Every year, Nintendo offers up this "virtual online summer camp" for a week to a limited number of entrants. If you get in (and it's first-come, first-served) you gain access to a cutesy web-based camp experience, driven by Nintendo marketing and teen chat rooms. That's really all it is, and for what it offers it is good enough.

There's a map of the grounds, where you can click around to read blurbs on upcoming games (which you probably already know about), daily contests between the 10 Cabins, and a preponderance of message boards and chat rooms. This year we had live chats with Nintendo spokeperson Reggie Fils-Ames, the Nintendo Power "Krew", and the Nintendo localization team (which might have been interesting; sorry I missed that one.) At the end of the week, the Cabins with the most points get some exclusive internet trinkets - wallpapers, graphics, whatever.

Most campers are 12-14. I know this because in every chat room I monitored inevitably someone would ask "HOW OLD IS EVERY1?" You have to walk in prepared for this. They're all on summer vacation, they're all video gamers, they're all painfully adolescent. It's best not to get too involved and let them have their fun. I rarely jumped in, although once I did feel the need to properly explain the DS's wireless capabilities.

It would be nice to have some kind of age verification system, and have some chat rooms open to 20+. But, short of using AdultCheck or a credit card, I don't know how Nintendo would accomplish that, and I don't think they'd care anyway. Camp Hyrule isn't for us.

So why did I (and Rhonda) join the fun this year? Because Nintendo was giving out 5 free Nintendo DS systems. We did not win.

But we played, to an extent. Every day there's these stupid activities that I would probably really get into if I also had the summer off. Write a haiku, Photoshop up a funny picture of one of the counselors, draw your favorite Pokemon. Simply attempting the activity earns a point for your Cabin, and when these kids get their competitive adrenaline up, nothing matters more than points for your Cabin. GO CABIN 3!

It took less than two days for news to spread that one of the counselors had "cheated" and rigged his Cabin hundreds of unfair extra points. This news was hotly exchanged in every chat room, and plenty of complaint messages were fired off. Oh, kids and their love of petitions. What I never understood was exactly how this guy cheated; that was never explained, the accusation was proof enough. His Cabin did win first place in the end, and he spouted off plenty of smack talk about it. Lame. I really hate giving in to that juvenile blood-boiling; I hated that in my own school days, where we were supposed to vilify the opposing team and win-win-win. But again, this is a show for the 12 year olds, so I kept to myself. I just wanted the damn DS anyway.

Of course, you could go Steve's (of N-Philes) route and purposefully enter Camp Hyrule to grief the other participants. That's sad, especially coming from a normally respectable Nintendo fansite. I guess N-Philes is making a bid to be the Bad Boy of Nintendo fansites. Interestingly, Steve thinks that Camp Hyrule was so much better four years ago... which is probably when he was 14. And now it's just internet newbie chatting and pointless busy work. Yes, it is. If you're at all offended by juvenile message boards and chat rooms, you should stay away from Camp Hyrule. Signing up just so you can go make trouble and annoy people is pretty pathetic.