At the height of my obsession with the greatest fighting game ever made, Super Smash Bros Melee, my favorite magazine (EGM), printed a little story about how to unlock Sonic and Tails. Thinking that I had done every single thing there was to do in that game, and the fact that I was 13 or so, I believed what I read, and proceeded to put a couple weeks of time into unlocking them. The only problem was that they didn't exist, and it was all one big practical joke.
This terribly shitty little screenshot is what duped me, and I wasn't the only one. Thousands of people poured their hearts out, trying to achieve what was in this picture, despite it's appearance, that picture was incredibly effective. EGM had already famously pulled off the Sheng Long deception, so I shouldve been aware that they had this kind of cruel humor, but I still fell for it.
This was what actually appeared in the magazine itself. It states that if you can get a KO count of 20 in Cruel Melee then Sonic and Tails will challenge you at the same time. This is what makes this April Fools joke so fucking mean, is the way they tell you to unlock them. Cruel Melee is batshit impossible, and proving this thing wrong required hours and hours of frustration. It pissed off Nintendo something fierce, they printed several articles in several Nintendo Powers telling their fans not to believe this nonsense, and EGM finally admitted to the joke, mocking everyone who fell for it, and giving copies of Sonic Adventure 2: Battle to everyone who could send them proof that they fell for the hoax.
Now, I never fell for the Toad hoax, I had learned my lesson by then, but Ive heard it was even more heartbreaking.
No comments:
Post a Comment