The Five Biggest and Best Eggs in Video Games

It's Easter! With chocolate bunnies and plastic eggs hidden around the house and yard, it's quite the holiday. Its also the number one time for gaming sites to make posts about all of the biggest Easter eggs, fun secrets, and hidden features in video games.

Screw that.

We don't walk to talk about Easter eggs. We want to talk about actual eggs! So instead, here are five of the biggest, most popular eggs in video game culture.

1. Yoshi's Egg



Mario is arguably the biggest video game franchise in the world. It makes sense that the brand's premier dinosaur would take the egg-based lead. Yoshi's first appearance was in 1990 in Super Mario World. Yoshi would hatch out of an egg, allowing Mario to ride on his back.

His popularity would lead to the creation of Yoshi's Island, where Yoshi takes the protagonist role. In this game, Yoshi has to escort baby Mario and baby Luigi back home, throwing eggs at enemies and obstacles. Since then, Yoshi would go on to become a household member of the Mario crew while also leading his own line of egg-based adventure games. More times than not, the character is even represented with an egg emblem.

2. Pokémon Eggs



From one major franchise to another. Pokémon has always been about raising (and battling) various fictional creatures. So when the series introduced breeding in 1999 as part of Pokémon Gold and Silver, people were simply ecstatic. Whenever you left two Pokémon of the same "egg type" and opposing genders in the daycare, they would eventually *ahem* "mate", resulting in the daycare attendant finding an egg and giving it to the player.

To hatch an egg, players had to keep it as part of their party while they travel. The hatched Pokémon would have a combination of both the father's and the mother's in-game stats. Hatched Pokémon are also more likely to be a "shiny" rare-color variant than in the wild. To intentionally hatch Pokémon in hopes of a Shiny is now known as the Masuda Method, named after the game's creator.

In the anime/manga, an egg's pattern will reflect what kind of Pokémon it will hatch into. There's also Exeggcute, a sentient pile of eggs. But the implications of this one frighten me, so let's just leave that one out.

3. Chao Eggs



So maybe making newly-hatched creatures isn't your idea of a good time. Then Sonic The Hedgehog has one of the most popular side-games for you. During the 3D era of Sonic games, names Sonic Adventure DX and Sonic Adventure 2: Battle, the player could visit a special landscape where they can hatch these cute, onion headed creatures called Chao. They can feed, pet, and level up these Chao and participate in a number of Chao games. As the player progresses in the game, they can find rare, alternate colored eggs on the black market, or breed two Chao together for a new egg. For a game all about going fast, this was a fantastic side-game that lets you slow down and tend to tiny creatures.

If you REALLY want to make them fight, Sonic Adventure 2 does have a Chao Karate mini-mini-game, where you can pit two Chao against each other in a combat ring.

4. Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg



Let's be real. Eggs aren't THAT interesting. Dare I say that they're dull enough that if you head of a game all about eggs, you'd probably not be too interested. I certainly wouldn't think it would be good. But there to prove us all wrong is Billy Hatcher. This 2003 Nintendo GameCube game developed by SEGA. In it, chickens and people live together in equally intelligent harmony. At least until an evil raven attacks the land. Now a young boy named Billy Hatcher is tasked with saving everyone by rolling these giant eggs to their full size, hatching the.. something or other within.

Listen, the story isn't the fun part, Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg was well received at its time for the entertaining and engaging gameplay mechanics. Regardless, for ANY game entirely about eggs to be as successful as this one deserves a mention.

5. The Adventure Egg



Alright, I admit. There aren't that many eggs worth talking about in video games. Does that really surprise you? So this last one is about THE easter egg. In 1979, Atari released an action adventure game called Adventure. In it, the player can move a block into a certain location to unlock a secret room. This room simply says "Created by Warren Robinett." This was hidden away because of the publisher's rules on in-game crediting. This is widely referred to as the first Easter Egg.

The Adventure egg gained a fair deal of modern attention after it was referenced in the novel/movie, Ready Player One.

There you have it, folks. The biggest eggs in gaming. Given the plethora of more-interesting topic matter out in the world wide web, I appreciate you giving this one, of ALL things, your attention. Or maybe you didn't. Perhaps you simply skimmed through and looked at the title of each line. That's fine, too. I'd have done the same really.

Happy Easter, everyone.