AR Games in Real Life

Headline’s kind of a misnomer because, the deal with the augmented reality games on the 3DS is, they are kinda-sorta played in real life. But not the way we’re gonna play them.

See, I have this silly belief that the AR characters are real, and they’re all around us, we just can’t see them. Only through the magical power of the Nintendo 3DS can we find the magic dragon who lives in the desk. Just go with me on this.

So, this week, let’s show the dragon, the targets, the coin boxes, the face raiders, as they are all around us. Of course this calls for mashing them into news photos, or juxtaposed with important or historic figures in important or historic images. Another approach would be the humorous use of an AR card in a similarly incongruent setting. Or, of course, if you have any other ideas, those are fair game too. I’m just tossing up suggestions.

Source: Google Image search: 3DS AR Games

Source Image: 3DS AR Cards

You know the rules: The 20 best will get rounded up and published at the end of next Saturday. Meantime, I and the rest of the starred commentariat will approve and promote as many as we can so folks can see them and pass judgment.

This is your no-frills step-by-step procedure to participation in the Kotaku ‘Shop Contest.

1. Create your ‘Shop.

2. Upload it to a free image hosting service. I suggest imgur. It’s stupid simple. No account is necessary.

3. This is very important: You must use the URL of the image itself. In imgur, this is the second URL it gives you after you upload the image. It’s under “Direct Link (email & IM)”

4. At the beginning of the comments roll, click “Start a New Thread”

5. To the right of your name, select “Image.”

6. Paste the imgur URL in the image URL field. It’s the field that says “Image URL.”

7. You can add editorial commentary if you want, but you can hit submit and your

8. This is important: Keep your image size under 1 MB. It will not upload to comments if it is over that size.

‘Shop entry will be uploaded to the comments.

As an added inducement, I want to let you know I do star commenters who send in worthy/funny submissions – whether or not they’re chosen for the final 20. This may not happen immediately. I usually start rounding up a gallery by the middle of the week. This is my subjective call, but I do want to recognize as many contributors as possible, and show gratitude for making this such a popular feature on weekends.

Now, Gentlemen, start your ‘shopping!