Video: This Harmless Exploit Will Help You Grab All Those StreetPass Puzzle Pieces

I just last week finished my last puzzle without any kind of exploit. cries

Uhh no thanks. I've spent years doing it the legit way. I'm not going to resort to cheating now.

Cheating the street pass puzzles kinda defies the point of even doing them

...Considering that I RARELY get any Streetpasses at all (...and when I do I get little no new pieces), I might end up just doing this. not gonna use this with my other games though. (besides the manor one, because for some odd reason my savedata there got screwed up and I had to start over. >_> )

I lost ALL of my Street Pass Puzzle Pieces when I got my New 3DS XL back from Repairs.

I've been doing this for a little while now, I'm taking a break atm, but I'll go back too doing it soon.

It's pretty entertaining that you use a character called "Honest Abe" to perform this...

Wut. This takes like 5 minutes to get 1 piece. Naw mate I ain't that free.

I'll definitely do this. Streetpasses are rare for me. And to everyone who refuses to do it, more power to you I guess, but if I don't do this I will never be able to complete the puzzles ever.

I like this if only because it means that a few more pieces will be in circulation. It really irks me when I get 10 people and only 2 of them have new pieces for me :/

I just wish that there wasn't that 10 Streetpass limit, before you have to refresh your Streetpass List...

I lost all my puzzle pieces when my 3DS got stolen from me on Christmas Eve, and I had every puzzle completed except for the three latest ones too. I doubt I'll be doing this exploit though. While I'd love to get back all the puzzles I lost, this sounds like a really time consuming method since you're only getting one piece at a time.

I like how this guy uses HONEST Abe for this exploit! XD

or you could just use HomePass, which is much more convenient and gives you 10 pieces at a time.

My God...I may actually have a chance at finishing them!

What a waste of time...

I forgot about StreetPass until now. I really don't care anyway.

I'm not a person to cheat these days, well except when I'm replaying vice city then I'm entering weapon code two and spawning a tank for kicks.

So would this work with any special Mii? Like if you deleted more than one, could you at least get more than one puzzle piece each round then?

Tried this earlier, though I think it doesn't work if you have streetpassed some people along with the special mii since he isn't reappearing for me. I was hoping it would've worked for me since I lost my puzzle swap progress when I got a replacement 3DS. Oh well, at least the mii wasn't too special like Reggie.

I've been working on my puzzles for years. I'm not resorting to cheating now.

@Captain_Gonru I agree about the coin limit. I literally do between 5000 and 15000 steps per day, it sucks that only 1000 of them are counted towards my coin count, but I get 10 coins per day. I would love for the coin limit to be increased 1000+, or removed completely.
I wish for the Streetpass limit was 50+ at least...

I only gunna do this cause 0 people around me for pieces and its frustrating and i have only gotten 2 tags ever since i got this my system and its torture and now after 3 pieces its way to boring to me.

This sounds like FAR too much work to be of any real value.
There are far far too many puzzles, though.
The limits Nintendo adds for how many coins you can earn per day slows things down as well.
There is no way anyone could ever obtain all the
puzzles through any normal sort of use of the 3DS.

I absolutely love the puzzles, and the whole StreetPass thing. I don't like how you can only have 10 games registered at once.

I use the Raspberry Pi trick to generate unlimited StreetPasses for me. It doesn't ruin any sort of enjoyment though, since there are, as I said, so MANY puzzles, that I am able to play for as long as I want through the games, without reaching "the end".

This just shows that Nintendo needs to change something, so people don't need to resort to convoluted roundabouts.

I will be getting mine the HONEST way, by going to McD and Best buy for spotpass hits.

An honest exploit! 😜

@manu0 what's HomePass?

Every time I finish a puzzle, it feels like 3 or 4 more get added. I'm going to get the pink pieces at least.

I'm kind of done with StreetPass, so if a special Mii becomes available in PAL regions before it's fixed — doubt it — then I'll be all over this.

Way too tedious, but nice find?

Using this method would take ages to just finish one panel. I don't care about puzzle swap and find mii anyway.

If you aren't the kinda person who gets many streetpass hits, I don't see the harm in doing it at least for the pink pieces(which you need streetpass for), which would be less tedious as you would just collect blue pieces from using the coins with regular usage and play normally that way.

