Swapnote is Effectively Dead

Swapnote, also known as one of the few genuinely interesting things about the 3DS has more or less been cut off at the legs and left to crawl for the immediate and indefinite future.  While Swapnote is not going away completely, the main component of it, the SpotPass sending feature has been indefinitely suspended, meaning the only way you can get notes from anyone, including official notes from Nintendo and affiliates...is through StreetPass sending.  Also known as that fucking thing that never happens ever.  The difference between SpotPass and StreetPass is that SpotPass uses the internet and StreetPass uses the little range of Nintendo wireless that goes out from the device, and is usually just picked up by other 3DS systems while you're out and about except it never really works that way because I guess not enough people are carrying around 3DS systems with this feature enabled.

So, the long and short of it becomes - sending Swapnotes through the internet to your friends is feasible, whereas sending Swapnotes to people around you is not...because you both have to Friend Code one another and if you're close enough to one another that you can send Swapnotes with StreetPass, you can do fucking everything else.  Granted there are some uses, I suppose, mostly the types that make you go "D'aww", like setting a Note with a sweet message to your significant other to send during their work day, but otherwise the uses are limited and made even moreso by redundancy. All of this is rather hilarious when you discover the reason, however.

The following message was sent out through official Nintendo bulletins, the official Nintendo website and has basically been copy-pasted at every news site covering this story, so it's fairly easy to find.  Still:

Thank you for your support.

Nintendo has learned that some consumers, including minors, have been exchanging their friend codes on Internet bulletin boards and then using Swapnote (known as Nintendo Letter Box in other regions) to exchange offensive material. Nintendo has been investigating ways of preventing this and determined it is best to stop the SpotPass feature of Swapnote because it allows direct exchange of photos and was actively misused.

Nintendo always wants to provide a positive experience for all consumers and limit the risk of any inappropriate activity or misuse of a service. We feel it is important on this occasion to take this action.

We are very sorry for any inconvenience to the many consumers who have been using this service responsibly; however this decision was made considering the point that many minors also use this feature of Swapnote. Thank you for your understanding.

Nintendo will continue to work to ensure more consumers are aware of our Parental Control features, which allow parents to manage their children’s experience on our systems. For more information, please click here.

• Service stop date: Thursday, Oct. 31, 2013, 7 p.m. PT
• Service being stopped: Nintendo 3DS software Swapnote – Sending and receiving notes using SpotPass
• Affected regions: All regions where the service was offered

Special Notes services are also stopped

So, in all reality, it's another case of Nintendo bending over backwards to ensure that they're being over-the-top cloyingly kid-friendly which is exactly what makes the masses at large scoff at them.  However, you can't really be mad at Nintendo for trying to protect the children - we shouldn't be trying to -not- protect them, after all - but there are varying levels of response, and Nintendo's Madagascarian approach is...less than understandable.  Especially since it was blatantly obvious from Day One that Swapnote was going to be 'misused' in the way they're suggesting.  Not only are you able to draw and write anything because there's a complete lack of filters, given that they are 'private' messages (no pun intended) meaning no peer review, but you can eventually unlock the ability to attach pictures taken with your 3DS cameras or the odd game that supports screenshots (like Animal Crossing: New Leaf).  A 3D camera, that is, on a device that supports 3D images.  Who didn't see the inevitability of lewd pictures being sent around to take advantage of that feature?

Apparently Nintendo.  What makes a further mockery of the situation is Nintendo's own basic admission that the Friend Code system that we've had to suffer with for -years- for the safety of the children has utterly failed.  The Friend Code system was basically built as its own fail-safe - kids aren't smart enough to figure out ways to exchange codes with anyone but those they 'should' be exchanging with, and thus effectively shuts them out from the folks nobody wants kids associating with.  This assumes, however, that kids are incapable of using the internet at an even rudimentary level and that they are also not allowed to do so without impunity.  Such assumptions are incorrect to make, and we have been saying this for -years- in argument against the Friend Code system since it does not actually protect people so much as it inconveniences them.

