Monday, April 5, 2010

Gaming Easter Eggs


So, today is Easter.  I don't know how many of you celebrate Easter.  You may do an annual Easter egg hunt, perhaps you went to church today, or perhaps Easter is just another day of the week to you.

Either way, I hope that today has been a great day for you.

This post, is about Easter eggs, though not about chicken eggs, chocolate eggs, or the plastic eggs.
This post is about virtual Easter eggs.

If you've been playing video games for a while, you've probably played at least one game that has some sort of virtual Easter egg in it.

You may remember my post, about my play-through of Ghostbusters: The Video Game, that I wrote back in February.
Ghostbusters: The Video Game, on the Wii, was developed by Red Fly Studio.

The Virtual Easter Egg Connection:
My wife and I started playing Ghostbusters together, she ended up not finishing the game, so I started my own file to play Ghostbusters.
It was during my play-through of the game, that I noticed what I believe is a virtual Easter egg of sorts, that Red Fly Studio put into the game.

The Easter Basket:
On Easter, people stuff candy and eggs into baskets.
In Ghostbusters: The Video Game, the "Easter basket" if you will, is the level "Going Up...".
Red Fly Studio decided it would place many "eggs" around the level.

The Easter Egg:
The virtual Easter egg is a poster on many walls throughout the level, "Going Up...".
I believe the poster is showing, in a subliminal way, another game(or games) that Red Fly Studio developed.

Cracking the Egg:
Just passing by the poster on the wall, many people may not have thought anything about it.
I believe the poster on the wall, though it apparently says, "Super Fungus Dudes", is a reference to Red Fly Studio's games, Mushroom Men: The Spore Wars and Mushroom Men: Rise of the Fungi.

Here are the screenshots, from Ghostbusters: The Video Game and also of the box art from both Mushroom Men games.  Mushroom Men box arts on the left, Ghostbusters: The Video Game screenshots on the right, notice the poster in the Ghostbuster shots.
 
(click images to enlarge)


Thoughts/Questions:
What do you think?  A virtual Easter egg reference to the Mushroom Men games?
Are there any games that you have played, with virtual Easter eggs in them that you remember?
If so, share them in the comments!

Again, I hope you all had an awesome day and thanks for reading!

If you're interested in any of these games, you can see some new and used priced on Amazon.com below:
  

5 comments:

  1. The Easter Eggs I remember are the ones in the Metal Gear Solid remake for Gamecube, and Mario and Yoshi toys were in the office where you fought Ninja for the first time, and if you shot the toys a '1up' chime would...chime.

    ReplyDelete
  2. @keith:
    You know, those Metal Gear Solid games are good I hear, but I wouldn't know because I've never played one at length!
    I've got one sitting in the case, I think Metal Gear Solid 2 on the PS2, but I haven't even attempted to play it.

    Anyway, that's awesome about the Easter eggs in the Metal Gear Solid remake on the Gamecube.
    I wonder if it was a lot of trouble to get Nintendo to approve that.

    Thanks for the comment!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I like this post. There are too many to name from my time on World of Warcraft but here are a few:

    There was a guy in the jungle searching for treasure called Harrson Ford referencing Indiana Jones.

    In the city of Dalaran if you go in the seweres you will see a rat and four level 1 turtles referencing TMNT.

    in Un'Goro Crater there is a character named Linken (Link) who has a bit of amnesia. Doing quests for Linken will help him regain his memory. He will remember a raft, a throwback to the original The Legend of Zelda where one of Link's collectible items is a raft. One of the other items you must bring Linken is a faded photograph, which shows Linken with a female princess that is similar to Princess Zelda. Other items you find in his old rafts are a map and a compass, objects that are found in every Zelda game dungeon. If you complete Linken's quests he will reward you with Linken's Boomerang and Linken's Sword of Mastery, references to Link's trusty boomerang and the Master Sword. Near Linken there is also a Kodo named Dadanga, similar to Dodongo, a monster from the Zelda series, and if you talk to its owner she will tell you that it "hates smoke", a reference to a hint given in the Legend of Zelda that "DODONGO DISLIKES SMOKE". Also during these chain of events there is an NPC named Miblon, a reference to the enemy (Moblin) from the original Zelda game. You must buy a piece of ham for Miblon, which opens a gate to an Evoroot. In The Legend of Zelda, you must give a piece of ham to a Moblin to access another part of a dungeon.

    I love seeing these things in games.

    nicodemusatnite.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete
  4. Ha ha, thats a pretty cool little easter egg. I loved those old NES boxes. Wish I had a good one to share. Well, I know what I'll be doing today, I love reading about obscure game trivia. (Its OK, I'm off today)

    ReplyDelete
  5. @Nicodemus at Nite:
    I had heard/read about the "Easter eggs", in World of Warcraft, but never read what they were specifically.
    Thanks for sharing! I think it's crazy the developers take time, to put characters and items in the game, that we may(or may not) recognize.

    @Chuckpebble:
    Yea, the little odd facts about older games, or even new ones, I find interesting.
    I still remember hearing about the original Punch-Out's cue, as to when to hit the "punch" button on Bald Bull's "Bull Charge" attack.

    I won't spoil what the cue is, but I tried it, and sure enough it worked!

    Thanks for the comments!

    ReplyDelete

Keep the comments clean. Rated "E" for Everyone. :)

LinkWithin

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...