Yeah, we know. Every Easter, we write up a historical account of well-hidden Easter eggs featured in video games over the years. You've heard them all by now, we're sure -- the guerrilla credits of Adventure, the "Secret Cow Level" in Diablo II, Yoshi's appearance in Super Mario 64, GTA IV's "Heart of the City," A Link to the Past's Chris Houlihan room, and Symphony of the Night's hidden audio track, to name a few. For more info about these tried and true surreptitious extras, we suggest checking out this GameSpot post.
However, this past year saw the arrival of a heretofore undiscovered Easter egg in a title you all know and love -- ladies and gentlemen, we present "The Goldeneye Breakdancing Glitch," viewable in the video after the jump. Apparently, tilting the Goldeneye cart in the middle of a game leads to hilarious impromptu b-boying from any and all on-screen characters. You simply must check it out -- and while you're down there, tell us your favorite video game Easter eggs in the comments!
I personally liked the halo 3 one where the soldier wouldn't let the other soldier into the door, citing their "meeting" where they decided the code word.
It's actually a glitch that occurs when cartridges are slightly pulled from the Nintendo 64. One of the best examples of this is when people started using it to exit the Kokiri Forest before they were supposed to or bypass any person who obstructed them in Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.
OMFG!!! I had discovered this with my friend, like, 7 years ago! We laughed so freakin' hard when we saw that while playing multiplayer but we had no idea what caused it and we had no idea it was breakdancing at the time...
Not technically an easter egg I guess, but in Mass Effect I always got a kick out of the guy trying to return an item to the turian shopkeeper in the Citadel markets.
That's a good question. The last part I remember is him getting mad that he accepted a return from another turian, but I don't think I ever went back to the markets during the final (intact) citadel segment. Maybe we'll find out in Mass Effect 2!
From UESPWiki - "Eltonbrand is easily the most obscure item to get within the game. Without prior knowledge or a great deal of luck, it is unlikely that the player will find this artifact during normal gameplay. First you must obtain the Goldbrand sword, which is itself one of the most difficult to acquire items. Next you need to become a vampire and perform the Shashev's Key quest for Sirilonwe in the Vivec Mages Guild. It is at this point that it appears you can 'mess' this quest up if you do it improperly, and thus spoiling your chances of obtaining Eltonbrand. The best course of action is to obtain the quest from Sirilonwe, kill Shashev and take his key back to Vivec. If you kill Shashev before speaking to Sirilonwe, you are likely to ruin everything. Once you have Goldbrand and complete the quest, you will need to be carrying exactly 11171 gold for the magical transformation of Goldbrand into Eltonbrand (you do not lose the gold). Upon transformation the message "Go to Hell, Carolina" is displayed."
More importantly, if this wasn't reverse-engineered through hacking into game files etc, the person who genuinely found it must've been the luckiest guy in the universe.
Hate to go off topic, but if your paper has an insert for Best Buy, turn to page 7 and look at the bottom left hand corner where they list the games available for pre-order. If you look closely at the Punch-Out!!! one, you can see a bald man with a mustache to the right of the game box. I think its obvious what this means.
Also, I loved the easter egg messages in GTA, the ones that say "You weren't supposed to be able to get here, you know." and "There are no easter eggs up here. Go away."
Those are always the most fun when you find them yourself.
I've been running across little easter eggs throughout Sonic and the Black Knight. Really little, things that only those who are intimately familiar with the Sonic universe would notice. Mostly lines of dialogue that are direct quotes from previous games, but obscure quotes
Has Joystiq ran an article about the scandal EA is in for sending out Brass Knuckle promos for the Godfather II game to people in the US/UK where it is illegal?
I liked the ID software PDA at the end of Doom 3. You hit a switch that says "ID" on it part way though the last level(Excavation), and a PDA appears that is full of messages from the creators of Doom 3.
Of course, the Mario characters in Ocarina of Time were pretty cool too.
Speaking of Doom3 I don't know if its an easter egg or just part of the normal scripting, but if you stare at a mirror in one of the bathrooms early in the game after about 15-20 seconds some hell like sequence shows in the mirror behind you. Only got it to happen once.
