About

Modding A 3DS Is Surprisingly Easy is a catchphrase among Nintendo fans who insist that it is simple to hack one's Nintendo 3DS gaming console. The phrase gained new relevance and began appearing in image macros and photoshops in late summer 2022, shortly after it was announced Nintendo shut down the eShop for the handheld console.

Origin

In 2022, Nintendo announced that it was slowly phasing out the eShop for the 3DS.^[1] On May 23rd, it became impossible for users to add funds to their eShop via credit card. On August 29th, it became impossible to use a Nintendo eShop card to add funds. On March 27th, 2023, it will no longer be possible to make purchases in Nintendo eShop.

The discontinuation of support for the eShop led to the increased prominence of people encouraging the hacking and modding of the 3DS. As of September 9th, 2022, the subreddit /r/3dshacks,^[2] a community dedicated to hacking and modding the Nintendo 3DS, has over 118,000 subscribers.

On September 1st, 2022, Twitter user and YouTuber Ant Dude^[3] posted a photoshopped image of Masahiro Sakurai saying it was surprisingly easy to hack one's 3DS, gaining over 7,000 retweets and 88,000 likes (shown below).

Spread

Over the following week, Ant Dude continued posting photoshops with text about how it was very simple to hack a Nintendo 3DS. Some notable examples include a September 5th, 2022, tweet^[4] with the phrase photoshopped over the win screen for Super Mario, gaining over 1,600 retweets and 19,000 likes (shown below, left) and a September 7th tweet^[5] showing an evolution screen from the Pokémon series that gained over 3,000 retweets and 35,000 likes in two days (shown below, right).

The virality of Ant Dude's tweets soon led other communities to post variations on the meme. For example, on September 8th, Redditor Yuxine posted art of Futaba saying the phrase in /r/Persona5,^[6] gaining over 1,500 points in one day (shown below, left). On September 7th, user cmscaiman posted a faked screenshot with the phrase to /r/Megaten,^[7] gaining over 1,100 points in two days (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References