--- title: The Death of the Easter Egg: somebody hid a flight... description: A reflective essay traces the history of software easter eggs, from the hidden flight simulator in Excel 97 to Warren Robinett's secret room in Atari's... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/the-death-of-the-easter-egg-somebody-hid-a-flight-simulator-in-excel-97-then-the-code-started-writ-uxwsm4wyt twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: The Death of the Easter Egg: somebody hid a flight simulator in Excel 97. Then the code started writing itself | daily.dev og:description: A reflective essay traces the history of software easter eggs, from the hidden flight simulator in Excel 97 to Warren Robinett's secret room in Atari's... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/the-death-of-the-easter-egg-somebody-hid-a-flight-simulator-in-excel-97-then-the-code-started-writ-uxwsm4wyt og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/uxwsM4wYT.png og:image:alt: The Death of the Easter Egg: somebody hid a flight simulator in Excel 97. Then the code started writing itself og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- [](https://daily.dev/simonee)[Simonee @simonee • Yesterday10](https://daily.dev/simonee) [The Death of the Easter EggFrom stimmie.dev • Yesterday • 8m read timeA reflective essay traces the history of software easter eggs, from the hidden flight simulator in Excel 97 to Warren Robinett's secret room in Atari's Adventure (1979), and argues these hidden features disappeared due to Microsoft's 2002 ban on undocumented code following Bill Gates's trust memo, the rise of code review, metrics-driven development, and the internet's speed at exposing secrets. The author argues the final blow came from AI-generated code: when software is produced in minutes by describing it to a text box, no developer spends enough time living inside a codebase to feel the ownership and affection that once produced hidden, unauthorized personal touches. The piece closes as a meditation on craftsmanship and care rather than a call to abandon modern tools.](https://api.daily.dev/r/4jxruM18a) Comment Bookmark Copy Share your thoughts Post [](https://daily.dev/simonee) [Simonee](https://daily.dev/simonee) [@simonee](https://daily.dev/simonee) Joined Sep 8\. 2026 10 Software engineer, tinkerer, builder of weird things. Writes at stimmie.dev #### Would you recommend this post? 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