Players Uncover Unusual Autobuild Sharing Exploit in Tears of the Kingdom

Alright, so here’s the thing. I was diving into this whole Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom situation—kinda wild, honestly. There’s this funky exploit people found that’s all about Autobuild Sharing. Yeah, it’s like players can whip up whatever in-game item they want, like it’s no big deal. No limits. None. Cue my shocked face.

Alright, rewind a sec. This game dropped on May 12, 2023, as the sequel to the legendary Breath of the Wild. Link starts off in a bit of a mess—typical, right? Zelda’s vanished, Ganondorf’s kicking up a fuss under Hyrule Castle, and Link’s arm? Totally toast. But hey, no worries, because Rauru’s got his back with a new arm full of cool old-school Zonai magic powers. Ultrahand and Recall, anyone?

Zoom in a couple of years to a new release for Nintendo Switch 2. Oh yes, they doubled down with both Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild. This means players get to bask in glorious visual goodness and smooth gameplay at 60fps. Oh, and there’s this handy Zelda Notes app now, packed with an Autobuild Sharing feature. Super useful, or so they say.

Ah, but here’s where it gets juicy. So there are some Reddit and Twitter folks out there, like this Formal-Code2341, who discovered they can essentially summon anything in the game using QR codes. Like, full-on herds of Epona galloping around or a bunch of dogs. Someone even managed to clone Ganondorf. Imagine facing a wall of Ganondorfs (Ganondorves?). Crazytown.

This one player—Aster______ if I’m getting that right—explained the hack. Apparently, a website lets you tinker with the game save files to swap out actors (aka game doohickeys). Do some wizardry with a modded Switch, shuffle stuff to an unmodded one, then flaunt it all on the Nintendo Switch 2 version. I mean, what could possibly go wrong, right?

And while you might think Nintendo would have thrown in some authentication to slam the door on these shenanigans, nope, seems wide open. But, players beware! Nintendo’s powers-that-be might just swoop in if this gets out of hand. Sharing’s a breeze with QR codes amongst friends—provided they’re all hooked up with a Nintendo Switch Online membership.

So, there you have it. A little chaotic, maybe. But hey, sometimes that’s how the game, or rather, the tale unravels.