I was thinking about games that have you use non-gaming household things to play, like how Chee-Chai Alien has you using any artificial light source, Chibi-Robo Photo Finder has you photographing various objects, and Wii Fit has a mini game where you pile stuff up on the balance board to try and match a specific weight.
I also thought of Boktai but I don’t think the sun counts as a household object the way your slippers do haha
Can anyone think of any other examples?
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A writing utensil and a notepad feels like too generic of an answer.
Writing utensils, graph paper, rulers, etc. for drawing maps seems less generic of an answer.
If there hasn’t been already, it feels like someone at Nintendo would be kicking themselves over not thinking of making people get household objects for some obscure purpose to play WarioWare microgames somehow.
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Eternal Darkness (GC) has you reaching for your remote control.
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Gosh, I would love that warioware idea! My brothers and I played it by passing the controller back and forth between rounds and that added “microgame” really amped up the tension, I can’t imagine having to scurry around the room haha
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Love this interpretation of the question! I think someone told me about a kojima game that tricks you into turning the volume up before blasting your speakers? I don’t remember the details but I could go ask if you’re interested
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Startropics has you go fetch some water to read invisible ink on a note provided.
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Ooooooh, yes! It actually came with a box to use in Europe and Japan (different boxes, funny enough) but not in North America
Also the forum thingy just taught me how to reply to multiple people in a row, sorry everyone, I’m new here haha
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ラビリンスの彼方 , AKA Beyond the Labyrinth for 3DS has a little sequence where one of the in-game characters can briefly visit the real world. You point the 3DS camera at one of the AR cards the console comes with and it shows her standing on it:
I’m sure I have the AR cards in a drawer somewhere but I just did an image search for them on my phone, seen here with the arm of my couch.
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Give Me Toilet Paper asks you to have a pretty good sized piece of cardboard or a similar plank and a full roll of (real life) toilet paper
(it looks pretty fun and it’s only $5, but I’ve never tried it because I don’t have that kind of cardboard lying around)
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This was my very first thought too. I loved the concept of this!
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@Yim That’s interesting, I also have a list of 3DS ar cards I’m (kinda) working on and I saw that that one came with an “AR Calendar” but I had trouble finding photos of the inside, do you have the link? I’m glad I looked into it though cuz I just found this! 君は見たか？ 『ラビリンスの彼方』ニンドリ衣装!! - ニンドリ編集部ブログ - Apparently Nintendo Dream distributed exclusive costumes for the game, neat!
@tokucowboy oh yeah the toilet paper game!! And the new one, Bruce and Box iirc? has you use a real cardboard box to play. Those totally count thank you xD I just would love to know the story of how they figured out that a joycon fits inside a toilet paper roll
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Heh, yeah that’s in Snatcher! Your little robot buddy Metal Gear tells you to turn up the TV volume to hear a distant sound, then a couple minutes later there is a lound explosion and he chastises you for leaving the volume turned up.
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I’m not sure about what came with the game. I have what I think is a complete copy, but I can’t read Japanese (played it with a translation patch - on 3DS you can play from cart while applying the patch) so I didn’t spend much time with the manual and stuff. I think I used generic AR card images off the internet. I’ll try to take a look in the box when I’m home later.
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Ohhh, it uses the default cards, I misunderstood, I see in the photo now! I didn’t know it did that, thanks for telling me, I get to add that to the list :D
Only the special (maybe pre-order?) edition came with the calendar, and I can’t find many photos of it online so it seems pretty rare. Thanks for the tip about the translation patch too ^^
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Yeah, my copy is not the special edition so I don’t have the cards. If you’re interested though I wrote about the game a bit on another forum.
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Talked about it all day with some of my friends and I have some new stuff to add!
3DS AR Games fishing minigame detects certain colours to make certain fish appear! Which is similar to the colour-finding game from Everybody 1 2 switch I’ve been informed.
Wii Party - has a wiimote finding minigame Hide ‘n’ Hunt where you hide the wiimote in real life. Also, in Japan there is a minigame called Quick Draw that requires a real deck of cards, but this was removed in localization. Everybody 1 2 switch basically copies this for Joycon Hide & Seek
I have an update on Let’s Tap! The NA version explicitly suggests a tissue box, complete with drawing!
For Racermate Challenge II to work you have to provide your own bicycle
(if you’re interested in this, I like this video overview: https://youtu.be/swD1Yo_iNQU?si=xE7QIK6UK3-4F0bR)
Various Monster Rancher games have you use CDs and DVDs to generate monsters
Encouraged but not required to use whatever you want: Nintendo Labo and Mario Kart Home Circuit
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Just played through What is a video game?, which despite being 10+ separate executables only takes a few minutes to get through. There’s some interesting overlap with some of the discussions we have from time to time here in the forums. So, I won’t spoil how since it’d be better for everyone just to check it out real quick, but it does fit this thread extremely literally lol
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Sometimes Insert Credit is a crazy place 'cause I have to be burdened with thoughts like “I bet everyone here already knows about I am a teacher: Super Mario Sweater
so there’s almost no point in mentioning it”
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Ooooh, that’s a good one! I do already know about but I think between it not really feeling like a game and also its entire point being to grab external materials, it didn’t occur to me! I suppose we have to check Mario Family too (and singer sewing machine operation software) cuz they’re probably both like “hold your cloth” or whatever. I wonder how many peripheral games do that, I guess to me I didn’t consider them because one of the limits I set was that it could not be packaged with the item it told you to use, but you’re right that sometimes they do still ask for additional items. Thank you for the suggestion!
Also I will count paper and pen because I remembered an example of a game explicitly telling you to write something down: Super Paper Mario. Of course now I can’t find the screenshot I took but it’s in the caveman level and he gives you a comically long series of inputs to hit some blocks in. I’m sure there’s more examples so if you know any, I’d love to see!
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