PACIFIC
It’s Easter season, and while everyone’s out hunting for chocolate eggs in the garden, we thought we’d take the search online with five software Easter eggs you can try right now.
For the uninitiated among you, a software Easter egg is a little bonus feature hidden within a programme—because if there’s one thing software developer nerds love, it’s sneaking in obscure references for other nerds to stumble across. (I say this in full knowledge of the fact that I recently helped hide an Easter egg in the new internal CRM system we’ve built here at Pacific.)
The idea even forms the main plot of Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One, which references the very first known Easter egg: hidden in the classic game Adventure by developer Warren Robinette. He was so proud of his work, he tucked his name away in a secret location so well-hidden, it’s a miracle anyone ever found it.
Luckily for you, none of our Easter eggs are quite that obscure—they’ll only take a few minutes to uncover.
1. Minecraft:
Heading over to Google and searching “Minecraft” will reveal a small grass block. Clicking this block will reveal the hand of Steve, the main character from the game. Then, as you click around the page, you will find the page disappearing slowly.
You can even go as far as breaking blocks within the scenes that appear and eventually crafting tools! Check it out and see how far you get – can you craft a Diamond Pickaxe?
2. Pokemon:
Another Google one, but this time you’ll need your phone. If you Google any one of the original 151 Pokemon, you’ll notice a little Pokeball appears in the bottom right corner. Tapping this Pokeball will allow you to catch whichever Pokemon you searched for, and add it to your collection. Can you catch ‘em all?
3. Spotify Star Wars:
Fancy a music one? Playing any of the Star Wars music on Spotify turns the progress bar at the bottom into Luke Skywalker’s Lightsaber!
4. Edge Surf:
Opening up Microsoft Edge and browsing to Edge://surf will bring up a cool little surfing game.
5. Earl’s Court TARDIS:
Open up Google Maps and head over to this location in Earl’s Court Gardens and you’ll notice a familiar sight (if you’re a fan of British Sci-Fi). Highlighting the Police Box will offer an arrow pointing in a slightly odd direction, and clicking to move there will take you into the box itself!
