April Fools' Day 2021 Gaming Roundup

April Fools' Day 2021 brought with it the standard deluge of gaming companies making jokes with varying degrees of success. From Overwatch to World of Warcraft, here's what gaming's biggest names had to say on April Fools' Day.
Overwatch April Fools' Day Experimental Changes Are Out There
Gravity? ❌
— Overwatch (@PlayOverwatch) April 1, 2021
Ricochet Arrows? ✅
400 Health Tank Mei? ✅ ✅ ✅
These are just a few choice highlights from today’s experimental patch.
? Check out the rest https://t.co/kz1QDM32Ns pic.twitter.com/GNV3v5BKdl
Overwatch developers added a bunch of wacky changes to the patch notes for its experimental mode. The changes affect a wide range of heroes, but here are some of the highlights:
- Brigitte's Whipshot resets the cooldown of Shield Bash.
"We've heard players get very excited about all things crowd control, so now with this sweet combo you can potentially up the stun time or I guess use it for mobility (ugh, boring)." - Doomfist's Rocket Punch can now travel upward
"This change should also address the issue of some Doomfist players occasionally touching the ground." - Hanzo's Storm Arrows now ricochet off the environment.
"Just scatter them around wherever you like and then claim that you totally lined that one up if it eliminates someone." - McCree headshots now refund 1 ammo, and Deadeye is no longer limited to 1 tumbleweed.
"Bullets work strangely in the future. As do tumbleweeds."
World of Warcraft April Fools: 9.0.5.0.5 Patch Notes 'Leak'
[Placeholder Social Media Text] https://t.co/d97dCwg1M4
— World of Warcraft (@Warcraft) April 1, 2021
World of Warcraft developers pretended to leak the patch notes for the game's update, and they're full of memes. There are references to "The Queen's Gambit," sea shanties, "Wanda Vision" and plenty more.
"But what is loot, if not RNG persevering?"
Valorant April Fools: Butterfly Knife Gets Literal
We've heard your feedback, and like with all of our skins we try to carefully craft an alternate thematic fantasy for our skin sets instead of just doing what's expected. With that, we are happy to present to you the first VALORANT butterfly knife!!@PlayVALORANT pic.twitter.com/F1kDFuZO1l
— Sean Marino (@oniram177) April 1, 2021
Valorant players have long requested a butterfly knife be added to the game, so the developers debuted their slightly literal take on the weapon Thursday. The knife floats down from above on butterfly wings before the player can grab it.
Razer April Rools: Razer Debuts RBG Hair
Razer's predilection toward RGB everything is almost self-parody in and of itself, but Razer pushed it a step further by introducing Razer Rapunzel, an RGB hair dye product.
Control April Fools: Remedy Ports Control to PlayStation 1
Starting today, you can play @ControlRemedy on the first PlayStation system.
— Remedy Entertainment (@remedygames) April 1, 2021
Here's a short clip, courtesy of our principal gameplay designer, Tommi Saalasti, the driving force of this port. Hope you like it!
? https://t.co/OjG0cmDtSI pic.twitter.com/HVfVVcJN30
New console ports are common occurrences these days, but Remedy decided to take their latest port of Control in a new direction: backwards. The studio posted gameplay footage of its PlayStation 1 port of Control to Twitter and YouTube.
Deathloop April Fools: Deathloop Cereal Challenges Lúci-Ohs for Throne
Coming soon to a store near you ? pic.twitter.com/aXRfCVk789
— DEATHLOOP (@deathloop) April 1, 2021
Following in the shoes of actual cereal Lúci-Ohs, Arkane Lyon revealed its own Deathloops cereal based on its upcoming game. Honestly? They look pretty good. Too bad they're not real.
Bugsnax April Fools: Bug-Free Snax Debuts
Our market research shows that bugs are considered 'creepy' and 'extremely off-putting' so we're rebranding to un-bug our snacks! pic.twitter.com/7dR7aXhsR1
— Bugsnax (YH Games) (@YoungHorses) April 1, 2021
Young Horses, the developer behind Bugsnax says it's listened to market research that showed people find bugs "creepy" and "extremely off-putting," so it's removed the bug element from Bugsnax. The studio published a trailer showing the game's various creatures with only their snack traits, rolling into and out of traps but not doing much moving of their own volition.
The studio also edited the Kero Kero Bonito-penned theme song to remove bug references. "Come to Snagtooth Island and discover... snacks!"
Discord Adds Lil Yachty Notification Sounds
releasing discord sound packs for a limited time only. restart your desktop clients and go to settings -> notifications to replace your pings & rings with sounds by:
— Discord (@discord) April 1, 2021
⛵️ lil yachty
? chaos
? my uncle pic.twitter.com/sOxxHrauGI
Discord teamed up with rapper Lil Yachty to add a new pack of sounds, available for a limited time. The sound pack includes Yachty commenting on the user's having friends, the loyalty (or lack thereof) of those friends when they leave a voice channel, and more. Other sound pack options include "chaos" and "my uncle."
These options are still up in Discord at press time, but they'll likely disappear in the near future, so get your kicks in now.
Devolver Releases Minit Fun Racer
Enough horsing around, go play Minit Fun Racer.https://t.co/OjT6hCa4DS pic.twitter.com/etpm4LAJ6C
— Devolver Digital (@devolverdigital) April 1, 2021
Devolver hidden gem Minit has been transformed into a racer in which players take on the role of a majestic horse running through... the void? Unclear. Anyway it's pay-what-you-want on Steam between $3 and $20, and the proceeds are going to charity.