In the spring of 1992, readers of Electronic Gaming Monthly (EGM) worked feverishly to defeat Street Fighter 2 with Ryu without taking a single hit before getting 10 draws with the final boss without receiving or dishing out any damage. Why would anyone set out on such an impossible errand?
To unlock mysterious Street Fighter legend Sheng Long. Or at least that’s what they thought.
For anyone who read EGM during its heyday, the April issues were always special. This is when the writers would insert one completely fictitious item into the magazine as part of their annual April Fools’ prank on readers. But oddly enough, many of these jokes ended up having an effect on the gaming industry.
Let’s take a moment to consider EGM’s greatest April Fools’ fakeouts that actually came true.
Sheng Long
The aforementioned Sheng Long prank is probably the most infamous. Leading to countless broken controllers and rage quits, this 1992 gag came at a time when readers couldn’t just get online and debunk what they were reading. The prank was so stunning that the magazine brought it back five years later for Street Fighter III: New Generation.
A mistranslation had led players to believe the existence of a character named Sheng Long, the rumored master of Ryu and Ken. The myth became so popular that game developers began including mention of the character in other Street Fighter games. Character assets and movesets detailed in EGM’s prank articles would pop up in later games in the franchise.
Eventually Capcom officials would carry on the prank, telling gamers that Sheng Long would be an unlockable character in future titles. Eventually, the Sheng Long character would be realized as a playable character in Street Fighter IV in the form of the highly powerful Gouken.
All Bonds
For their 1998 April Fools’ prank, EGM teased players of the ultra popular first-person shooter Goldeneye. This time gamers were promised the ability to unlock each and every James Bond that had appeared on film up to that point. To do so, players would need to complete the Aztec stage on the highest difficulty in under nine minutes. Oh, and you must crank up the abilities and health of all the enemies.
EGM’s writers were more on the nose than they could have ever guessed. Players later found where the other Bonds had been left in the code of the original game, and with a little digging and modifications could be unlocked as playable characters.
Then in 2012, Activision released 007 Legends, which allowed players to step into the most iconic scenes from the entirety of the film franchise. Finally.
Intellivision Returns
In the year 2000, EGM reported that Mattel was preparing to resurrect its 1979 home console, the Intellivision. Doctored convention photos showed displays of the new Giga Intellivision, which was said to include “Sensation Heightening Technology.”
The article also featured the results of a fake online poll gauging gamers’ excitement over the new console. The top responses were, “I have no idea, but I just wanted to vote anyway” and “I have no idea what an Intellivision is. Who am I?”
Oddly enough, a new console, the Intellivision Amico, is currently in development. Announced in 2018, the launch of the new Intellivision has been repeatedly delayed due to issues related to the global pandemic.
Sonic Smashes Mario
If there was one thing that EGM loved, it was subjecting children and adults into toiling pointlessly in an attempt to unlock a secret video game character that doesn’t exist. For their 2002 April Fools’ prank, the writers claimed that Sega mascot Sonic could be unlocked in Super Smash Bros. Melee for the Nintendo Gamecube. All players had to do was get 20 consecutive victories in Cruel Melee, and then defeat Sonic and his pal Tails (real name Miles Prower).
The subsequent release of Super Smash Bros. Brawl for the Wii would make playable Sonic a reality. The speedster joined Metal Gear Solid’s Snake as unlockable third-party characters.
Apple’s iGame
Imagine this: Building on the incredible success of the iPod, Apple enters the portable gaming sphere with the release of a handheld console that plays music and features games you can download from an online store. Yeah, EGM presented this concept to readers a year before Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone and two years before the launch of the App Store.
It’s incredible to think that a group of video game journalists thought up Apple’s approach to digital sales as a joke to mess with readers. It’s even more incredible just how right they got it.
Resident Akuma
Anyone familiar with the modding community knows that you can do just about anything. These days it would be little trouble to insert any character into a game, rather than, say, trying to beat a game on the hardest difficulty without taking damage and doing the impossible. But this was not the case back in 1998.
That was the year that EGM spinoff magazine EGM2 decided to get in on the April Fools’ fun. The magazine featured an article instructing readers on how to unlock Street Fighter’s Akuma in Resident Evil 2. This secret character didn’t seem too implausible since both franchises are brought to you by Capcom.
Readers were instructed that to unlock Akuma, they would need to beat the entire game six times, earning an A ranking each time. Oh, and you could only use the starting weapons, a pistol and knife.
The article features the appealing image of Akuma throwing a fireball at the undead, so it’s reasonable that fans would go through hell (six times) in order to make this a reality. Sadly, it was all for naught.
On a positive note, we now live in a time when modders are more than happy to insert Akuma into all manner of Residents Evil.
I know these days that April Fools’ is one of the worst times to be online, but it’s nice to look back at when a great magazine would razz its readers. It’s also incredible to think that so much of what they jokingly promised came true.
