Top 20 Video Game Myths

Video game myths spread fast because they travel through playground chats, message boards, and half remembered magazine tips. Some began with clever pranks or mistranslations. Others came from real glitches that looked like secrets and then took on a life of their own. Either way, they shaped how people explored games, tested limits, and traded rumors long before official patch notes and developer posts were easy to find.

This list rounds up famous myths tied to specific games and explains what players were told to do, what actually happens in the game, and how each tale kept going. You will see hoaxes that fooled entire communities, secrets that turned out to be real but different than expected, and myths that developers later embraced and turned into features.

Pokémon Red and Blue

Players were told that Mew was hiding under a truck near the S S Anne if you saved your Cut use and reached the pier. Fans tried every approach with Strength and Surf and even glitch assisted methods near the shoreline and still found no event tied to that truck. The game never placed Mew there and the story spread because it sounded just plausible enough.

What did work was the Trainer Fly glitch which lets you manipulate encounters and generate Mew at level seven if you trigger a specific trainer from a distance and then visit routes in a set order. MissingNo also added fuel to the myth cycle since encountering it can scramble graphics, duplicate the sixth bag item, and write odd data into the Hall of Fame without usually deleting your save.

The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time

Players believed the Triforce could be found as a usable item through perfect skulltula counts, torch puzzles, or hidden trials. The quest screen does show the Triforce emblem which led many to assume it was collectible, but the item does not exist in the finished game and no sequence of switches or time travel unlocks it.

Leftover ideas and debug objects kept the rumor alive. Hacked versions surfaced objects like an Arwing test enemy and inaccessible rooms that seemed like clues and fans pointed to beta footage with unused locations such as a unicorn themed fountain. None of these elements turn the Triforce into an obtainable item in normal play.

Grand Theft Auto San Andreas

Bigfoot sightings filled forums with stories from players exploring Back o Beyond and remote forests. The original release has no Bigfoot character in the world and many screenshots came from mods that added a model or manipulated lighting to create a silhouette among the trees.

Legends kept going because San Andreas encourages long hikes and the map includes weather, fog, and ambient sounds that suggest things moving at the edge of view. Later entries in the series and fan mods added official nods to the idea which helped the tale stick to the game in memory.

Mortal Kombat

An audit screen labeled ERMAC in the first arcade game was short for error macro and not a fighter. Rumors turned that label into a hidden red ninja with special moves and players shared steps for forcing a fight that never legitimately appeared.

Developers eventually turned the rumor into reality by adding Ermac as a playable character in Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. That decision cemented the series habit of transforming myths and messages into secret characters that later became part of the regular roster.

Street Fighter II

An April Fools magazine story convinced readers that a hidden master named Sheng Long could be challenged by winning with perfect rounds and strict conditions. The source line in the game read you must defeat Sheng Long to stand a chance which was a translation of Shoryuken and that wording became the spark.

Capcom later introduced Akuma as a secret boss in Super Street Fighter II Turbo with a surprise entrance that felt like the rumor made real. The tradition of hidden bosses and special unlocks continued in later versions and kept players trying strange conditions during arcade runs.

Super Mario Bros.

Players discovered the Minus World by clipping through a wall near the warp zone in World 1 2 which leads to a water level that loops forever. It looks like a hidden stage but it is a side effect of how the game reads level pointers and not a planned extra world.

Another rumor said you could jump over the flagpole in regular stages to find new content. With a precise setup the jump is possible and you can land beyond the pole but all that waits is more ground with a timer that eventually runs out. The trick is real but there is no secret beyond the finish.

Halo 2

Skull hunting was so popular that players believed there was an extra secret skull that would unlock a new ending or bonus content. The game does hide multiple skulls that change gameplay in dramatic ways, but there is no final skull that reveals cut scenes or epilogue content outside known discoveries.

Another long running claim said the Scarab walker could be piloted in campaign without outside tools. Through very specific sequence breaks and trick jumps it is possible to board and control Scarab weapons in limited scenarios, which looked like a hidden feature, but these setups rely on glitches and not on a normal unlock.

Minecraft

Herobrine was presented as a ghostly miner with blank eyes who stalked players and built odd structures in the distance. The story started with a forum post and edited screenshots and it grew through creepypasta entries that described eerie encounters in single player worlds.

Patch notes sometimes joked about removed Herobrine which kept the myth active even as the creator stated that no such character was ever part of the code. Mods, custom servers, and map seeds continue to add Herobrine sightings that keep new players curious.

Diablo II

The Secret Cow Level existed after years of jokes about cows in the first game and the famous phrase there is no cow level. In Diablo II you can open a red portal by cubing Wirt’s Leg with a Tome of Town Portal after you have cleared the main quest on that difficulty and then you enter a pasture filled with Hell Bovines.

