Top 10 Video Game Hoaxes of All Time
There are few areas in the entertainment world so easily taken in by hoaxes than the video game side of that industry -- largely because even the most fantastical of stories can be made to sound perfectly plausible when given the right 'spin' by the culture-jammers who rejoice at taking nothing more than an outrageous idea and turning it into a full-blown 'scandal' that gets emotions flowing on all sides.
That being the case we thought you might enjoy our counting down the Top 10 Video Game Hoaxes of All Time -- bearing in mind that we have had to remove Duke Nukem Forever from the list...
10. The Legend of Minecraft's Herobrine
Very few hoaxes have been so widely accepted and violently defended as that of Herobrine, the mysterious character said to be the ghost of the dead brother of Notch, the creator of the game.When we say that this hoax was widely and violently defended we mean widely in terms of you know, worldwide, and violently in the sense that arguments on chat boards can be violent -- but still... At least part of the reason it was so widely defended probably has to do with the gullibility of players and with human nature.
That is to say players heard about it and then either imagined they 'saw' it or decided that they did, and stated that to be so in public, making them one of the defenders of the hoax because hey, it is hard enough to admit you are wrong when you are honestly wrong but when other players call BS on you, you gotta maintain props!
The source of this hoax appears to have originated with a gamer named CreepyPasta, who posted a screen shot that was supposed to be the mythical Herobrine -- and the legend began to pick up steam!
Now you would think that once the actual creator and programmer of a game calls BS on a hoax that would be the end of the matter, right? Well, no, not so much really...
It seems that players are simply too convinced that the hoax is real to the point that they wold rather believe that the creator of the game is in fact hoaxing them into believing that the hoax is not a hoax and... Wait... We're so confused!
09. Bigfoot in GTA: San Andreas
The GTA series is well-known for its Easter Egg content, so when the hoax got started that GTA: San Andreas included an encounter with a Sasquatch, gamers were perfectly willing to believe it. And then when players began posting screen shots that were claimed to have been taken in game that featured that big hairy fat fellow gamers took the Mulder Line - I want to Believe!
The only problem was that there was no Sasquatch in GTA: San Andreas -- a fact that was confirmed by one of the dev team, who publicly denied the hoax.
Despite these denials the gaming community wasn't buying it -- hey, screen shots don't lie! Or wait, do they?
The hoax -- and the battle over whether it was a hoax at all -- blew up into epic proportions, finally resulting in another public denial, this time by Rockstar Co-Founder Terry Donovan -- and still there was a significantly large portion of the community who professed the belief that the Squatch did exist, and that the devs and founders were in on it.
While there was no Sasquatch in GTA: San Andreas, the same is not true today with GTA V! Whether the inclusion of the Squatch in GTA V is a nod to the hoax or simply a naturally occurring Easter Egg we will never know for sure -- but wait... GTA: San Andreas was set in San Andreas -- and GTA V is set in San Andreas...
08. Mew in Red and Blue
While the Pokemon series is no stranger to hoaxes, there was one hoax that hit the Pokemon community particularly hard, largely we suspect because of the power of wish fulfillment and the very strong desire that the hoax actually be true -- because very few gamers at the time even knew about the special event at which the Legendary Pokemon Mew could be had -- let alone attended it.
It is fair to say that 99% of the gamers who had a Mew got it by hacking their game with a Gameshark device -- but what if you could legitimately get that rarest of Legendary Pokemon honestly? Legitimately? Fairly?
According to the hoax (a hoax that gained a LOT of traction and press by the way) the secret was simple -- you needed a Pokemon that knew the moves Surf, Cut, and Strength and then you Surf to the shore near the SS Anne where you find an abandoned Ute and you slash the tyres using Cut, then use Strength to push the Truck out of the way and Mew would come out and do battle! Capture him and he was yours!
The only problem? Yeah, didn't work.
After the hoax was fully debunked a new version made the rounds and, shockingly enough gained almost as much credibility as the original one! The difference? To actually get the trick to work you had to have a Pikachu who knew Surf, Cut, and Strength.
Our next three top video game hoaxes of all time follow on the next page.
weird
To the Guest who has so strongly protested the issue of Mew in Pokemon Blue...
I mean no offense when I say this, but you have taken the entire issue way out of context. It is clear that you have decided that the issue at hand and what we were focusing upon in terms of the Hoax is the matter of Mew in Pokemon Blue and Red.
That is NOT what we were focused on.
What we said is that the Truck cheat in Pokemon Red and Blue IS a Hoax. And it is. You can NOT obtain Mew using it.
What I do not understand here is why you have decided to be so insulting and judgmental? You did this by recasting the issue in your terms. But that does not match the topic you are attacking.
Unless you can prove that Mew can be obtained by moving that truck, you make yourself look like a complete fool.
So CAN you prove that the Truck cheat is not a hoax? Well?
KNOW YOUR FACTS!!! I played pokemon blue, and it took 10 years for the truth to be unraveled, but getting mew is NO HOAX. I never had a gameshark, and I did the trick to get mew, and it worked. seriously, google how to get mew and try it. this article has no credibility.
