Play n Trade

WHY MUST WE GO THROUGH THIS EVERY YEAR? BECAUSE IT’S FUN!

Posted by Play N Trade staff writer, 1st Apr 2009

As I write this post to go up on our website, I have just finished reading about how Google is now a self-aware Artificial Intelligence that will also answer my emails for me if I tell it how much punctuation to use.  Every year, April Fools’ Day brings out the jokester in a lot of people.  Video game companies and other tech-based industries seem to really enjoy planning very elaborate pranks.  Many of them are done with a wink and a nudge knowing that their intended audience is tough to fool but will appreciate something done in good fun.  I enjoy these kinds of jokes.  It is one day that these companies that may be a little silly (or, in some cases, sillier than usual).  Here a few of my favorite video game related jokes from this year:
 
5) Bethesda, the makers of The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion, have reduced the price on all downloadable content for the game to half off, with one exception.  The horse armor content, that caused a lot of controversy when people realized that they would have to pay for it, has been doubled in price.
 
4) The developers of Red Faction: Guerilla have taken what was a joke about a leaked screenshot from a forum and run with it creating a full behind-the-scenes look at the creation of “The Ostrich Hammer”.   The hammer is a usable weapon in the game, but someone thought it looked like the head of an ostrich and photoshopped one into the screenshot for fun.  Volition decided to go one better.  There’s no word on whether the item will make it into the final game or if it is just a joke.  Either way, it’s fun to watch.  http://kotaku.com/5193915/red-faction-guerrilla-presents-the-ostrich-hammer
 
3) Microsoft UK decided to talk about their new music game, Alpine Hero.  Yodel and play an Alphorn as you overcome your throat lozenge addiction to make it to the ultimate yodel-off competition.  http://www.xbox.com/en-GB/games/a/alpinelegend/
 
2) Kojima Productions and Konami released a trailer for the next Metal Gear Solid game that essentially places an unlikely character in a Metal Gear Solid 4 cut-scene that he wasn’t originally a part of.  It’s well worth watching if you enjoyed MGS4.    http://www.konami.jp/kojima_pro/movie/april_fool/index_j.html
 
1) Blizzard is known for going all out in the depth of their jokes.  This year is no exception.  Every major part of their site has a different (probably) fake bit of information about an upcoming part of the game. The World of Warcraft page talks about their new Player vs. Player Dance Battle system.  Put together a dance team and do your best to net “get served”.  The Diablo III page has a new playable class called the Archivist.  He is extremely slow and weak, has powerful attacks that can kill him by using them, and he has a multiple pages worth of hilarious dialogue options.  The Starcraft II page talks about a new unit for the Terran (human) forces: an entire base that transforms into a giant robot! (That’s my personal favorite.)  The fun didn’t stop there, as they rigged all posts in their forums to add “flavor text” that makes it look like everyone is pretending to be a fantasy character.  (“’srsly’, he said, brushing back a lock of silvery hair.”) Irony is not lost with them, however, and they set the section of the forum normally set aside for the actual role play and in-character discussions to add “lol”, “lulz”, and other variations of that to all posts.
 
All in all, it’s a good day for the developers to take a breather as they work hard to create the games that we enjoy.  I look forward to seeing what they do next year.

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