The 50 Best Video Game Easter Eggs

Every spring, people love trotting out their lists of favorite Easter eggs in video games: ten here, seven there, generally always pulled from the same 20 or so well-known eggs. And hey, there's nothing wrong with that.

But programmers have been putting secrets into games for more than 30 years, (yes, THIRTY) so we had to compile a countdown that took into account the vast numbers of games published during that timespan. And there's also the fact that we hate doing anything with the rest of the crowd, so waiting until next April simply wasn't an option.

With that in mind, we're pleased to hatch our hidden gem, the 50 Best Video Game Easter Eggs. From shooters to puzzlers, from Atari to PS3, these are what we think are the funniest, toughest, and just straight-up inexplicablest (yes, inexplicablest) hidden treats in gaming history. And you don't even need a cheat code to read it!

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In the last chamber of the Santa Maria Delle Visitazione, there is a pool. Stare into the pool for one minute, and a SQUID swims by. Repeat the process, and an enormous tentacle comes out of the water. Yeah, we don't get it, either. Unless Ubisoft Montreal is making some kind of byzantine penis joke, in which case *applause*.

You know that weird cloned-chicken-you'd-never-fry-and-eat-unless-maybe-you-were-blowed-off-that-Hyrulian-piff thing named Ooccoo? Well, that's the HTML code (#00CC00) for the color of Link's dress tunic in the first Legend of Zelda. Which makes this a FUBU Easter Egg: made by devs, for devs. Also, popular only in Africa.

Game: X-Men Origins: Wolverine

In the game's first level, after you blow everything up, there's a hatch left of the wooden gate. If you've watched LOST, you've seen this hatch before. Inside the hatch, Desmond is probably doing unspeakable things because he has no Internet, no girlfriend, and an endless supply of Dharma brand canned cherries.

Pause the game and punch in the code "YABBAYABBA"—and you get a screen full of caricatures of programmer Nick Jones, along with a series of messages admonishing him for using the "old cheat code." We particularly like the one that makes him look like the medic from Team Fortress 2. I AM FULLY CHAHGED!

This is just pure hilarity. If you manage to sing out “helloooo” into one of the pipes in Gears of War 3, a small, seemingly unthreatening chicken will hop out to confuse the shit out of Marcus. Just…be careful with that bastard around. You'll see.

During the "Kate" level, you'll have to do some sniping (peep out the video), but if you manage hit all the targets, you'll see a giant rat run through the streets. That egg would probably be a lot more amusing to us if we didn't see these rodents snacking on discarded halal cart containers on the 4 train platform like every day.

So what if it only took 26 years to discover? Atari programmer Landon Dyer hid his initials in the original Donkey Kong so diabolically that it was only last year that Atari fan Don Hodges figured out how to access it. And trust us, you don't want to bother.

If you choose to play the game disc as music CD from the menu—because, uh, why wouldn't you?—you'll hear a secret tune. Old-school weedheads get hidden Pink Floyd tracks; we get hidden Castlevania tracks. That's cool, though, because our weed's way better than it was in the '70s.

In The Silk Stocking Murder case in L.A. Noire you'll find a nod to one of Rockstar's other fairly recently released, and incredibly awesome titles: John Marston's cowboy hate from Red Dead Redemption.

In level 5, you'll find the little dude from Sam and Max inside a civilian's house. You can fight him, but he might kick your ass. Or, you can "use" him and he'll go outside and start whupping on Storm Troopers. Bunnies are vicious little shits, as we learned so long ago.

When you can leave the building during the journalist escort mission, go into the journalists' neighbor's apartment. You'll see a calendar with a smiley face over November 19th, which was the release date for the game.

This may not be an Easter Egg per se, but who cares? It's a playable, sprite version of Cloud Strife. That's better than finding a stupid Easter Egg. It's like having a semi-dressed Jennifer Connelly (circa The Rocketeer) feeding you Cadbury Eggs wrapped in bacon.

We refuse to believe that this UFO was a reference to Hitler's alleged "build a spaceship" plot, preferring to think of it as confirming our belief that Nazis weren't Earthlings at all—but rather aliens from a strange alien planet that produced scheisse videos, bad techno, and vehicles that are so technologically advanced they break down after 5,000 miles.

You'll have to do some player stacking to get to this egg in CS_ITALY (or just drift around in spectator mode), but in the apartments you'll find a painting of Jesus (who apparently co-signs rage-quitting 13-year-old kids in Singapore PC cafés).

While this isn't a true "Easter Egg" per se, we had to include this as one of those instances where Kojima's insanity tilted in the right direction. The Boss Battle with The End is pretty epic, but there's one simple way to take him out (OK, there are actually two; you can snipe him earlier in the game, you cheapass).

Once you begin the fight with The End, turn off the game and either wait a week or fast forward your PS2's clock to one week in advance. Turn the game back on, and The End will have died from old age.