I think herobrine was never in minecraft in the first place
You are very welcome - and sorry about the name spelling oddity - it is just one of those things where the fingers do not always type what the brain is thinking. I do that with the word "every" when I mean "ever" quite often as well...
Lara...not Laura or Lolra
Besides this, thanks for this superb article
The Pokemon and Minecraft entries are in fact hoaxes. Just because you can obtain Mew using a glitch does not mean that the widespread widely shared hoax is not just that - a hoax.
The pokemon and the minecraft ones were not hoaxes
I found hero brine and he sacred the Sugar Honey Iced Tea out of me.
I completed all the pokemon and got all the pokemon in red and blue I have mew
Mew actually is obtainable in red/blue. You can either use a gameshark, do the mew glitch, or you could have just gotten him legit by doing that contest thing nintendo did...
Mew is actually coded into the game. It shares an almost identical setup to ditto. Here...For this method, the player first needs a Pokémon with a Special stat of 21. It doesn't matter if the stat was naturally leveled or boosted with stat experience, as long as it's not due to an in-battle Special-stat boosting skill. The player needs to find any Trainer in the game that will engage in battle the moment the Trainer is on screen and the player is in the Trainer's line of sight. The player then needs to take one step down closer to the Trainer, but make sure that the Trainer does not see the player, and then immediately press the "START" button. Once the player has pressed Start and the menu appears, the player needs to Fly or Teleport elsewhere. The location being traveled to must have a path via which the player can walk both to a place where there are wild Ditto (Route 15RB or Pokémon MansionY) and a Trainer to fight. This is because the Start button will no longer work until after
Yes it is LARA not LAURA... I apologize but the thing is that my fingers and my brain are not always in synch. I often type every when I mean to type ever, and Laura when I mean Lara - and because they do not get flagged by the spell checker, I don't always catch it and am not always aware of it.
Sorry that ruined it for you...
The triforce is actually in OoT... It's power radiates from the Temple of Time into Link, Zelda, and Ganondorf.
Also, maybe a tongue-in-cheek reference to Nintendo anticipating this rumor, a triforce symbol can be found under Zelda's courtyard in Hyrule Castle (viewed using GameShark hover cheats of course).
Herobrine CAN'T be real; the coding of minecraft doesn't allow it.
For the love of everything people hold sacred! Her name is LARA not LAURA! jeez! if it had been once okay, but you're repeating it every 2 lines on the last page!
I don't know why this wasn't added, but what about supposedly being able to revive General Leo in the World of Ruin after he was killed by Kefka in the invasion of Thamasa?
That thing caught fire fast, I remember trying to do it on the SNES many times..
(signature since this is guest post)
--barbed_wire83
For Goldeneye, the other Bond actors images actually were in-game, and you could unlock and play as them in multiplayer - but only with a gameshark. Trouble was, they all still used the same Pierce Brosnan character model.
you forgot about the unlock-able akuma in re2 rumor
mew is cool and canbe found in nugget bridge as 4herodork hes a gaming ghost mostly called aglitch you can find him if there is something strange in your game
GTA San Andreas:
IT'S OBVIOUSLY A MOD! C'MON!
"Laura" Croft, LOL
Igg juice virgin blood potato!
alright yea i tested it out. takes a while to get to the nugget bridge but I did get a mew. Used the red version. Not a hoax. The game just sometimes does this.
I was going to battle my "enemy" that you meet at the beginning of the game and instead a mew faced me in battle. took 3 pokeballs to catch it at low hp. came at me at level 16.
So no, not a hoax.
i went here just to say that you can actually catch mew. Got it in pokemon red and blue. I never tried it in yellow, however. It's very random, I don't remember the steps to how I came across one but I know I didn't use a gameshark. I'd even go out and buy the game again just to show people
It's like getting that weird missingno pokemon, that I am pretty sure was a glitch, or getting a level 490-500 pokemon on that island, which would fall to level 99-100 after using it in battle, but you could always get another one.
As for real hoaxes, the hoax I always spread around was the "121st star" in Super Mario 64. Annoyed a lot of people with that one when they kept trying to find it in the game :D
the video from game theory isn't about aerith being alive, it's about Cloud being the one responsible for her death.
"in flagrante delicto" does not mean what you think it means
Herobrine is fake, I don't know who came up with it but I do know Mojang only said they removed him as a joke cause they knew the hoax was getting bigger
Yup
How is stop and swap not on here?
There actually is a way to catch Mew in Pokemon Red and Blue (And yellow) without using a gameshark.
You need to teleport (or fly or dig) the exact second specific trainers spot you (the most popular being the trainer in the grass near nugget bridge). Then you walk up nugget bridge and you'll end up in an encounter with a Mew.
Other FFVII ones I've heard: Play as Sephiroth after the initial flashback sequence with him. Find Aeris alive and well if you beat most of the game (including all weapons) without certain items, like the gold chocobo and knights of the round.
As for Herobrine I sure as heck have seen him. Scared the hell out of me. I don't care if it's supposed to be a hoax or that I WAS playing at 4am, I SAW HIM.