Software

Looking back at Microsoft Money Easter Eggs

By // October 2, 2007, 11:29 PM PST

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  • By Greg Shultz

    While the Microsoft Money developers were a different breed of developers, with financial instincts, they still relished the idea of creating Easter Eggs in their software. And they really went all out in Money 2000 and Money 2001. Let's take a look.

  • Money 2000

    To access the Easter Egg in Money 2000, you begin by creating a new account and specify that it is held at Microsoft.

  • Money 2000

    Then, you specify that it is a checking account.

  • Money 2000

    Make sure that the account is called Microsoft.

  • Money 2000

    When you get to the main Accounts page, right click on the Microsoft account, and select the See Account Details command from the popup menu.

  • Money 2000

    When you see the Update Details page, type Money Rocks! in the Comment field and click the Done button.

  • Money 2000

    When you return to the Accounts page, select Balance an account from the panel on the left.

  • Money 2000

    When you get to the Which account do you want to balance page, just click the Microsoft account.

  • Money 2000

    As soon as you do so, you'll see the What is the Money 2000 Team page, catchy theme music will begin playing, and Japanese characters begin falling down from the top of the page mimicking the effect used in the infamous 1999 movie called The Matrix.

  • Money 2000

    As you watch and listen, the team names and the member's names will appear on the screen as the Japanese characters continue falling in the background.

  • Money 2000

    After the names appear on the screen for a moment, the falling Japanese characters begin knocking out the letters one-by-one. Then new names appear.

  • Money 2001

    To access the Easter Egg in Money 2001, you launch the application as you normally would and get to the Money Home Page.

  • Money 2001

    Locate the Go to the Internet text box, type Money Rocks!, and click the Go button.

  • Money 2001

    You'll now see the Reversi Easter Egg page.

  • Money 2001

    This is a fully functional Reversi game with 6 levels that you play against the computer or a friend. Here you can see that clicking Moves in the left panel shows your possible moves.

  • Money 2001

    Even though this is a real game, it does contain the standard credits display. As you hover your mouse pointer over any square, you see the a team member's name appear at the top of the screen and the name of the team that they were on will appear at the top of left panel.

  • Money 2001

    As the white player, your cursor turns into a smaller white circle when you hover over a valid square. You can see that many of the team members received nicknames.

  • Money 2001

    While there isn't any catchy theme music in this Easter Egg, there are sound effects. When the computer makes a move, the black piece makes a whooshing sound as it slides onto the screen. When the pieces flip from one color to the other as the result of move, you hear clicking sounds.

  • Money 2001

    If you happen to beat the computer, you get to enter your name in the High Score dialog box.

  • Money 2001

    Ah ooh!

  • Money 2001

    Of course, more often than not, the computer wins.

By Greg Shultz

While the Microsoft Money developers were a different breed of developers, with financial instincts, they still relished the idea of creating Easter Eggs in their software. And they really went all out in Money 2000 and Money 2001. Let's take a look.

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By Greg Shultz

Greg Shultz is a freelance Technical Writer. Previously, he has worked as Documentation Specialist in the software industry, a Technical Support Specialist in educational industry, and a Technical Journalist in the computer publishing industry.