Inside the arena you can fight the Cow King and collect loot, but killing the King on a character can prevent that character from opening the portal again in that difficulty. The level became a tradition that returned in different forms in later entries and events.

Final Fantasy VII

Players traded long instructions promising a way to revive Aerith by collecting rare items or visiting a secret location late in the story. The original game does not provide any legitimate method to bring her back into the party after the key story event.

Hacks and mods created fan made paths that restore her as a playable character, and expanded universe releases kept her story central which made the rumor feel possible to new players. Within the original release the party composition after that point is fixed.

Tomb Raider

A supposed cheat code to remove Lara’s outfit circulated widely and even appeared in prank magazine tips. No such code exists in the games and third party patches that attempted to alter models became known as Nude Raider which led to legal action to stop their distribution.

The developer stated clearly that the games did not ship with any built in function to do this. The rumor persisted through sequels because it was easily copied and it aligned with playground style cheat code lists that mixed real inputs with invented ones.

World of Warcraft

The sword Ashbringer gained mythic status through early item mentions, in game books, and nonplayer character dialogue that hinted at its history. For a long time players could not obtain it and theories grew around quests or raids that might unlock it.

Karazhan and its sealed crypts also drew attention with creepy ambience and an off limits area called the Upside Down Sinners that some reached through exploits. Later expansions finally let players wield versions of Ashbringer and the earlier mysteries became part of official storylines.

The Sims

Bella Goth’s disappearance in The Sims 2 turned into a community investigation. In the Pleasantview neighborhood she is missing and family trees, memories, and dialogue suggest she was taken during a stargazing session which points players toward Strangetown for clues.

Save file digging shows multiple references that place her in different towns and timelines which kept the mystery open for years. Later games revisited the character in ways that acknowledge the disappearance while leaving room for players to connect the dots.

Metroid

Entering JUSTIN BAILEY followed by rows of spaces loads Samus without the Power Suit and wearing a different palette in the original game. The meaning of the phrase has never been confirmed by the game itself and it likely fits the password system rather than referencing a real person from the team.

Another set of endings reveals Samus without the suit if you finish quickly which surprised many players at the time. That reveal led to more password myths as fans tried words and names hoping to unlock outfits or weapons that the system never supported.

Sonic the Hedgehog 3

Many players believe Michael Jackson worked on parts of the soundtrack due to style clues and interviews from collaborators who described sessions related to the project. Credits in the game list a team that includes Brad Buxer and other musicians whose work lines up with tracks fans discuss most often.

Years later a compilation replaced certain tracks in early zones which renewed debate about rights and authorship. The result is a long running myth with partial confirmations from individuals and no full on screen credit that settles the question inside the game itself.

Pac Man

The famous kill screen appears at level 256 when a counter overflows and the right side of the maze fills with garbled symbols that prevent you from eating all dots. Players can still move and score points but clearing the level becomes impossible due to the corrupted side.

A perfect score requires clearing every dot, energizer, and prize in all completeable levels and reaching the kill screen without missing anything on the way. The target is 3,333,360 points and expert routes map out the exact patterns needed to keep the ghosts under control.

GoldenEye 007

Rumors said that all previous James Bond actors were unlockable in multiplayer. During development there were models for multiple versions of the character but rights issues meant those versions were not available in the retail game.

Data left in the files helped hackers restore the models in modified versions which made the rumor feel true to people who saw screenshots. On the original cartridge there is no legitimate method to choose those actors in normal play.

Grand Theft Auto V

A mural inside the Mount Chiliad cable car station shows a diagram with UFO shapes and a jetpack sketch that launched a community wide hunt. Players discovered that reaching the summit at a specific time during a storm can spawn a hovering saucer above the peak.

Later updates added peyote plants that unlock special transformations and a mission that features a sasquatch which players linked back to the mural. An actual jetpack arrived as part of later content for the online mode which tied modern discoveries to the original in world drawing.

The Legend of Zelda Majora’s Mask

BEN Drowned is a haunted cartridge story told through posts and videos where a save file named BEN causes eerie events. The tale used in game assets like the Elegy statue and altered text to create an unsettling narrative that moved between game footage and websites.

It later expanded into an alternate reality game that asked fans to solve puzzles and follow clues outside the cartridge. The project turned the idea of haunted media into a collaborative experience and influenced many later fan stories about mysterious saves.

Polybius

This urban legend describes an arcade cabinet that appeared in Portland with gameplay that caused headaches and lost time while men in black collected data from the machine. No verified physical unit or manufacturer record has ever been found and the earliest printed references appear years after the supposed events.

The myth inspired fan made versions that attempt to imagine how the game might look and play and it has appeared as a reference in shows and comics. Even without a confirmed source it remains one of the most discussed arcade stories and a touchstone for conversations about experimental games.

Share your favorite tall tales and the ones your friends still swear by in the comments.