Game developers sometimes just can’t resist pulling a fast one on the very people who keep them in business. Whether it’s a sly Easter egg, a pointlessly cruel quest, or a fourth-wall break that leaves your jaw on the floor, these moments go beyond a simple jump scare—they’re full-on pranks that mess with your expectations. And let’s be honest, while we might rage-quit in the moment, those same tricks are often the ones we remember decades later. By 2026, these eight games have become legendary for mastering the art of player trolling, proving that the developers are always one step ahead of us.

Ghosts ’n Goblins – The Never-Ending Knightmare

You battle through hordes of demons, dragons, and the undead as the valiant Sir Arthur, rescuing Princess Prin-Prin from certain doom. After countless continues and frayed nerves, you finally reach the final chamber and land the killing blow. Victory! Except… not quite. Tokuro Fujiwara’s arcade classic calmly tells you that the whole adventure was merely an illusion, and you must play through the entire game again—at an even higher difficulty—to see the true ending. This brutal twist wasn’t just a one-off; it became the series’ trademark, separating the hardcore knights from the squires who’d never pick up a lance again. If you needed an arcade cabinet to eat your quarters, Ghosts ’n Goblins was the ultimate coin-devouring troll.

Undertale – The Sins You Can’t Escape

Toby Fox’s role-playing masterpiece is built on the idea that your choices actually matter, but it takes that premise one mischievous step further. Kill a few monsters and then reload your save to try for a kinder route? The flower villain Flowey and other characters remember what you did, calling you out with unnerving dialogue. Go full genocide and slaughter everyone, and you’ll permanently taint your copy of the game—the world turns into a wasteland, and even after reinstalling, the secret demon Chara will haunt future playthroughs. Fox went so far as to leave mocking messages inside the game’s files for any player who dares to scrub their sins manually. That’s next-level psychological trolling: the game knows you tried to cheat your conscience.

Drakengard – A Rhythm Game? Seriously?

Yoko Taro’s twisted mind was already on display throughout Drakengard, what with its unstable cast and a world map that’s literally Europe flipped upside-down. But the game’s ultimate prank arrives after you’ve poured dozens of hours into collecting every single weapon and defeating every hidden boss. Your reward? A final encounter that ditches the clunky action combat entirely in favor of a chaotic rhythm game against a giant queen in the skies of modern Tokyo. The camera angles are actively hostile, the music is a discordant mess, and if you somehow manage to press the right buttons, victory is immediately followed by the Japanese Air Force blasting Caim and his dragon out of the sky. Roll credits. No fanfare, no thank you—just a cheeky reminder that you just got trolled by a game that never played by the rules.

Nier – Delete Your Save, Earn a Flower

Taking place after the wildest ending of Drakengard, the original Nier seems gentler on the surface—but Yoko Taro wasn’t done messing with completionists. To unlock the fifth and final ending, you must achieve 100% completion (which NPCs will mock you for pursuing), and then the game makes you an offer: give up everything. Item by item, weapon by weapon, menu section by menu section, you are forced to manually wipe your entire save file until there’s nothing left. Hours of grinding and heartfelt story moments vanish in a slow, deliberate execution. The only proof of your dedication becomes a single delicate flower icon on the title screen. It’s the ultimate statement: you think you want the whole story? Then prove it by letting go of all you’ve earned.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – 900 Seeds, One Massive Pile of Dung

Nintendo knows exactly how obsessive their fans can be. Scattered across Breath of the Wild’s massive Hyrule are 900 Korok Seeds, yet you only need 441 to fully expand your inventory. Those extra 459 seeds are entirely optional, and anyone who hunted down every last one was probably expecting a heartfelt cutscene or a legendary weapon. Instead, Hetsu rewards you with his “gift of friendship”: a golden, squishy, foul-smelling lump of poop. All it does is let you visit the big tree anytime to watch him dance. After scaling every peak and checking under every rock, you get a literal piece of crap and a silly jig. It’s the most expensive toilet humor ever coded, and it’s absolutely beautiful.

Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem – Your Console Just Turned Off… Wait, What?

Silicon Knights’ cult survival horror gem is built around a Sanity Meter that, when drained, begins to mess not just with your character, but with you the player. At first, the effects are merely weird: your head falls off, the room starts leaning, statues follow your movements. Then things get personal. The game might display a fake “controller disconnected” message, pretend to delete all your save files, or suddenly switch the TV off—sending you diving for the remote in a panic. One notorious trick even claims the entire adventure has been a demo the whole time. After a few heart attacks, everything snaps back to normal, leaving you too paranoid to open the next door. It’s a masterclass in using the medium itself as a tool for terror and trickery.

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty – You Are Raiden, and You’ll Like It

Hideo Kojima’s entire Metal Gear series loves yanking the player’s chain, but Sons of Liberty remains the ultimate bait-and-switch. Every pre-release trailer showed Solid Snake as the main hero, facing off against bosses like Fortune and Mr. X. Yet when the full game arrived, fans discovered the legendary soldier was playable for only about a third of the experience. The rest of the time you’re stuck as the whiny rookie Raiden, a man who literally wants to become Solid Snake—exactly like you, the player. The game even lets you enter your own name and birthdate on Raiden’s dog tags, only for him to fling them away at the climax, declaring he won’t be a proxy anymore. It’s a meta-commentary on fan obsession, and Kojima’s way of telling players, “I made you care about a pretty boy you hated. Who’s laughing now?”

Takeshi’s Challenge – The Game That Hates You

Japanese media outlaw ‘Beat’ Takeshi Kitano famously despises video games, and in 1986 he teamed up with Taito to create the most openly hostile Famicom title ever released. Takeshi’s Challenge is a trolling anthology: select “Punch” on the title screen? Immediate game over. Need a treasure map? Sing into the second controller’s microphone for five real-time minutes without messing up, or start over. That map might take an hour to develop, might spontaneously combust, or might switch your TV to a test pattern for up to four hours. Survive all the nonsensical hurdles, and your grand payoff is an 8-bit image of Kitano’s face saying “Good” for a few seconds—followed by him taunting you for actually finishing the game. It’s the rare case where the developers genuinely wanted you to fail, and somehow that spiteful energy makes it a twisted classic.

These eight gems prove that trolling isn’t only for online multiplayer lobbies. When a game is willing to break your brain, waste your time, and mock your dedication with a smile, it can turn frustration into a treasured memory. So the next time a game tells you the princess is in another castle or asks you to delete your save file, take a deep breath and remember: you’re playing right into their hands—and that’s exactly what makes gaming so beautifully bonkers.