Easter Eggs in Games

"There is no secret cow level."

The Secret Cow Level was born in the diseased mind of some unnamed Diablo player, who began spreading rumors that a cow appeared somewhere in the game, and clicking repeatedly on him would open a hidden level full of cows. He made it all up, of course, but the rumor proved so persistent Diablo's developer Blizzard added a cheat to Starcraft that read, "There is no cow level." Think of it as a sort of meta-Easter Egg in itself.

So developer Blizzard Software, ever keen to play along with user-created memes, added a real Secret Cow Level to Diablo II, complete with huge, halberd-wielding bovine monsters and its own boss, the Cow King. Players loved it, both for its off-the-wall presentation and, until it was toned down in patches, its excellent prospects for character experience and good loot.

Diablo 2's secret cow level

Does the Cow Level appear in any other Blizzard games? Take a look at World of Warcraft's Taurean player race: hulking, bipedal, weapon-wielding cows. Coincidence? You decide. Rumors of a genuine Secret Cow Level in World of Warcraft persist to this day, and the search continues.

"Ni!"

Monty Python characters -- and, specifically, the Knights Who Say Ni from the "Holy Grail" film -- seem to be a real favorite of bored massively multiplayer online game designers. Smash hit MMORPG Runescape gives players the message "This is not the mightiest tree in the forest," when players try to use a raw herring on a tree. World of Warcraft features a quest in the Coilfang Reservoir instance named "Bring Me a Shrubbery!", a quote from the film's characters. Guild Wars also named a quest for the Knights Who Say Ni, although it was only available for a few days over the Chinese New Year festival back in February.