Your April Fools' Day 2014 Round-Up

April 1 is the one day of the year where everyone is free to blindly stumble their way through the world of humor with impunity. Judging from our inbox, most video game developers are harboring a secret desire to quit their day jobs and become comedians. Judging from their April Fools' Day pranks, most shouldn't. Here's a round-up of the day's shenanigans.

Click on the title of each entry to see the full story.

Blizzard's Herald of the Stars
Blizzard announced a new non-linear StarCraft II campaign that delves into extremely important questions like how the Protoss breathe (the jury is still out).

Blizzard's Outcasts: Vengeance of the Vanquished
Not one to skate by on a single April Fools' Day prank, Blizzard also announced a new fighting game that pits popular characters from series like Diablo and Warcraft against each other. That's almost as ridiculous as a series-blending MOBA...oh wait.

Blood Dragon III: Vietnam War 2?
Dean Evans is teasing a potential sequel to Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, which would be set during a second Vietnam War where the battlefield is overrun by aliens and mechs. Considering the first Blood Dragon tease turned out to be true, we're keeping our fingers crossed this one also isn't a joke.

Nester Joins Super Smash Bros. Roster
Is this actually a joke? I don't see how it's any more ludicrous than adding the Wii Fit trainer Super Smash Bros.

GRID: Railroad
Codemasters is taking its racing expertise on rails with Grid: Railroad, a train-racing game. I'm guessing it might actually sell pretty well in Europe.

Frostbite Now Up And Running On Wii U
EA and DICE took the lazy approach to April Fools' Day, sending out a few tweets that mock the Wii U's power (which have since been deleted). That's okay – they're better off forgoing an elaborate April Fools' Day prank and just focusing their time on trying to fix Battlefield 4.

Final Fantasy XIV's "Favour" System
I don't know if "Favour" has some secret alternate meaning in Final Fantasy nerd code, but Square Enix seems to imply it will let players romance the NPCs in its MMO. Jokes!

Titanfall: Optimus Prime DLC
IGN is getting in on the fun with a trailer for Titanfall DLC that lets you control Optimus Prime. Make it happen, Respawn!

Killzone: A Helghastly Adventure
Guerrilla Games is teasing an animated Killzone movie directed by Tim Burton and voiced by Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter. Click the above link to see the cartoony movie poster.

Mighty No. 9 Is Looking...Special
Mighty No. 9 game designer Naoya Tomita checks out a new preview of the game in this spoof video from Comcept. Those Apple bosses sure look awesome.

Coming Up Next: More Jokes...

Neverwinter Gets A Meta Game
The new expansion for Neverwinter, Respen's Marvelous Game, lets players partake in an in-game tabletop game with their MMO avatars. Sure it's funny now – until we all wake up in The Matrix. Perfect World tells us that Respen's Marvelous Game is actually playable right now, along with a new playable race: Dragons. Frankly, we don't know what's real and what's a joke anymore!

Path Of Exile Goes Pay-To-Win
Grinding Gears Games announced that its online action RPG is forgoing its "ethical microtransactions" approach to free-to-play and is now pay-to-win. They even made a humorous video to go along with the announcement.

Sony Announces Power Food
Even Sony proper has a joke or two up its sleeve, in the form of food that can also power your electronics. The best part is because Sony is so serious a company, they had to run the following disclaimer at the end of the press release: "This non-factual news release is issued by Sony Electronics and is an acknowledged spoof press release for April Fool's Day."

Thief Goes Old-School
But seriously, ask yourself: Wouldn't you play a 16-Bit Thief RPG in the style of Final Fantasy?

ThinkGeek's Coolest Products
Online retailer ThinkGeek has a number of April Fools' Day products on its site, including a Beard Machine, a Klingon edition of Rosetta Stone, and a Flux Capacitor Car Charger that we would totally buy.

Flappy Bastion
S2 Games is branching out from its free-to-play MOBA Heroes of Newerth for a new character-driven adventure game. It's only kind of an April Fools' Day joke, though, as you can actually download and play the game. Blizzard also gets in on the Flappy Bird clone wagon with a Reaper-themed spinoff. Alright Blizzard, you like April Fools' Day – we get it!

Tropico Llama Simulator
Why run your own banana republic when you can manage a llama farm instead? Kalypso Media went through the trouble of mocking up some screens and box art for the game – complete with goofy hats for all the llamas.

Orcksmith: Lords of Metal
What do you get when you cross Rocksmith and Might & Magic? Developers in wigs, apparently.

Sherlock Holmes & John Watson Break Free
Frogwares' goofy April Fools' Day video has a serious undercurrent to it: The Ukraine-based studio has faced some difficult times due to current events. It's nice to see they're still in good spirits.

WayForward Announces Bloculus
The developer behind A Boy and His Blob and Batman: The Brave and the Bold are teasing a new VR headset that de-makes any game into an indie masterpiece.  

Coming Up Next: Is April Fools' Day over yet?

Sega Announces MEGAne Drive
Now this is the future of VR. Check out Sega's link for more goofy pictures.

Guild Wars 2 Gets Big-Head Mode
Ah yes, the ole Big Head mode gag. It's funny, because their heads are bigger than normal.

ARMA 3 Karts
Bohemia Interactive's ultra-realistic military sim is getting stupid with some fictional go-kart DLC. Hey, it worked for Gran Turismo.

Razer Eidolon Drone
Peripheral maker Razer is teasing a wearable drone that allows you to play life from a third-person perspective.  Am I a bad person for thinking that some of the shots in the video actually make it look cool?

Dead Island: Epidemic Gets Goat Class
Deep Silver's zombie-themed MOBA is getting a new four-legged class. Okay, we know this one has to be a joke – who would ever want to play a game as a goat?

Garrus Body Pillow
The sad part is you know some fans would totally buy this life-sized body pillow adorned with Garrus Vakarian, and do terrible things to it. Thankfully, the "Add to Cart" button flees from your cursor when you try to click on it. BioWare hasn't forsaken its Dragon Age fans either, who can scope out this awesome Varric Chest Toupee.

Nuclear Throne Goes First-Person
Vlambeer's top-down roguelike shooter looks awesome as it is, but we'd play it as a first-person shooter as well – which you can, because the developer's April Fools' Day joke is actually playable.

Cult Of The Danged?
Blizzard has posted a pages-long list of patch notes for World of Warcraft, which are – you guessed it – full of jokes. For those keeping count, this is Blizzard's fourth April Fools' Day gag. What is in the water over there?

Call of Duty Gets New Game Modes
Activision and Infinity Ward have updated the names of multiplayer modes in Call of Duty: Ghosts to give them a decidedly bro-tastic flair. Would the COD community notice if they didn't change them back tomorrow?

War Of The Vikings: Godlike Warriors
This video is incredible and I want to play this version of the game now. 

League Of Legends Gets Ridiculous
Riot Games' Ultra Rapid Fire balancing patch makes everything more awesome. I'm sure the hardcore eSports community won't mind the changes.

Minecraft Gets Annoying
Mojang has been known to offer up its own April Fools' Day shenanigans, and this year is no exception. Minecraft's latest update changes everyone's character skins, adds annoying sound effects, and serenades players with an all-vocal Game of Thrones intro theme.

BioWare Wants You To Cuddle Up With Garrus
Mass Effect developer BioWare knows that Garrus is a fan-favorite character. That's why they added a cuddle pillow featuring the calibrating character to their shop.

What's your favorite joke from the list? Share it in the comments section below.