If you played the first Resident Evil, you'll recall the G.O.A.T. video game quote: "You were almost a Jill sandwich!" And one of the shops in the mall of Dead Rising is called Jill's Sandwiches.

You'd be surprised just how powerful this foam finger weapon is. If you beat the game on hardcore difficulty you can play with unlimited ammo, too.

One of Bloodrayne's developers is an Indiana Jones fanboy: explore the small corner rooms of the Nazi compound, and eventually you'll find the Ark of the Covenant, as depicted in Raiders of the Lost Ark. We tried looking for Short Round's corpse in another crate, but no dice.

The only time you (Jack, the protagonist) can see your own face is when you peep out some security cam pics of yourself in Andrew Ryan's office. It's sort of creepy that you're looking at voyeur shots of yourself—but propriety's kinda out the window once you've just killed a bunch of dudes named "Big Daddy" who walk around with little girls who collect bodily fluids.

Although Arkham City boasts its fair share of easter eggs, this one happens to be our favorite. Besides the homage to one of Batman's beastliest enemies, it's a good reminder of the battles against Croc we had in the first installation from Rocksteady.

Why hasn't General Mills made this into a real kid's cereal? It would have all the FDA daily requirements for Vitamin A, B12, and Frosted Creatine Marshmallows.

In the Tibetan village (Chapter 16), you'll encounter what is either a series of yaks or a single stealthy-ass yak who's unimaginable fast. You can actually go up and pet them by pressing "X"—and if you rub all the yaks just right, you get a medal named after either Marshawn Lynch, Stu Scott's discarded catchphrase, or an upcoming Gears of War 3 multiplayer mode. Your pick!

One of the longest-running in-jokes in gaming, the buck-toothed little bugger made his first appearance in Commander Keen 4, and has popped up since in everything from Quake to Alan Wake.

We're partial to this one, in one of John Romero's weirdest games, since there are four points at which you can actually fight the Dopefish. And, inevitably, lose. When you grow up looking as crazy as the Dopefish, you'd better be able to scrap.

You'll find this LOST tribute in the White Forest Inn, in the form of "The Numbers." OK, now we seriously want to see a HL2/LOST crossover. Gordon vs. Smokie. Alyx vs. Kate. Dog vs. That Hobbit who's dating Kate IRL WTF.

You may want to sit down for this news: you can only find this egg playing the SINGLE PLAYER CAMPAIGN. Check out the upstairs bathroom in Makarov's safehouse (aka the "Estate" map). Actually, his entire house looks like the aftermath of one of the best euro-trash parties to ever happen in Russia—sleeping bags, dead bodies, and all.

The UFO ending has been a recurring egg in most Silent Hill game, and was probably a welcome catharsis for the dev team at the end of every game.

Think about it: they'd just spent a year or more poring over a game in which faceless nurses are stabbing you with a scalpel, and meat puppet things are spraying acid from some orifice, all set to the metallic soundtrack of grinding buzzsaws. A goofy-ass ending probably saved a few Konami-ites from stepping out onto a ledge at some point.

When you're at the Temple of the Oracle, tap R2 near the firefily, the Gravedigger, and then between the two torches at the bridge. You'll see the words "Surrender Kratos" written in the sky in real time. Which is cool and all, but we expected the words to be written in blood, not in dainty cursive.

We're talking about the gods of Olympus here; they kill their own children. Why does the message look like it was skywritten by Snoopy's flying doghouse?

On Day 694 (game time, not real time), some new secret black cars will appear for purchase. Cop 'em quick; they'll only be there for a week. And these aren't rice rockets.

What gamer doesn't like The Simpsons? There's a hidden Homer tribute in the next-to-last level. Yeah, you have to do the old school "running against walls while clicking your mouse to find the hidden room" thing. But once you find it, you'll be in Homer Simpson's office at the nuclear power plant. Doughnuts for everyone!

Pay attention to the cutscene with the submarine in "The Dive" (third part of the mission). You'll see the numbers "8675-309" written on the side of the sub. Doesn't ring a bell? Try singing the numbers, and see what tune comes out of your mouth. Still no dice? Then you were probably born in the wrong decade and we pity you.

Who the hell hasn't fantasized about taking a ray gun back in time to World War II? It's like Back to the Future, but cheesier/better.

When you're tracking Naomi in Act 2, follow the straight path when you find her handkerchief on the ground (no, you can't pick it up and sniff it—yes, we tried). You should have crossed a river. There'll be one crouching soldier; put him down. Keep going left, and you'll find an alien crop circle.

You'll suddenly hear Colonel Campbell start to recount his tales of abduction, blah blah blah. After listening to him blather, you'll get 1000 Drebin points.

Remember that cryptic voice in the last stage? That was a backward-masked John Romero saying, "To win the game, you must kill me—John Romero."

Although you really just had to shoot rockets into a hole to beat the game, you could use the idclip cheat and walk through the wall to see what was in the hole: Romero's head on a stick. Sucks to your asthmar, Romero!

