Giant Nintendo 3DS Augmented Reality Hack, MIT-Style

MIT students are known to be a studious bunch, solving differential equations and soldering all night in lab. But sometimes, this diligent group finds the time to have a little fun by putting up “hacks” across campus. At MIT, hacks aren’t harmful, nefarious “cracks” of computer or security systems; instead, they’re clever pranks or creative performance art intended to amuse, and make people wonder, “How the heck did they do that?”

Today in a main lobby at MIT, a gigantic Nintendo 3DS augmented reality (AR) card appeared hanging from the ceiling. If you haven’t had much time to play with a 3DS yet, it’s a handheld gaming system from Nintendo that does 3D without glasses, social networking, and augmented reality. Point the camera on your 3DS at a special card and the screen will not just show video of the card, it’ll also overlay 3D avatars, known as Miis,` on top of the card and whatever else the camera sees.

An enterprising MIT student, Michael Snively, saw this huge 3DS AR card hanging from the ceiling and instantly knew what to do: he snapped out his 3DS, pointed it at the monster AR card, and got a host of his Miis, or Nintendo avatars to show up standing on the card in the MIT lobby. The Miis were even seen in a conga line and skydiving. Michael reports he was able to battle a giant dragon as well inside the lobby.

Unfortunately for other would-be 3DS gamers who wanted to shoot targets and have their Miis dance at MIT, the giant AR card was removed a few hours after Michael spotted it. Sometimes school is just no fun.

Have you seen any slick 3DS hacks out in the wild? Let us know in the comments!

[Michael Snively]

One of Alessondra Springmann’s favorite MIT hacks involves terrible plays on words. Follow her on Twitter and on her blog.

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