Photo Dojo DX

Photo Dojo DX
	The title screen itself.
Build date	June 07 2010 10:31:41
	v; t; e;

Photo Dojo DX is a prototype/tech demo created by Nintendo as a follow-up to their DSiWare game, Photo Dojo. The game has been discovered on a few Nintendo 3DS prototypes used only by Nintendo.

Background

In 2010, Nintendo brought several tech demos to showcase the Nintendo 3DS at that year's E3. Showcased titles, such as Tech Demo: 3D Hopper and Tech Demo: Face Ace, were built around late May and early June. The known build of Photo Dojo DX has a build date of June 7, 2010, and in both cases it was discovered, it was found among builds for demos that were shown at E3. However, there is no evidence that it was present on the show floor or behind closed doors, as there was no coverage of it from the press. According to two journalists from Nintendo World Report who attended the 3DS booth at E3 2010 and got access to closed-doors demos, neither of them recall seeing Photo Dojo DX. Because of all of this, it is speculated that Photo Dojo DX was meant to be shown at E3, but had its inclusion dropped at the last minute.

History

Initial finding (2019)

In 2019, a user by the name of Voodooween showed a Nintendo 3DS demo unit from 2010 containing several prototypes and tech demos. One of those listed was "Photo Dojo DX". Voodooween described it as a 'fully playable but short demo, only 1 minute to be exact'.

Although Voodooween planned a NAND dump of the entire unit, there was trouble trying to obtain a dump, due to a hardmod being required. As of 2025, Voodooween has not confirmed whether a dump has been made.

Rediscovery (2024)

On October 26, 2024, Photo Dojo DX was found on a Nintendo 3DS X1A prototype owned by Japanese collector XX_750000.^[1] A dump of this unit was released by CodeBound on December 31, 2024.

Overview

Photo Dojo DX is similar to its predecessor, but with the following changes:

The game supports stereoscopic 3D.
Only a single photo of the fighter's full body is needed. The game now morphs it during gameplay.
Facial expressions are taken separately, at a 45 degree angle.
You can now save up to 9 fighters instead of 8.
The Spin Kick, the Sweep the Wave Blast and the Chain Attack are new moves.
You cannot longer press Start to pause the game. You have to press Pause on the touch screen.
The only special attack available is the Judo Warrior.
There are many new types of enemies. [TODO: Someone with Photo Dojo knowledge clarify this, please. For reference of what the different enemy types are called, examine the code.bin strings.]

Unused Content

[TODO: A lot. Get audio and visuals for this stuff and talk about what's not described here yet.]

Present in the files are a boss theme and victory theme that go unused in the demo. There are also graphics and strings related to an unused 2-player mode, which appears to exist in the code as well, because of some strings present in the code.bin.