You'll run into a lot of asshats in WoW, but Dak Krause wasn't one of them. He was well known in the community as a genuinely kind WoW player; sadly, he passed away in 2007 from leukemia. Blizzard commemorated him by immortalizing his WoW character as a level 70 NPC in Shattrath City.

So...should Noam Chomsky feel offended or complimented after having his namesake resurrected from Half-Life 2 Episode 2? Probably neither. If we plopped him in front of a PC and had him play the Dark Carnival campaign, he'd probably just mutter something politically intelligent, light up a blunt, and start playing.

Grab yourself a jetpack. When you get to the bridge between Las Venturas and San Fierro, fly up to the top and you'll see this message from the developers: "There are no Easter Eggs up here. Go away." Which, of course, is still an Easter Egg in and of itself. Milhouse isn't a meme is a meme is a meme.

There's a drawing of a moon In the Pyramid of the Moons. Stand on it, for a while and Keen will "moon" you. Sure, it's juvenile humor—but it was 1991. We thought Garfield was funny, too.

This isn't just an easter egg—it's the whole basket. Along with a Wookieload of Star Wars references they hid in the game, Lucasarts decided to include the entire original Maniac Mansion within Day of the Tentacle. All you have to do is log onto Weird Ed Edison's (probably malware-laden) computer.

During the last cutscene after the credits roll, look to your left and you'll see a monkey. It's one of those things that seems so random to the person playing the game that he thinks it must be something ZOMG OBSCURE, when the truth is that one of the devs probably just thinks a monkey in space is funny - even if it actually isn't.

Evil Dead brings together movie and game geeks as effectively as Domino's and Mountain Dew. One Gearbox developer felt it appropriate to name one of the game's kazillion weapons "The Boomstick," an homage feels right at home in a game about freaks killing freaks.

The first known video game easter egg. Atari didn't credit game developers back then, so Warren Robinett decided to fight the power by inserting a hidden message within in a hidden room: "Created by Warren Robinett."

This man should earn a royalty on every game released thereafter that has an easter egg. At least give the dude a free copy of the games or something!

For all you hardened gamer cynics: developers do listen (sort of). Diablo fans kept hearing about this mythical, magical cow level in the first Diablo, but no one ever found it. That is, until Blizzard decided to actually put a secret cow level into Diablo II to reward fans for their pestering.

Inside the warden's office, there's a wall that doesn't appear to be destructible—but take it down with explosive gel and you access a hidden room that's filled with goodies to related the upcoming sequel Batman: Arkham City.

There's a map of "Gotham City" that's been stamped "Arkham-Approved," as well as what appears to be concept art that actually shows up in the Arkham City teaser trailer. Speculation says this room was added during a game patch, but we like to think that it's all just another Scarecrow mindfuck.

Probably one of the most annoyingly difficult Easter Eggs ever. To be able to even FIGHT Reptile, you had to have two completely flawless (no blocks, no damage) battles in the Pit stage, and it had to be during the eighth cycling of the stages. If you beat him, you were awarded with 10 million points and a lower IQ from having spent so much time trying to figure out the stupid conditions in the first place.

More eggs in this game than a Baptist church kids' day in April. One of the most famous was the Big Head mode, which is self-explanatory. Other eggs included President Clinton as a playable character (along with Hillary), The Secret Tank Game, and the Beastie Boys. No sleep 'til you're ON FIRE!

If you start doing a bunch of backflips in front of the race girl at the hoverboard race in Blackwater, the girl's chest will.... expand. MOAR POLYGONS.

Check the monitor on the next-to-last level, and you'll see a scrolling recipe for...cake. (You can also hear GladOS reciting it.) It's a nice egg and all, but seriously, when's the last time any of us baked a cake? Aside from grandma's birthday, if you're a male over 13, there's no reason. Well...unless...

According to Kojima-san, if you're going to go with panty shots in a video game, you'd better have at LEAST two. The first one is Chris Hansen-worthy: you creep up on Meryl, watching her exercise from a ventilation shaft above. The second is straight-up Metal Gear Awkward, as you have to chase Meryl into the restroom to catch her changing out of her soldier's uniform.

Many an '80s baby's first egg, dropping down behind the blocks in Level 1-3 for the first of three warp whistles was a mindfuck that can only be compared with hearing that Vader was Luke's dad for the first time. MIYAMOTOOOOOOOO! *shakes fist at sky*

One of the most elusive and difficult eggs in gaming. (seriously, there's no way to survive once you've found it). Halo level designer Jamie Griesemer coded within the Pillar of Autumn level a hidden dedication to his girlfriend Meg—who then gave a series of cryptic clues to message-board devotees on how to find it.

We won't go in to the whole thing, but some people with a whole lot of time on their hands finally figured it out. All we have to say is, we hope Jamie at least got a little Halo:Reacharound for his romantic gesture. Zing!