Secretlab TITAN XXS and our 3 favorite April Fools' jokes made real
The folks that make Secretlab chairs had a good idea for an April Fools' joke. They'd take the design of their already-popular TITAN gaming chair and cut all the dimensions in half. The resulting piece of gaming furniture would be super funny to behold, especially with a dog sitting in it. But wait, now it's real?
April Fools' Day gadgets
As is sometimes the case when it comes to gadgets and accessories for computing and gaming, a good idea – even one made in jest – is a good idea. If your company has the resources to create a prototype for a peripheral for the sole purpose of making a joke, you effectively have a built-in public opinion poll on your hands.
April Fools' jokes from companies like ThinkGeek and Razer have been turned into some of the most awesome real-deal products ever sold. In some of the most out-of-box companies in the tech world today, the following process has been executed time after time:
1. Think of a product that might not otherwise make sense to invest time and money into, like a gaming-branded toaster, and create a prototype for a joke.
2. Create a prototype and promote said prototype with a big April Fools' Day campaign.
3. Discover a significant amount of fans of your brand demanding that the prototype be made into a real product.
4. Profit.
Products that do not get enough of a demand to constitute the creation of a real device or accessory still play a part in promoting the brand itself. Companies that make April Fools' joke products worth sharing are given a bit of mind share by the public – and a non-traditional promotion finds success.
Secretlab TITAN XXS
The Secretlab TITAN XXS was originally promoted as the "TITAN Xxxxxs", a gaming chair made for dogs and children. On April 1, 2021, Secretlab suggested this chair would allow you to "Be the best pa(w)rent you can be." The final product was just revealed here in November of 2021 as the Secretlab TITAN XXS, in multiple colors. There's a Secretlab NEO Hybrid Leatherette edition (in "Stealth" black), or SoftWeave Plus Fabric in Plush Pink or Frost Blue.
This chair appears to have taken so long to produce because the company went through the effort to ensure BIFMA certification and all the Children Safety Requirements and Tests they could lay their hands on. If you're aiming to buy this chair, you'll pay at least $299 for the base edition.
Razer Toaster and Respawn
Razer is another company that's effectively made the process of April Fools' testing of products a tradition. They've created Razer Respawn energy drinks, a Razer Toaster, and to a lesser extent, Razer Rapunzel – an RGB "hair dye" they instead made into an augmented reality filter as part of a product contest.
ThinkGeek Star Wars Tauntaun Sleeping Bag
It's happened so many times now, it's expected that ThinkGeek's April Fools' jokes arent jokes at all. Not all products make the cut, like the Useless Light Switch. Our pick for best-ever April Fools' Day joke made real from ThinkGeek has to be the Tauntaun sleeping bag.
It was with that product (which still remains in production today) that ThinkGeek might very well have started to truly consider April Fools' Day was the ideal place to test ideas before putting them in full production mode. As they posted back in April of 2009: "ATTN Tauntaun Fanatics! Due to an overwhelming tsunami of requests from YOU THE PEOPLE, we have decided to TRY and bring this to life." They certainly did just that.
Pokemon GO
The most monstrous success in this realm is no less than the most massive mobile video game ever created: Pokemon GO. The origin of this product was an April Fools' Day product.
Before there was Pokemon GO, there was Google Maps with Pokemon. That was March 31, 2014 when Google Maps launched their "Pokemon Challenge." This product was so well received that it was developed into Pokemon GO and Niantic was spun off into one of the most significant forward-thinking "gaming" companies in the world today.