I have to agree though about upping the coin limit and street pass limits(at least the former), because I tend to walk a crap ton, so it sucks that only 1k steps is counted, as someone said above.

ETA: I, too, find the Honest Abe thing to be pretty funny.

StreetPass Plaza is dead to me save for the puzzles. I unlocked everything already.... But I live by Nintendo of America so it's sorta easy.

Haha, oh wow,... funny enough, somewhere in the past years, my Wii Mii Plaza got an Abe Lincoln made. I recall transferring him to my 3ds. Then, this (last, or past if you prefer) Christmas, I got Smash, so my 3ds Smash has a brawler that I recently(few weeks ago) changed his name to Honest Abe.

As for StreetPass, there are always more puzzles added, as I slowly get more pieces for puzzles on my system. There are a few places I go, that generally are a guarantee to pick up SP hits. I've learned over time to focus on completing my favorite puzzles. Find Mii is fun, too; slowly picking up hats, there.

I'll have to watch the video, but by article reading, it sounds more time-consuming, than the pay-off.

@Folkloner its not cheating, yeesh.

i cant believe people are on a high horse about this

@suhpo Changing the settings of your internet router to have it unlock and other settings

When the hell does the EU get any special miis that can be exploited in a cheat like this????? You can set up a special mii as your streetpass mii really easily without any illegal flashcart or anything that supports piracy. So, until we actually get special miis I'll be carrying my console with me so everyone can get the special mii hit! Not what Nintendo wants probably, but tough! That's what happens when you give us what, 12, and everyone else at least 4 times more. Note that turning your mii special doesn't get you all the pink pieces so you cannot distribute them unless you have them already.

To some it's cheating. To others, it's using initiative to get what you otherwise cannot in any other manner.

@JoseRachi96 cool I didn't know you could do that. Do you know a website or something that can show me how to do that?

@suhpo Just google "homepass" or "streetpass at home" and staff should come up, and ways to do it with your internet connection
enjoy~

@JoseRachi96 awesome! Thanks for the info!

I'm all for it.
Even when hitting Wi-fi zones like the ones at McDonald's, I get 5 hits at most and only one or two people seem to have any new puzzle pieces.
And because when you trade in your coins for pieces you can get duplicates. Not sure how this has ever been fair.
Not planning on using the exploit, but it's nice to know there's hope for folks who live in dead zones.

While doing the legit way is cool, it'll take forever for me to complete my puzzles. No lie. I can't even get one streetpass when I take a walk downtown. The most I'll get is two and that's very rare.

Thanks for all of the input, everyone, I was pretty excited to figure this out! I figured if nothing else it spices up these games for the people in sparsely populated areas. Enjoy if you choose to!

I used to use Homepass for a while to get a ton of hits, Homepass seems much faster than this. Does homepass still work? In any case, very handy for those in low streetpass areas like me, but I really can't be bothered anymore haha

I'll just keep playing the games as intended, bleck!

I've beaten Find Mii twice and almost finished my second playthrough of Find Mii 2. I've also completed Mii Force, got master gardener in the plant game, and just today conquered the world in the battle minigame. I've still got a ways to go for the Monster Manor thingy.

@sleepinglion : It would be nice if using Play Coins guaranteed a new piece every time, or if we had to option to pay more coins (say, 5) for a guaranteed new piece and maybe a premium for the coveted "pink" pieces (say, 20-30 Play Coins each).

I don't think that this would "cheapen" the experience due to the sheer number of puzzle pieces that are now available. Late 3DS adopters certainly have their work cut out for them. I've had my 3DS since launch and I'm struggling to keep up, especially now that I'm no longer studying in the city.

@Babybahamut Hahahahaha yes, HONEST Abe xD

Those captions are amazing!

"Come on Indonesia"

I'll be using it to get all the pink pieces for the latest Monster Hunter puzzle, the only puzzle I have left to complete. I farm coins at work by disabling the WiFi and changing the date on the 3DS every time I hit 1000. On a good day, I can get 50 coins, and that fills up the blue pieces on puzzles mighty quick.

This would take soooooooo long to get all the pieces.

