An Epic Quest

Here are pictures of me on a roof-deck in Brooklyn, straining to get a wi-fi connection with anyone else with a Nintendo DS running Nintendogs in Bark-Mode.


where...

are...

my...

dogs...?

I spent the weekend in New York, having a good time with great friends Chad and Jenny, leading up to the Sunday autograph signing by Shigeru Miyamoto, creator of Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong, etc. The draw for me, however, wasn't Miyamoto, but the line to see him.

I can be a semi-passionate fan of all sorts of dorky things, and I can definitely respect the awesome contributions that Miyamoto has made to my life, but I had no real desire to stand in line for 4-5 hours or more to get a handshake and an autograph. I'm bad enough in most social situations as it is, so I have no lofty dreams of sharing a real moment with a video game creator in a retail store surrounded by like-minded sweaty fan-boys like me. If my ace-reporter pal, Geek, had been able to get me past the huddled masses, body-guards and barricades without the wait, I probably would have gone for it, but then I really would have missed out on some great Nintendoggin'. I spent most of my Sunday in Rockefeller center pacing up and down the street swapping presents and dog-information (through wi-fi) with the people waiting in line.

I buy into the interactive/collectible aspects of video games in a big way. I got into Pokemon partly because of the RPG elements, partly because of the cuteness, and a lot because my girlfriend was big on it. However, I also really appreciated how Nintendo (owner of Pokemon) wanted you to trade with other players to complete your collection, encouraging interaction and taking RPGs out of dank basement rumpus rooms and into vibrant elementary school cafeterias. I just really like the idea of working hard on a video game on your own, but also being rewarded for interacting with other people.

Nintendogs really enticed me because it encourages the interaction with other players for trading and getting bonuses, and it allows it to occur almost anonymously. I'm not super social, and in my local social group I am the only one that owns a Nintendo DS. With the Nintendogs game, I can go about my daily life and if I come within 30 feet of someone else with the Nintendogs Game (assuming we've both put our games in "Bark Mode") we'll swap information wirelessly, a barking sound-effect triggers, and our dogs will meet up and play with eachother. In the early Pokemon days, the only way to trade was to physically connect a cable to each of your Gameboy systems and, through a series of menus, set-up the trade. Wireless capabilities were added later, but they still required manual set-up and acceptace of the trade.

Nintendogs swaps information with someone within range, and your dogs hangout the next time you play the game, whenever that may be. It is this elegant anonymity that I find really enticing. The idea that I can ride the subway home and find that my dog met up with another dog during the trip and now they're hanging out and playing is easy, breezy, beautiful to me. Plus, I can keep the system in my backpack or pocket rather than blatantly advertising my dorktitude by carrying it around and approaching anyone who'll make eye contact to ask for a trade.

Now, the anonymous trading sounds all fine and good, but like most utopian concepts, it sortof breaks down in practice. I have been in "bark-mode" in subways and airports in DC, Dallas, London, Dublin, Paris, and Zurich, over the past 2 months, and not once have I ever actually found someone else putting their dog out on the airwaves. I spent the day before Miyamoto's signing riding from Brookyln to Rockaway Beach to Manhattan and back and never once got barked at. This is why I had to go to NYC for Miyamoto's signing, because I knew that a line of rabid Nintendo fanatics would be the perfect environment to get my bark on. Like the small group of hippies able to maintain a successful communist economy, I knew I had my perfect storm.

I arrived at Nintendo World around 10:45am. Doors were set to open at 11am, and I was meeting up with Geek and his pal JrHawk out front. I rode the train and made sure to feed, water, and walk my dog to be ready for the big day ahead of us. I put the dog in 'Bark-Mode' and exited the station, ready for my first, real, anonymous hook-up. As mentioned before, I don't know anyone in my area with a DS and the Nintendogs game, but the idea of playing 2-player wireless games was so enticing that I went ahead and bought two systems. When Nintendogs came out, I bought two versions of the game, just so I could try out 'bark-mode' on my own.

Since we're all thinking it, I'll say it: This form of preplanned self-to-self bark-mode was a lot like masturbation... Enjoyable and satisfying, but ultimately lacking the magic that makes this world worth living in. So as I walked towards the throngs of people, my pulse quickened and a big smile spread across my face. I knew that at any moment my pocket was going to start barking, and the greatest day of my life would begin....

