GAME CLEAR No. 207 -- Puzzle Swap

Puzzle Swap (2011, 3DS)

Compilation: StreetPass Mii Plaza (2011, 3DS)
Developer: Nintendo SPD
Publisher: Nintendo
Clear Date: 1/24/25

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Why should I care?
StreetPass is so cool and fun!

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Jolly cooperation

For those who may not know, the Nintendo 3DS has a cool feature called StreetPass. When enabled, it allows the device to communicate with other 3DS consoles physically nearby and transfer their respective owners’ Miis to appear in each other’s StreetPass Mii Plaza app (various 3DS titles support the transfer of other data like high scores as well). Those Miis can then be used as helpers or allies in a number of little games within that app. I think it’s a lovely and cute little idea that enables some pleasant “interaction” with people you may not have even meaningfully noticed out in the world.

StreetPass was clearly designed for the transit-heavy and pedestrian-friendly world of urban Japan, but in its heyday, I could still pick up some Miis while out and about (and especially while in college). And on the subject of its heyday, StreetPass was also obviously designed for a world in which lots of people are carrying around the current-gen Nintendo handheld, the Nintendo 3DS. That is no longer the case, but fortunately those of us that yearn for the smile-inducing blink of the green indicator light of a successful StreetPass tag, video game conventions (such as MAGFest) still draw a contingent of diehards. For a few short days, we can mutually provide each other with little Mii assistants to march into each other’s Mii Plaza games.

And that was how I finally finished the Mii Plaza’s simplest game, Puzzle Swap. All Puzzle Swap is is a little game in which a bunch of images — art from various 3DS games — start out empty and must be filled in with puzzle pieces to be completed. You can earn these by buying them with coins accrued via the built-in 3DS pedometer, but they are not guaranteed to be new or unique. Much faster, then, is to rely on the help of the strangers you pass on the street. You may select one puzzle piece that you don’t already have from any of their images to add to your collection. Complete a full puzzle, and you’ll unlock a little scene rendered in stereoscopic 3D.

Of course, these puzzles are functionally ads, and indeed new ones often dropped around the release of new 3DS titles. Nevertheless, there’s something pleasing about the collaborative feel of this and all Mii Plaza software. Even though I now have completed every puzzle in the game, it’s at least nice to know that anyone who hasn’t will be guaranteed to get new pieces from me!

Hopefully I can keep providing that service at MAGFest and elsewhere for years to come.