Perfect timing; I just got my 3DS repaired, and lost all of my Streetpass Mii Plaza data. This should help me recover.

I'll probably use this just to secure the elusive pink pieces from a few of my puzzles and start up a few that I have no pieces for at all.

My personal 3DS I've completed or came within a handful of pieces about thrice before new panels came out. Currently two pinks off of SSB4's and 6 pink + some blues from Monster Hunter #2 (coulda finished the former, but figured other people might would too). Almost tempted to just secure the pink pieces, but then, there are two other 3DSes here and more opportunities for special Miis coming, so I'll just simmer. I am worried about the data being wiped from repairs, though: getting my sis's b/f's filled through ours, so it'd be a damn shame to see his wiped.

I tried this on my side 3DS, did everything the directions said, and even got the blue notifications but Abe didn't show up again.

@Sakura I would love to know how to do this.

'Honest Abe' Lincoln Mii, when is that coming to Europe and how can it be get?

It really sucks that they don't just send those through Spotpass easily somehow, I have in the past 1,5 years only got two special Mii characters Aonuma and one other Nintendo developer. I could kill for official Iwata and Reggie miis to arrive.

Street pass on the 3ds is almost as useful in the UK as TVii on the Wii U.

I live in england and regularly get 8-10 hits most days, it just depends on where you live

Nope, I'm fine with my legit collection. I get about 10 streetpass hits per day.

YES. Now to finish that blasted Kirby puzzle.

This wouldn't be too big of a deal if people were just willing to actually go to streetpass meetups where I live.

@jedisquidward can't believe some people are in denial about this. Some people find it difficult to come by StreetPass hits and this exploit will no doubt help them but let's not pretend that this isn't exploiting a flaw in the system.

...or do you think Nintendo intentionally built this exploit in hoping people would use it to get as many puzzle pieces as they wanted from Special Mii's?
No, i didn't think so either.

Wayyyyy too tedious. Worst exploit ever.
You are better off trying to edit data through a hex editor or something or making a home streetpass nintendo point with your modem/router.

@Kolzig Special Miis do come via spotpass. The problem is Nintendo of Europe rarely ever send out special Miis full stop (given the Chibi Robo Photo Finder puzzle panel is missing for no reason they really don't care about puzzle swap). The last one I received was about 6 months ago (some Game Freak employee) and I've yet to receive 10 (I've had the system since 2013)

Meanwhile America gets one every other month it feels. As for Honest Abe. Well it is promoting Code Name STEAM so in May, perhaps?

Only in North America?
Streetpass is rare in my country. If it will be avaible (this special mii) in Europe i may try it.
Or not. Basically i dont give a f*** about that puzzles.
And again. "Dear" Nintedno remove that stupid limit of 12 games using Streetpass simultaneously.
And:
Is there any chance to get this pink puzzles spending coins?

@Hy8ogen I timed it while going as fast as possible. One loop only took about 2.1 minutes, 2.3 minutes when completing a puzzle. If you're not focused on doing it fast, it will take longer, but I wouldn't hold it against anyone to watch videos while performing the exploit. Depending on how many pink pieces you need, it could take a good while, even longer if you decide to get blue pieces this way rather than spend Play Coins for a random chance of getting the ones you need.
I hope Nintendo doesn't decide to stop sending special Mii's. I got a growing collection of Eiji Aonuma Mii's in Mii Maker!

@Robo-Knight mind has to go in for a repair, may I ask what was wrong with yours?

I hope they don't lose my data for the 4th time

Yep, this is cheating, no doubt. Hope the availability of pieces doesn't get broken by this.

And the limit to the number of games active is there for a reason. If you have turned on several games, it takes longer for the system to get all the data from the system you are passing. If you're only in range for 20 seconds or so, you might miss out on passes in some games. Personally I keep the number of games with streetpass on down to about 4-5 at a time. Don't want to miss any precious, legit pieces.

By the way, still pisses me off that 3DS Streetpass doesn't have maps of all the countries of the world. Especially in Europe.

Really pathetic that many countries are missing, for example all the Nordic countries so you can't see which counties you have already gotten streetpasses from, like you can with map of Japan or UK or USA etc.