END PART ONE

OK, that whole "and the greatest day of my life would begin..." line was a joke. I mean, it was an awesome day, but c'mon...

Also, you're about to embark on a long, long, post, that I'm not sure most will appreciate. If you like pictures, I've tried to include as many as I could, but I spent most of my time Nintendoggin' and not taking pictures. There are a bunch at the end, so be patient.

To get started, here's one of Me with Jenny and Chad who kept me company and gave me shelter for the parts of the weekend preceding the Nintendoggin'. Though we had a great time, they didn't really show up much in this already epic post, but I wanted to thank them for the hospitality. So, thanks!


They did offer to let me shower while I was there, but I didn't think it'd be right.

Picking up from "and the greatest day of my life would begin.."

Unable to hear anything but the cabs and street vendors (certainly not a barking Nintendog), I reached into my pocket and grabbed my DS. Flipping it open I saw the message letting me know that my dog had indeed found someone, and that someone was a trainer named 'KingShit'. It was a dream come true. I mean, it was exactly the type of person I wanted to be my first. Someone who nurtures a virtual pet and calls themselves 'Kingshit'. It was serendipity. It was kismet.

A brief account of how/why I choose character names in video games
My dogs are named "Butty" (a Laborador) and "Shihtse" (a Shih-tsu). I think these names are playfully sassy, but fairly tame. Pokemon taught me early-on that while naming your characters "Buttdick" and "Cumbubble" was pure comedic genius, it made it hard to trade with the 98% of the gaming popultaion whose parents may be offended by the names. This is particularly difficult when those parents are your girlfriend's aunts and uncles. So, I try to keep my character names 4th-grade-clever, and fail.

back to the story
Energized by my first ever non-self-satisfying Nintendoggery, I met up with Geek and JRHawk, smiling broadly and telling them all about my experience. I let them know I hadn't bathed since I arrived in New York. I guess I felt a little self-concious since I had been away from home a couple of days and didn't get a chance to bathe. I did have the British version of Axe deoderant (Lynx) and it's haunting 'Africa' scent seemed to be serving me well.


Just wanted to break up the monotony with a photo!

Geek and JRHawk were talking with a random Nintenfan on the street, who was asking them to take his camera inside and snap some photos of Miyamoto-san. As I whipped out my second DS and began setting my 'bark-mode' system, the guy talked about how his son really wanted Nintendogs, and how he went to New Orleans (pre-Katrina) and told girls he was the founder of Girls Gone Wild. "3 rolls of film, 36 photos each, of the best tits you've ever seen" or something like that. I didn't really get a good listen to all he was saying, because I was engrossed in developing and honing my Nintendog Bark-Mode efficiency system.

The System
Though I have 2 DS-es, I can't just put them both in 'bark-mode' at once and reap the benefits. If I did that I'd end up trading with myself and missing out on all the random strangers trying to meet up with my dogs. So, my system involved me using my duffle bag as a desktop (see picture below), putting the first DS in 'bark-mode', getting the next DS ready to enter bark-mode as soon as the first dog found someone, and repeating. Using this system I was able to quickly and efficiently meet up with a lot of people.



I had two different dog-setups, so I think people weren't as likely to get mad that I would trade with the same person multiple times, since they could think I was two different people. You don't really have any control over who you link-up with, other than just relocating yourself to a different part of the line to find other users. I have to imagine it was frustrating to those people waiting in line to inevitably end up bark-moding with the same people in the same part of the line over and over again. Not tethered to any one part of the line, I was able to walk it from beginning to end, picking up various gifts and dog-information all along the way. As I walked, I would hear people commenting on my set-up:

"Whoa, he's got two DS-es!"

"He's playing in style!"

"DORK!"

free marketing product development for Nintendo
Noone approached me directly to initiate a bark-mode. I have wanted to wear a shirt that says "In Bark Mode" or "Bark at me" or something to let people know I'm putting my dog out there and they should be too. I'm shocked that Nintendo doesn't market this product. I didn't need it on that day, because on that Sunday morning, the airwaves were teeming with dogs, and I was plucking them out faster than I could get my other dog set-up.

