The Best April Fools’ Jokes in Gaming

Written by Chad

April 1, 2014

april fools

We take a look at some of the best and memorable April Fools Jokes in the world of video games.

Imagine yourself in this scenario, on a sunny afternoon, you’re reading some updates on the internet, then you suddenly stumbled upon a news that is revealing a new game, or an upcoming patch. The news was so unbelievably crazy that you also fell for it, then you realized on your calendar it’s the 1st day of April.

Some April Fools’ jokes were so well crafted, you’d almost think that it is the real deal. Some took the jokes seriously while some just made a few laughs out of it.

So we put a list on some of the best pranks ever made for video games, these are the jokes that are so memorable to the gamers, that some developers took the joke to the next level and actually made the prank into a real product.

 

Guild Wars 2 Super Adventure Box

Super Adventure was a dungeon in Guild Wars 2 that was added on April Fools day in 2013, it was dubbed as ‘a game within a game’. It featured an 8-bit theme on the dungeon to make it more nostalgic to players, heck even the trailer for Super Adventure Box was created in 80’s style of TV commercial.

The dungeon was an instant hit to the players although it was only available for a month, but it eventually returned on September 2013 as Super Adventure Box: Back to School, this lasted until December 10 of 2013.

 

Metal Gear Solid 4 / Assassin’s Creed Crossover

Hideo Kojima is a man full of surprises, it can be an awesome revelation or a sick joke. On April Fools of 2008, a trailer shows Jade Raymond,  the producer of Assassin’s Creed (AC was released in November of 2007) revealing a new game as the latest chapter of a certain series, then it featured a gameplay footage set in the modern day and it featured a very familiar assassin, at the end of the video, it turns out to be Old Snake and the footage were from Metal Gear Solid 4 followed by a short clip of Kojima saying: ‘Did you like it?’

And of  course the Altair costume is available in the game by completing the game with 50 throat knife kills or with a certain password. The cross promotion continued during the release of Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker in 2010.

 

The Legend of Zelda Movie Trailer by IGN

During the first decade of 2000, a lot of video games franchises had their silver screen adaptations, and it became a trend in Hollywood to turn video games into movies. So the guys at IGN.com had a lot of time in their hands that they produced a fan-made trailer, in April Fools’ Day.

And the result? A high production quality, CGI enhanced trailer you would have thought it was a real movie, their April Fools’ joke was an instant hit. As of today, the video has a total of almost 5 million views on Youtube. IGN then posted a behind the scenes video on how they pull it off.

 

Fight Sheng Long in Street Fighter II by EGM

ShengLongEGMScan

 

Before internet became a medium for spreading April Fools’ Pranks, there were video game magazines, and one of those magazines that are notorious with the annual jokes was Electronic Gaming Magazine.

In the 1992 April issue of EGM, they posted a guide on how to fight the secret boss, who is the master that trained Ryu which you always saw mentioned on Ryu’s victory dialogue. The conditions in fighting the boss was brutal, you need to defeat 11 of the characters without getting hit then you need to get nine draws in a row against M. Bison.

The joke was a hit that after several years, in 2008 it was announced that Gouken, the master of Ryu and Ken will be a playable character in Street Fighter IV, which of course, inspired from the EGM April Fools’ Joke.

 

Assassin’s Creed for Kinect

Some hoped that this trailer was really real, no matter how goofy you may looked when playing. This April Fool prank was created by a group of fans along with some of their film making friends to make the video believable. The trailer was uploaded in 2012 and shows what you can do when playing Assassin’s Creed on Kinect, from stealth kills, to running and even performing the leap of faith.

Right now the video has almost 4 million and seven hundred thousand views.

 

8-Bit Google Maps

Search engine giant Google gave classic gamers a treat on their April Fools Joke, they transformed Google Maps into a massive 8-Bit world. The classic design lets you remind of the goold old JRPG days, especially Dragon Quest. Despite changing the overall visuals of the app, you can still perform any Google Map tasks, such as searching for certain cities and landmarks as well as setting routes.

The 8-Bit feature only lasted for a day, though we wished they let it stay longer.

 

Warcraft III’s Playable Pandaren Race

pandaren

At the time when Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos was still on its popularity, Blizzard Entertainment created a 2002 April Fools Joke where there will be a 5th playable race for the upcoming expansion, complete with statistics and ability list for each unit.

The response from the prank was so positive that Blizzard decided to include a playable Hero class on The Frozen Throne expansion in 2003.

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