking menu changed overnight. Instead of the standard match-type names, you were greeted with names like, “Bro, Do U Even Cap?,” or, “YOLO,” or even (my personal favorite), “Pew Pew.” These hilarious match names vanished with the next day’s updates, but it was fun while it lasted. Honestly, I am all for them bringing those goofy names back. It made for much more fun banter in online matches.

Nightmare on Helghan

Nightmare on Helghan

The official Sony blog site for Killzone “leaked” that a Tim Burton, puppet-style film featuring the world of Killzone was in the works and that none other than Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham-Carter would be taking lead roles in the film. The site even went on to “confirm” that the musical film would take place within the Killzone timeline in the days following the events of Killzone Shadow Fall , when the Helghast settle on Planet Vekta. As hilarious as this posting was, what was even more frightening was the abject outrage by fans of the series before even thinking that something as outlandish as this may just be a hoax. It was actually kind of funny to watch the insanity play out before the reveal.

Ultimate Street Fighter Battle

Ultimate Street Fighter Battle

This one is an oldie but a goodie. Back in 1992, Electronic Gaming Monthly magazine let the cat out of the bag that you could fight against Sheng Long, Ryu’s master. The trick was simple (right). All you had to do was fight your way through all eleven characters in the game without being hit. Then you had to engage M. Bison and fight him to a draw nine times in a row. At which point, Sheng Long would appear and you could fight him in the ultimate Street Fighter battle. This gag actually got Capcom to create a character named Sheng Long for the game, so let it never be said that a little practical joke never does anyone any good.

The SEGA Neptune

The SEGA Neptune

This one cracks me up. Apparently, a gaming magazine site “leaked” information that SEGA had uncovered a warehouse that housed their entire stock of unreleased SEGA Neptune gaming consoles and that they were selling them off at discount rates to gamers who acted quickly. There was even a link to a professional-looking site where you could place your order. But the best part is when you added the system to your cart and headed to check out, a screen popped up that said “April Fools” and then proceeded to show you a counter of how many other idiots had bought into the gag.

Find Your Destiny

Find Your Destiny

Become a Legend: Bungie has one of my favorite April Fool’s pranks as well. As anyone who has played Destiny knows, the planet Mars plays a big role in the game. It features a tough, militarily advanced race to fight and vast expanses of territory to cover both above ground and below. So it seemed only natural that Bungie would announce that for the meager price of $7,000,000.00, you too could become a part of the actual lore of the Destiny series by being shot into space and sent to Mars by the Bungie team. Fortunately, there aren’t many of us who have that have that kind of cheese… mainly because we spend it on Destiny . But you know damn well someone would’ve tried.

Transform and Roll Out

Transform and Roll Out

A trailer surfaced for Titanfall . It was one that would’ve made the biggest skeptic think twice. Essentially, according to this trailer, you would be given the option of calling down Optimus Prime to be your mech rather than the standard fare of suits you had available for drop. The trailer also touted that there was much more in store for those who dared download it. Things like new gameplay, new weapons, obviously Optimus himself, and even a new track from Linkin Park called, “Prime Time.” Sadly, there is no such song or DLC for Titanfall . Maybe if they had actually gone through with it, people would still be playing it.

Bond, James Bond

Bond, James Bond

Goldeneye was the standout title for the Nintendo 64 in 1998. It was the first game to really usher in the FPS genre as we know it today. There had been others before, but none did it as well as Goldeneye , especially when you were rocking the four player versus mode. Anyway, an info leak led to the rumor that you could unlock 3 other actors who had played James Bond in the game. The visages of Sean Connery, Roger Moore and Timothy Dalton were said to have already been written into the game’s code and that with the proper cheat code, you could unlock them. An interesting footnote to this story is that the rumor turned out to be true, except you needed a GameShark to do it.

Cheat Code Central

Cheat Code Central

This one actually happened to me personally. I worked as an assistant manager at a GameStop before coming on board at CheatCC. During my time there, the Skylanders games released and started gaining in popularity. I made a comment to a friend of mine that what Disney needed to do now that they owned LucasArts was to create a Star Wars themed Skylanders style game with collectible figurines. So one day I got the call from our Editor-In-Chief, who told me he was sending me an email he thought would be of interest to me. Within this email I found a thread of conversations detailing a tip from someone inside Disney who was a friend of our EIC. This “friend” told him that he was getting this info first and that Disney Infinity was getting a Star Wars expansion featuring collectible figurines of popular Star Wars characters. I wrote the article, detailing this info for the masses as quickly and excitedly as I could, and turned it in. At around midnight that night I got a call from another friend of mine at CheatCC asking if I was angry. When he realized I had no idea what he was talking about, he told me what had happened and that I had been gotten by our EIC. Now normally, I am not the guy that gets got. I am the guy doing the getting. So all I could do was laugh and secretly swear vengeance…which I have not exacted yet.

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