Regardless, it's strange that Nintendo pulled the plug on everything SpotPass-related to Swapnote, including the special notes that developers could send out to get you hyped in the latest game, as well as Nikki's notes that informed you of certain things regarding Nintendo News or what have you.  At that point it becomes less "We're saving the children!" and more "We're cutting costs, fuck you", or at least that's where my mind went first.  Still, Nintendo gonna Nintendo, I suppose and while it would have just made more sense to kill the photo-sharing aspect of Swapnote (besides Developer access for screenshots), I imagine the cost aspect -does- come into play a bit, which is why the entire thing was killed in every way that makes it worthwhile.  And I don't see it coming back either, which is unfortunate, since it was fun drawing off little notes and sending them off, even if I didn't make much use of it.  So, goodbye Swapnote, you were fun while it lasted.

I'm a little annoyed that I spent play coins on stationary now, though

Actually Pretty Cool - Swapnote

As with many things that are on the 3DS, I have been completely oblivious to the existence of a things called Swapnote until today when I found out something pretty neat about it.  From what I can tell, Swapnote is basically PictoChat from the original DS (basically a service that allows you to implement something of a chatroom setup with friends, using text either written or typed and drawings to talk) but does what I wanted PictoChat to do:  be viable as a thing to use when not surrounded by friends.  Basically, try as I might, I couldn't figure out a way to connect with anyone on PictoChat without being right near them and, well, if you're that close, why not just talk to them?  There are reasons, of course, but I found more that I hoped to be able to open my DS, find one of my online friends and draw little pictures back and forth at them.

Swapnote proves to be able to do this with the added security of knowing that any Note you get through this is from someone you've already friended on your system through the 3DS' Friend Code.  As such, should you find a picture of a wang sticking out at you (literally), well, that's your friend doing that, so you either find it funny or you need new friends.  Where it really starts getting impressive is when you get into it a bit more and realize that it's more than just "Here's a picture" "Here's a picture in response to a picture" in that you can apparently bundle four screens-worth of notes together to send as one to be scrolled through.  This is handy, of course, as I'm sure we've all often found that limits actually do get in the way of some things (character limits on Twitter, space limits on pictures, etc.) so something much looser, as four screens is, can only help.  If you need more than four screens then, well, you're being a bit ambitious but perhaps not overly so.

I don't think I will ever not be amazed at what some people can create with the simplest of tools.  Nor do I think I'll ever be able to have the kind of intuitive creativity some people display with this sort of thing.  How do you get from "This thing that sends four screens of info" to "Let's play some gatdamn D&D on it"?  Apparently the sight of what looks like a graph paper background, which, admittedly might have sparked it for me as well.  (As a young'n, I once attempted to make D&D maps using Excel after changing the visible cells to little squares.  It actually worked in theory as I never got to use the maps, but they looked pretty cool.)  After figuring out he could make maps on it easily, the next step was trying to figure out how to build an actual game around that which I think was handled fairly brilliantly.

It seems like, after watching the above video, that it might not be that intuitive to use/work with, and someone would likely say "there are probably better methods of doing this" and you'd certainly be right; being that you have to at least somewhat know the person enough to get their friend code, it's entirely possible you're already in contact in another fashion where doing this would be a little easier.  Message boards and Chat setups (IRC and IMs) can likely be setup to be at least a little more elegant than the Swapnote solution, though they don't allow for as much freedom with pictures (aside from linking).  But the point of it all is that this is honestly so impressive on merit alone that it seems at least worth a shot.  By the same virtue of pointing out that Chat/IM could be offer better implementation than Swapnote, you could make an argument that Real Life is better than Chat/IM which might not be open to you.  Use what you've got, is the basic message here and if you use it well (Like this usage of Swapnote) then it will at least be fun for everyone involved.  Provided you can wrap your head around the execution and work out mechanics with the buddies you want to play this with (which could honestly be fairly easy to handle with Swapnote itself), it could be one of the more memorable uses of a Free App that you could get from a handheld.

I will say also that the 'turn-based, person-to-DM' system this presents might actually help games get played in all honesty, which has been a problem in my endeavors into D&D and the like.  It's too easy to get distracted with shooting the breeze and before you know it, you've realized that you've talked about the virtues of a certain class over another for half an hour while your buddies have talked about how awesome this other campaign they've been in was, and you're all thinking about how awesome it was when you actually played the game.  With only four screens to respond back and forth with, the DMs is the easiest four to fill which means the responses back and forth between player and DM should be easy enough to handle.  Just another thing to look forward to for when I ultimately pick up a 3DS sometime down the road.