Zerg Rush Google Easter Egg

[LinaLauneBaer]

This easter egg is referring to the game StarCraft 2 by Blizzard. There are three fractions in StarCraft 2: Protoss, Terran and Zerg. Imagine the Zerg like aliens. Zergs have a unit called "the Zergling" which is a small creature that usually attacks buildings and enemy units in groups. If you have a lot of Zerglings and run to your opponents fast this can be called "a Zergling rush". There are also custom maps that you can play that are called Zerg Rush: You are in the middle of the map and Zerlings are streaming to your bade from all sides. You have to defend it like in the easter egg.

[ehamberg]

Well, I would say that it refers to the Starcraft series. I'm so old that I remember the first Starcraft game – and I'm quite sure it had Zerg. ;)

[ralfd]

Finally the secret identity of "StarcraftJokeExplainer" is revealed!

[blyuher]

As to APM: "Actions per minute is the number of actions (such as selecting units or issuing an order) completed within a minute of gameplay in real time strategy games, most notably in Starcraft. High APM is often associated with skill, as it can indicate that a player both knows what to do in the game and has the manual dexterity to carry it out. Software has been developed to analyze players' APM in these games. Beginners often have low APM counts, typically below 50. Professional e-athletes in South Korea usually have average APM scores around 300, but often exceed the 400 mark during intense battle sequences. Notable gamers with over 400 average APM include Lee Young-Ho and Lee Jae-Dong. Park Sung-Joon is noted for the record APM of 818." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actions_per_minute

[leeoniya]

"factions"

[hackermom]

I think it's also referring to the phenomenon as it exists today in every single online multi-player game that features open PVP as well as closed battleground type PVP, not just StarCraft.

The "zerg", as it was commonly known to all players, presented itself to me in the beginning of 2002 in a well-known and still active MMORPG called Dark Age of Camelot (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_age_of_camelot). DAoC-players refer to a mass of ungrouped, uncoordinated players joining in on the large battles between the realms of the game as a "zerg", and to individual players making up the "zerg" as "randoms" (random players; ungrouped) and sometimes as "zergers". The term certainly sprung from the first StarCraft game, but the phenomenon is today embodied not just by NPC units in this or that game, but by actual groups of players, and is seen in practically every MMORPG with PVP.

[9diov]

It is a nice touch how originally there are 6 zerglings coming out and others came in pair.

For anyone who never played Starcraft: zerglings are created in pair, two per egg and the maximum number of eggs are 3. A player who attempts to do a zergling rush wait for the first 3 eggs to be available, hatch them and subsequently make a new pair of zerglings as soon as a new egg is available.

[whileonebegin]

I would have liked Google's implementation more if instead of clicking the little O's to kill them, you get to instead make buildings that produce G's or something to defend. Clicking the O's isn't really starcrafty.

[alt_]

Opera logos attacking page elements? Is there a backstory for this or is it just a coincidence?

[tikhonj]

That's what I thought at first too. Once I saw the yellow ones it made more sense :).

[pgsandstrom]

It's the O:s in the google-logo

[Osiris]

That's funny. That's exactly what I thought when I first saw it. I figured that's because I opened the page in Opera (my default browser) but then I later realized it was open in Chrome. The O in Google explanation makes more sense, but it really does look a lot like the Opera icon.

[neiled]

I wonder how Google deal with all these little easter eggs from a code perspective. It's pretty impressive that they can add so much extra to a particular search term without it affecting the overall code quality.

[sev]

I would imagine each search term being something like a key in a database, and each key has an associated field which can link to anything they want. That linker probably then gets attached to a "hook" on their site.

It's just a matter of adding in the hooked code into the associated field in the DB.

I know I over simplified this, but I would assume that's the gist.

[martindale]

I figured this would be easy to hack, and I was right:

1) Insert jQuery into the search results page by using this bookmarklet: javascript:void(function(){if(!document.getElementById('jQscript')){var%20jQscript=document.createElement('script');jQscript.id='jQscript';jQscript.src='https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.5.0/jquery.mi...);

2) use the console to execute the following, moving all zerglings to 250x250: setInterval(function() { $('.zr_zergling_container').css('left', '250px').css('top', '250px'); }, 50);

3) click away. #winning

[nostrademons]

When we were code-reviewing it, we had a bunch of fun trying to hack it programmatically and sharing ridiculously high scores (things like 12,000 zerglings killed). It's not even as hard as you mention: you can simulate a mouseclick on all zergling divs programmatically, and instantly clear the screen of every wave.

Then I went and just entered the code to pop up a ShareBox programmatically on the JS console, letting me edit the share message to whatever I wanted it to be. "I took down 1,853,642.93 zerglings with 3.14 * 10^42 APM." And I didn't even need to play the game!

[imkevinxu]

The GG at the end was a very nice touch.

[athst]

gg'ing when you win is so bad manner

[Forrest7778]

I thought the same thing, haha

[TeMPOraL]

APM counter is a nice touch as well :).

(APM stands for Actions Per Minute, where Actions in StarCraft are input events that do something, like selecting an unit or ordering it to attack. Professional players tend to have >200 APM).

[TheCapn]

200 is on the low side? I'm amateur and hit that commonly during games. I think JulyZerg was on record to hit 800 at one point. Lord only knows how that was physically possible. I would credit the source to TeamLiquid's Wiki (I believe) but I cannot search it while at work.

[chris_wot]

I was searching for information about Zerg Rushes, you insensitive clod!

[Bockit]

I realise you're joking, but for anyone looking for advice regarding how to play SC or SC2, I recommend http://wiki.teamliquid.net/

[jurre]

I need https://www.google.com/intl/en/chrome/multitask.html now!

[nkassis]

For some reason my brain read the last part of that url as "Mutalisk" ;p

[Shenglong]

Well, if this was an attempt to get me to share stuff on Google+, it succeeded.

[scottmp10]

If someone shares a link to a public Facebook post, do you consider it an attempt to get you to share stuff on Facebook? I find it odd that you assume someone sharing something on Google+ is an attempt to get you to use Google+ rather than an attempt to share the content with you.

[eliben]

It even comes in waves of 6-es, brilliant :)

[marcloney]

6 'ling rush FTW!

[thomasfl]

Is it Opera Browser logos you're supposed to shoot?

[rplnt]

Half of them looks like that. It's actually the two "o"s from Google logo. But funny coincidence nevertheless, Opera even tweeted it: https://twitter.com/#!/opera/status/195796939709743105

[imkevinxu]

Works on iPad too! High score of 74 :) http://imgur.com/Q52P9

[fatbat]

Interestingly, I saw this comment on reddit yesterday that was a "leak" about this new easter egg. (http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/stek5/what_little... )

[tehC]

Nice share! This is the first time that my clicking skills were needed to 'defend' a search result page. :)

[kingatomic]

Unimpressed Flash: "I just killed all the little O's, were they supposed to do something?"

[sekou]

It's coincidental this post is popular because less than a week ago I decided to relive the past and install StarCraft: Brood War to play over LAN. It's still just as fun, but I forgot how easily the game consumes your time.

[Tipzntrix]

You click on them to kill them? That's not how Starcraft works...

[fatbat]

Actually, in Starcraft: Brood Wars you could explode a critter with a "nuke" animation by clicking repeatedly on it. :)

[tryke]

I would have done much better if I could type 1a2a3a to send groups of marines. :)

[jianshen]

gg!

[nsns]

It almost seems like some Freudian reaction to the recent accusations that Goggle search is broken.