Game developers get that humorous itch this time of year, and its always fun to see some of the creative humor that they can come up with to tease fans and even sometimes take a humorous jab at some of the competition. Join us as we take a look at some of the creative gaming gags from this years April Fools Day.
World of Warplanes: Dragons on Approach at Full Throttle
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Wargaming.net got the gags started early this week when they revealed that their upcoming online aerial combat game, World of Warplanes, would be adding dragons to the fights in the sky. Despite aircraft being the more modern (and real) choice, the dragon would be the clear winner here with more mobility and a its ability to cause other flying things to crash by breathing large streams of fire.
PWI New Feature: GM Bodyguards!
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Perfect World International took to the thug life for April Fools Day by pimping out their GMs as personal bodyguards. And while bodyguards that could permanently reduce your run speed by 10%, teleport you into the sky or into the deepest part of the ocean is an effective deterrent to getting ganked, the inevitable abuse of power if it were real could lead to some comical GM wars.
Mojangs Mars Effect
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Given the heated controversy surrounding the Mass Effect 3 ending, it was to be expected that BioWare would end up on the proverbial April Fools Day chopping block. Minecraft creator and Mojang boss Markus "Notch" Persson made a post to his Twitter page about his April Fools gag, which he put in the form of a new game titled Mars Effect.
The Mars Effect mock game page claims to have chosen the name after deciding to not learn from previous experiences and pick a name that's already kind of in use by a huge existing franchise, a reference to Bethesdas lawsuit against Mojang last year claiming that the name of the developers Scrolls title infringed on the trademark of their The Elder Scrolls series. Mars Effect jokes to have a fully working computer system, sci-fi setting, abandoned ships full of lots of loot, and most importantly, a game ending that makes sense.
Supply Depot 2: A StarCraft Adventure
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Not to be outdone in the April Fools Day fun, Blizzard Entertainment unleashed four gags on its playerbase. Blizzard also took an April Fools Day shot at BioWares Mass Effect 3 ending with Supply Depot 2: A StarCraft Adventure. Described as having riveting story set in the StarCraft universe, Supply Depot 2 takes a jab at Mass Effect 3 by promising, "multiple endings, each influenced by your choices and color-coded for your convenience! (Further epic endings planned for post release as downloadable content.)." Ouch! This gag also comes with a "sort of" brief minigame where you can torment a StarCraft Marine by not letting him pass. He gets a bit moody about that.
Blizzard also added more April Fool's Day fun with the educational Blizzard Kidzz, a training program for children taught by the zerg, the aging tween-focused Fledgling Heroes: Blizzard Novels for a New Generation and their new Zergotchi Authenticator.
City of Heroes - Featured Items at the Paragon Market - 4/1/12
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Paragon Studios added their April Fool's Day post for City of Heroes by pointing to new items not really in the Paragon Marketplace. While if they were real it would be a source of endless amusement, the new gag items include a literal Vanity Pet, a custom power that a dev will walk you through making, a custom identifier to bombard the email, phone, in-game tells, text and dispatch a security team to deal with that one offending player that wont click Enter Event (you know who you are) and always holds up the game. There are quite a few more on the list, so head over and check them out. Clown summoning power for the win.
SWTOR Live the Ship Droid Experience
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And this brings us back to BioWare and Star Wars: The Old Republic, who is not without their own sense of humor. Referencing the upcoming 1.2 update, BioWare lays out the new pseudo storyline featuring those most trusted of companions the ship droids. Live the Droid Experience promises to let players live the most exciting life of their ship droid by preparing meals, painting walls and fluffing seat cushions. You know...the fun stuff. Fluff enough cushions and your droid may even become the new galactic hero.
BioWare also included new videos of droid storyline and romance. All very disturbing stuff if you slip up and let that image sneak into your mind even for a moment. In any case, welcome our new robot overlords.
Have you found a good April Fools Day gag to share? Feel free to post it in the comments below.
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