April 1st seems to bring with it two styles of 'pranks' on the internet. The first is where someone comes up with some sort of ludicrous or plausible lie and just throws it out there. I don't understand this at all. Some of it can be a little amusing I guess, but mostly it just feels pretty stupid. The other kind is where a website/game/whatever puts a ton of work into implementing something really absurd and cool for a day. Google has been pretty awesome with this sort of thing and this year they 'hid' 150+ Pokemon on Google Maps or something like that. This sort of thing seems fun for the users and like it was probably fun for the implementers too. I do understand this!
League of Legends has been coming out with new game modes to try on a short term basis and they timed their most recent one to coincide with April 1st. The 'back story' is that they're changing the big pro league to use just this mode starting next season which falls into the first camp which I don't like, but then they actually went out and implemented the game mode and put it live for a week which I do like. And getting two of the top pro teams to play a 'serious' game on the map as a way to introduce the mode was pretty amusing and they went far enough over the top that it's pretty clearly not true.
The mode involves knocking 80% off of the cooldown of every ability and making everything cost no mana. There are some other buffs as well like earning more money, moving faster, and getting more attack speed/crit from items. But the basic idea is everyone just stands around spamming buttons and making crazy things happen. I played a game and it was pretty fun. I think it would probably get old pretty fast but as a one week thing it's pretty great.
April Fool's Day is a pretty silly idea, but if people keep doing it like this I'm just fine with it. But you'll forgive me if I wait until April 2nd to listen to your baby announcements.
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