I certainly understand why a lot of game journalists absolutely loathe April Fools' Day. Besides having to be on alert all day for fake news coming through the pipes, game journos also have to spend the day enduring some truly awful attempts at "humor" from writers who really have no business trying to be funny.

I can't count myself among the Fool-haters, though. I look forward to April 1 every year as a day for game journalists to stretch a bit outside of their tiny, fact-based reporting-and-commentary boxes to try their hand at some creative fiction. It's a chance to imagine what could and should be in this industry, a day to create elaborate fictional worlds where even the implausible is possible.

So, this year, as in years past, I've put together this set of awards to celebrate the best (and denigrate some of the worst) of the April Fools' form. Enjoy.

Note: These awards focus on jokes perpetrated by the videogame news outlets themselves, not jokes created by developers/publishers that were merely reported by news outlets (this is Press Pass, after all, not Developer Pass). For a pretty comprehensive list of larger industry jokes, GameSpot has you covered.

That head silhouette on the right is key to making this joke convincing (but not necessarily believable) (Photo: IGN)

Most Convincing: IGN's "Mature" Super Smash Bros.


To clarify, there's a difference between convincing and believable. IGN's story about a blood-filled, M-rated version of Super Smash Bros. Brawl doesn't really pass the sniff test for believability, given Nintendo's long-lasting and deeply-protected reputation for family-friendly games. That said, the accompanying video for the story still manages to be rather convincing, what with the shaky, handheld camera angle and a Japanese spokesperson speaking in front of a realistic-looking, big-screen demo of the game. Bravo to IGN for once again going the extra mile in service of a gag.

Is this your idea of a joke, Cubed3? Oh, it is? Well, it still sucks. (Photo: Cubed3)

Least Convincing: Cubed3


OK, the overall joke about a new Sonic the Hedgehog sequel being leaked from a Sega FTP site is the kind of minimally believable, pedestrian fare that you see all the time on April Fools' Day. But then they go and add in a "debut trailer" video that looks like it was thrown together in five minutes by a developmentally disabled five-year-old. Look, if you're not even going to pretend to take the joke seriously, next year just don't waste your time or ours.

Most Elaborate: Destructoid's "Egyptian Dental Fair"


Most sites, when making up a fake game, would be content with making a simple fake news post and calling it a day. The Destructoid folks, though, went the extra mile, registering a URL for a teaser site complete with a pyramid-and-tooth-filled Flash trailer for Egyptian Dental Fair, a ridiculous ancient Egyptian dentistry game. Not only that, but they also reported on a fake viral marketing campaign for the game and even held a fake contest encouraging readers to submit pictures of themselves dressed as mummies. Now that's commitment!

Least Believable: Games Are Evil


A headline touting that Microsoft will be "Discontinuing 360 in 2010," is certainly intriguing, but seems immediately ridiculous right off the bat. Why 2010? Why would they announce it now? Why even stop when the system is selling so well? All these problems get worse once you get into the story itself and come across horribly-written quotes like, "After a tough couple of years of pretty-decent exclusives and a lead in the console market, it only makes sense to shut down the Xbox brand and reinvest our efforts into more profitable business sectors." Come on, guys. I want to believe, but you have to put some effort into it at least!

Cruelest Joke: AkibaBlog


For those who can't read Japanese, Kotaku explains how Akiba Blog announced that Square Enix had just pulled off a surprise release for Dragon Quest IX at midnight on April 1, months before the slated June release. While there are no reports of people actually marching to stores and demanding a copy of the still-unreleased game, I'm willing to bet that a few Japanese readers at least put in a phone call to their local retailer demanding to know what's up. Considering the type of response a Dragon Quest release usually gets in that country, we'd be lucky if that's all that happened.

The "Synchronicity" Award for Coincidental Similarities: PS3 Price Changes


The PSXtreme headline: Current PlayStation 3 Drops To $299, New Model Announced

The Joystiq headline: $99 PS2 price drop a 'typo,' Sony meant PS3

The Age AU headline: PS3 price shock

That last one is actually a truly ridiculous story about a PS3 price INCREASE, but the synchronicity still stands.

I can't tell if he's just happy or full of shit. And that's why he's a winner. (Photo: GameSpot)

The "Straightest Face" Award for Even Delivery: Peter Molyneux and GameSpot's Ricardo Torres


I'm really not sure how the famous game designer and his GameSpot reporter cohort stopped themselves from busting out laughing during this video explanation of a new pet-breeding DLC addition to Fable II. Kudos as well to the GameSpot team for some hilariously, intentionally bad Photoshop images, and to whoever came up with the idea of paying $1 a day to keep your pet alive. Brilliant!

The "Wait, This Isn't a Joke?" Award: Rock Band/Star Trek promotion


On April 1, any press release with a headline like "MTV Games and Paramount Pictures Take STAR TREK and Rock Band 'Where No Man Has Gone Before'" goes immediately in the "suspect" pile. I mean, what in the hell does Star Trek have to do with Rock Band? The cross-promotional event is apparently real, though, and just the victim of some poor timing. At least one site had to update its overly incredulous initial report of the news, while another site felt the need to confirm the story's veracity right in the headline. This is what April Fools does to us, people!

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How exactly is this worse than a standard blog? (Photo: 4 color rebellion)

Best Journalism Commentary: 4 color rebellion


I'm pretty sure 4 color rebellion was trying to say something about the declining state of the media business when they turned their entire site into a constantly updated Twitter feed for the day. That said, I think I actually preferred reading the short, 140-character updates to the site's usual blog posts, which often drone on for two paragraphs or more before finally wrapping up. As the TweetCR description itself says, "times change and we must change with it."

The "What I Really Want to Do Is Make Games" Award: Zam


Named after Scott Jones' GDC panel this year, this award goes to the game journalism outlet that would most obviously rather be in the game-making business. This year it goes to Zam, who ruined a perfectly serviceable and somewhat believable joke about a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles MMO by insisting that they would be the ones to develop and publish it. When's the last time you heard of a videogame news site designing and publishing its own mass-market game? Yeah, me neither.

The "Double Take" Special Award for Self Doubt: Wii Qube and Wii Relax


The worst thing about April Fools' Day, from a journalist's standpoint, is that it messes with your instincts. Take, for instance, Pub Company's recent announcement of some rather odd new Wii accessories, the Wii Qube and Wii Relax. The press release and video announcing the upcoming products came out over a week ago, and the company behind them has insisted that it isn't an April Fools' joke. Still, the folks over at Joystiq, at least, still seem unsure whether it's real or not. I often say you can't be too wary when April 1 rolls around, but in this case, well, maybe you can.