A synopsis of Bark Mode
A successful 'bark-mode' transaction allows you to swap a few types of information between the barkers.

dog
The primary information swapped is your dog. Your actual dog stays in your system, but the information describing your dog (name, status, what they're wearing, etc) is sent so the other user's game can create the visiting dog to interact with their dog.

profile
At the same time, your trainer profile is shared and added to their "Friends List". The trainer profile is like any internet user profile; consisting of name, birthday, user-icon (limited to 4 clip-art age-variations each for male or female trainers), list of dogs owned, and a short user defined comment (usually the most interesting part of the profile).

Comments ranged from the boring ('...'), mundane ('Hello, my name is momo'), and inspirational ('Love Yourself Always'), to proud('Leon RULES'), belligerant(every body else sucks'), or nonsensical ('I shift like no other [A][B][X][Y]'). A couple even included website addresses.

audio
If the user has recorded a voice message, that is also transferred. For the most part these were hard to really appreciate with all of the street noise, but as I received each person's message I held the DS up to my ear hoping to get a good chuckle. Far too many had either nothing recorded or just some random noise. I am embarrassed to say that for the first half of my barking one of my dogs was sending just a single droning note, the result of an experiment to see if the recording could be used as an instrument with the musical keyboard you can buy in the game (You can play the sound, but the pitch doesn't change, so the experiment was a bust). When I discovered that I'd been boring the pants off my fellow barkers, I replaced the sound with an encouraging message. I really felt a need to positively reinforce people's bark-moding. My other dog's message was an acapella song called "Diggidog" that Chad and I composed 4-5 years ago after a night of drinking. Chad has 2 CDs out and is touring the Southwest in November. They don't sound like that.

Some folks' voice-messages were pre-planned and well-produced. For instance, Brian exclaimed "Hi I'm Brian" Followed by the sound-effect you hear when you die while playing a game of Super Mario Bros. Others just reported the facts: "I'm waiting in line to meet Miyamoto-san!". Predictably, some were belligerent "My dog can beat-down your dog!" and some were bizarre and seemingly delivered in broken English: "This is my dog. He barks. He goes 'woof woof'".

presents
One last thing sent during a 'bark-mode' session is a gift. Gifts are items you find in your game that you select to give away to the next person you bark with, assuming they also elect to send a gift when setting up the bark-session. I typically tried to send any duplicate item I had that could not be purchased in stores, ones that had to be found while walking your dog (in the game). When you take your dog for a walk (in game) you often come across little gift boxes that contain a randomly determined item. Some are plentiful and worthless (like sticks, empty juice bottles, and dog photos), some are dog accessories (like hats and collars), some are dog toys (like frisbees and chew toys), and some are weird (like piggy banks, statues, records to listen to, etc). I gave away some pretty sweet stuff (pirate hats, spiked collars, business glasses!), but near the end I began to run out of quality items and resorted to things you can buy in stores, but not usually (pull-ropes, bark-balls, etc). On the whole it seemed like most people were giving fairly alright. I did receive a few sticks (boo!), but I also got some hott stuff like a green Luigi Hat.

celebrity endorsements
Interestingly (to me), one time while near the front of the line I was informed that I had just barked with trainer "HaylieDuff". Thinking it to be some Haylie-fan out there without a name of their own, I was surprised to hear her voice message say (in a professional sounding way) "Hi, I'm Haylie Duff. My Nintendog Bentley has a special gift for you. Have fun playing Nintendogs!". Figuring the real Haylie Duff wasn't in line to meet Miyamoto-san, I put together that some sortof repeating-nintendog-bark-mode-relay was set up inside the store to pass on "Star Sunglasses" to folks visiting the store. After accidently sending out another primo gift to robo-Haylie, I did another few laps of the line.

slave labor
At this point, my friend M0ly showed up. This was the second time we were meeting, the first time being when she was teaching English in Japan and I was visiting suemejack who was doing the same thing. Being a bit delerious due to my Nintendog excitement and the lack of good sleep that accompanies a weekend in New York on friends' couches, I put her straight to work on taking care of one of the dogs.

star-struck
Figuring that Haylie's Star-Sunglasses were at least a semi-rare item, we returned to the front of the line and got set to send Haylie a nice 'stick' to make up for the awesome pirate hat I had wasted on her earlier. Instead I was surprised to find that I had sent the stick to someone called "Miyamoto".

OK, this one had to be a hoax. I mean, bark-moding with Miyamoto was originally billed as the prize for the first 10-people in line Sunday morning (who actually arrived Saturday evening and camped out). Plus, Miyamoto's Jack Russel Terrier was named "Jack", a name I thought a bit too pedestrian for the video game messiah.