Also since my locale is set to Finland, I don't have the globe icon at all in Streetpass Plaza where you can view which countries you've gotten streetpasses from.

Really pathetic display of lazy work from Nintendo of Europe.

If you're planning on using this exploit, I would use it now because I think it will be time sensitive. Nintendo will fix the exploit and/or the special miis will only be available for a certain amount of time.

I'm going to continue to get them through wi-fi zones and actual street passes but I don't care if others use this. I don't consider it cheating at all, but I do think it destroys the purpose. I don't get a ton of street passes in my community and for some reason, most of my coins are spent for duplicates.

@Kolzig

I agree. I have one from Brazil and a few Caribbean countries and there are no maps....so this goes for NoA as well.

Not sure I'll be doing this, but nice find nonetheless.

Interesting, but ultimately not that useful. Getting puzzle pieces is nice but you could just as easily use 3DS Coins for most of that. The real value in Streetpass hits is the number of actual people you connect with (kind of like a gamer score).

Well if you're going to do this, you should do it quick before a "stability update" removes it.

Sounds like more work than it's worth.

That homepass thing people do is far more convenient than this exploit but I suppose if you have the patience this is still a decent way to finish a puzzle if you aren't likely to streetpass often.

Bah .... since the Nintendo ID started working, here in México we don´t receive Mii guests any more

so meh ....

I have most of the pieces already, I'll wait for the next Streetpass Weekend.

I live in a "Crap Towns" book runner up in the UK and I don't have that much trouble finishing my puzzles thanks to general 3DS populous, local game stores, game meet ups and Nintendo zones.

Maybe where you live has less 3DS, perhaps you don't have a McDonald's you can walk past. If its such an issue, if you absolutely need to exploit to get these then just disable Mii plaza (not spot pass) and look them up online

I'm liking this trick a lot.

PuzzleSwap is NOT fun. It's tedious, dull, and thoroughly boring. And yet I obsessively collect every piece I can and I thrive in being up to date. Despite it being a lifeless time-waster, I've been hooked since day one. Hook, line, sinker. Oy!

I wouldn't call this exploit cheating. And if it is cheating, then they're cheating at something that isn't much of a game, oh dear. I mean, with my friend and sibling's permission I've occasionally used their own 3DS's for my benefit. So if that's cheating, lock me up. I say go for it to anyone who just needs that precious few left.

@JoeyJoey95 I posted those times right after I timed the process. I don't know when the Honest Abe distribution will end, but I managed to finish off the last three panels I needed pink pieces for with this.

I hate the slowness of completing the puzzle pieces, but I don't have the dedication to do it this way either. So... hello incomplete puzzle pieces!

They must have patched this with 4.1??

I just tried it and it didn't work. I deleted the new character from Animal Crossing, following the directions, it came up saying a new surprise guest is here, AYA KYOGOKU, but then when it opens Mii Plaza she is deleted and doesn't come back.
Now I'm down to zero special characters so I can't try it again.

In addition it also came up with two more notifications:
1 "StreetPass Mii Plaza — New Games" saying a new update is available (it's not)
2 "Puzzle Swap" telling me nee panels are available. Neither of these do anything other than just open Mii Plaza when clicked on.

Any ideas? Not I expect any replied this far out, but if this helps keep someone else from deleting a special Mii then I suppose it's worth my time to post.
I guess it serves me right...cheating, or attempting to anyway.
It's just that we get ZERO people around me with 3DS systems so it's taken me about 4 years to complete ONE puzzle! I have. I have no way of getting pink pieces other than the few a year from Nintendo.

@spoonmanx You have to do the exploit while a Special Mii is being distributed via SpotPass. After he appears, use him for whatever, deactivate StreetPass (which deactivates SpotPass), reactivate StreetPass and SpotPass, then close your 3DS for about 15 seconds. You'll get the Special Mii again as long as Nintendo is still giving it out. I just tried it with Kyle from Nintendo and it worked, and this article is wrong in that you don't even need to close out Mii Plaza.

@allav866
Thanks for the reply.
Maybe 3pm was the cutoff point.
I have another 3DS I can try this on. Can you tell me the name of the latest Mii? I See Kyle and BBY Kyle.

@spoonmanx Pretty sure it's Kyle.