Game Industry April Fool`s Day Pranks - Part 1

Instead of beating against the tradition of the industry to put forth a pile of pranks on the first of April every year, we at GDN have taken to compiling them all for you to see what they’re doing (when they should be making games!)

Twisted Pixel

TWISTED PIXEL AND HOME DEPOT ANNOUNCE MARIONETTE CONTROLLER

Yeah, it’s a stick...

Twisted Pixel Games announced today, in partnership with Home Depot, a new marionette controller for the upcoming Kinect title The Gunstringer coming 2011 for the Xbox 360 and Kinect.

The new controller, previously codenamed “Project 144in. x 1-1/4in. Pine Round Dowel”, brings the feel and texture of professional marionetting into your living room. Made of professional grade pine, The Gunstringer Marionette Handle Controller is built to withstand the hardest stresses that virtual marionetting can provide

While only announced mere paragraphs ago, The Gunstringer Marionette Handle Controller has already taken the Kinect controller market by storm. Official Marionette Monthly says “With The Gunstringer Marionette Handle Controller, I can finally experience the feeling of hard wood clenched in my hands without having to visit a seedy downtown performance venue”.

The Gunstringer Marionette Handle Controller is available today from all 2,244 Home Depot stores for $2.17 MSRP. Only authorized Gunstringer Marionette Handle Controllers work with The Gunstringer. Accept no substitutes. Some assembly and sawing required. Click here to order now!

There were some other poorly photoshopped images but..the funniest part is "Some sawing may be required..."

PopCap Games

This one made me laugh just reading the title:

New Microwave Game Console Allows Gamers to Play While They Cook

A new microwave that has been developed to allow computer games fans to play their favourite games while they cook a meal will be in UK and Ireland stores by Christmas 2011.

Created by PopCap Games, the worldwide leader in casual videogames, the ‘PlayWave’ features a fully functional touchscreen within the microwave door and comes preloaded with puzzle game Bejeweled.

The 19 litre, 1,000 watt PlayWave will come with 167mb storage capacity as standard and will be able to connect wirelessly to the internet. In addition to the ‘full power’ and ‘defrost’ settings, the PlayWave will also have a ‘playtime’ setting, which will cook the food according to the player’s performance in the game.

PopCap Games co-founder and Chief Creative Officer, Jason Kapalka said: “It has always been our ambition at PopCap to create game experiences that people can enjoy anytime, everywhere. Our fans tell us they love to pass the time playing a few levels of their favourite games anywhere and everywhere and everyone loves a good meal so we thought why not combine the two?”

The launch of PlayWave follows extensive research into the gaming habits of consumers, which revealed they wanted to be able to play games wherever they were. In response to this research, PopCap have revealed that they are also working on a toilet game console. They originally hoped to launch both consoles as a kitchen and bathroom suite but due to complications arising from the curvature of the toilet touchscreen. PopCap do not expect to have a prototype of Play-n-Poop until early 2012.

Oddly, we just had an article about no game consoles in the toilet. OK really it was about only 50% being in the living room.

Namco Bandai

Namco Bandai Purchase and Restore a Jet-Fighter to help Promote Ace Combat: Assault Horizon

Namco Bandai Partners have today revealed their latest weapon in the war on wishy-washy marketing by blowing nearly the entire Ace Combat: Assault Horizon budget purchasing and restoring a real-life jet fighter. The MiG-21Bis model was one of nearly 100 planes due to be scrapped by the Estovakian Air Force because of government cuts to the nation’s armed forces.

Namco Bandai invested just over £285,000 in restoring the aircraft to a fully functional state before it was finally transported to the UK aboard the aircraft carrier, Admiral Kunzetov, as it rendezvoused with navy forces for a routine training mission. The aircraft has since been skinned using a modified design from the Ace Combat Skin Design competition (http://www.facebook.com/#!/AceCombatofficial) and delivered to Namco Bandai’s UK offices on the back of really big lorry.

The aircraft will be used for Marketing and PR promotions, primarily to deliver preview code to press, take journalists on experiential jet-fighter experiences and to scare local publishing rivals, Capcom. It will remain in the London HQs car-park as according to leading insurance website, weinsureanything.com, ‘it would be impossible to insure for the road’.

Now it says they will give press rides, so they should come get me.

Well they are a creative bunch aren’t they? I suspect we’ll see more as America wakes up and the emails flood in.