I figured it was some wise-acre about to send me some assy audio raspberry, but instead the voice message attached said "Hello this is Miyamoto-san, you now have a very rare Nintendog. Enjoy" in a friendly Japanese voice. He even gave me a Rhinestone collar as a present. I was shocked, and began imagining Miyamoto trying to bark-mode with one of the elite first-ten in line and me ganking it by being in the right place at the right time.


I wasn't too shocked/stunned to take a shitty/worthless picture of it!

When Miyamoto's Jack Russel Terrier (rare breed!) appeared a second time, I became suspicious. Haylie Duff was nowhere to be found, and each time I barked-out a stick I was rewarded with a rhinestone collar and Miyamoto-san's cheerful voice. Figuring that they put Miyamoto's DS into wherever Haylie's used to be, I decided to load up on rhinestone collars.

At this point we could see Geek inside the store on the second floor, standing in a press section watching the autographing action.


I called him and asked him for some perspective on the Miyamoto bark-moding, and he informed me that maybe Miyamoto's translator was controlling the barking. I hope I wasn't the sole ruination of their attempt to transfer dogs to patient line-waiters. This article on Joystiq.com mentions the problems they were having. Having banked 5-6 or so of Miyamoto's collars at this point, I wanted to get back to meeting other people's dogs. So, we set out and walked the line again.



Now that I was walking the line with an actual female around, people began approaching us and asking what was going on and what we were doing with the DS-es. I explained the bark-mode thing (a lot more succintly than I am here!) and let them know I hadn't bathed in a couple of days. I'm not sure why I kept telling people that, but it was true. I think it was because I kept catching a glimpse of myself in window glass and noticing how oily my hair was. In fact, I woke up this morning with the first nasty zit I've had in years. Bathing is fun, kids!

We were next approached by a camera-weilding guy who asked if it was OK to phtotgraph us. We said sure, and he did. He explained that he worked for Nintendo and they'd send out the photos on their corporate intranet. Also, if Nintendo's Marketing thought the pics were any good they might want to use them for advertising. I made sure to inform him that they probably wouldn't, since I hadn't bathed in a few days. I am moronically awesome.

By the way, congrats on making it this far. Reward yourself!

I sleep on a futon!

After peddling a few Tennis Balls and Yellow Ribbons on some strangers, we ended up back at the front of the line watching Geek and JrHawk's backs through the glass of the store.

I called geek again, who was apparently so bored at watching items get autographed he suggested we play some Ouendan remotely while he waited for his chance to get things signed. Unfortunately, we never got our signals to link up, so we abandoned the idea.

Feeling that I had done all the bark-moding I needed to do, at least while trying to not be a totally worthless friend since M0ly had come downtown from Brooklyn to hang out, we went to the bookstore nearby to wait for Geek and JrHawk to wrap things up on the inside.

When they got out and we met up, they told us great stories about:
*The woman who almost wet her pants when she met Miyamoto.
*The guy who kissed Miyamoto's hand.
*The guy who tried to get
Miyamoto-san to sign his PSP (a competitor's product!).
And many more insider tips which can be seen on
his weblog.

Here is a picture of the hand Geek used to shake hands with Miyamoto-san.


And here's the one JrHawk used.


Geek found Miyamoto's lingering scent handy when confronted by piles of garbage on the streets of New York.

We ate some bagels, and M0ly showed us her miniature gashapon-style buns.

Yeah, awful puns like that are the reason I'm writing a live-journal and not for some fancy-pants web-zine...

Then we headed outside and took the requisite group photos.
Here we are with a bird...


And here we are with someone's car...

That shot is actually reminiscent of Geek and I's first trip to the Nintendo World Store...


When we got to Geek's car, we were pleased to find that unlike the first trip to the Nintendo World Store there were no parking tickets!


We said our goodbyes to Geek and JrHawk and then M0ly and I walked 3.62 miles to the wrong Broadway and then took a cab to my Chinatown bus which would take me home. After a bunch of confusion, I hopped on the bus that would later get a flat tire on the Jersey turnpike where I would take this picture.

Still unwashed!

I made it home to DC in time to catch the last train to Silver Spring, and took a nice long shower.

Thankfully, that's
THE END.

of part 2.


Check out the appendix.
Here's dogging in Europe.