Nintendo shocked their fans when they announced that the Switch would feature a paid online service. While the presentation didn’t feature any details about what paying for the service actually gets you, Nintendo’s official website has listed everything you can expect when you subscribe. The service will include online play, voice chat, online lobbies, exclusive deals and even a free NES or SNES game per month. Depending on how much Nintendo decides to charge, this seems like a fair amount of features. Are you planning to subscribe? Tell us below.
Online Play on Nintendo Switch
You’ll be able to play compatible co-op and competitive games online by signing in with your Nintendo Account. Online play will be free for Nintendo Account holders until our paid online service launches in fall 2017.
Online lobby and voice chat
Our new dedicated smart device app will connect to Nintendo Switch and let you invite friends to play online, set play appointments, and chat with friends during online matches in compatible games─all from your smart device.
A free, limited version of this app will be available for download in summer 2017.
Monthly game download
Subscribers will get to download and play a Nintendo Entertainment System™ (NES) or Super Nintendo Entertainment System™ (Super NES) game (with newly-added online play) for free for a month.
Exclusive deals
Special offers for subscribers may include discounts on select digital games and content.
If they also allow N64 and Gamecube game downloads each month will be 100 percent worth what they charge!
Nintendo have been left behind when it comes to online play and this is a move in the right direction.
Notice the wording. “For free for a month”. So you only get to play the game for a month. That’s laughable.
The right direction would have been to build a fairly robust online network that consumers have faith in before charging them.
They did say that the online service won’t require a subscription until the Fall. It’ll be free before then. I doubt 8 months is enough time to allow people to experience the service and gauge reaction/make any necessary improvements, but we’ll see. Hopefully the online service isn’t delayed until well after release.
And I’m not too assured that they can justify a charge for online play.
All their game/console features tend to be so boring, limited, and not built for the modern demographic.
If they are going to charge then they better let go of the baby bottle. They have to integrate some damn core, online features.
P1.
“Subscribers will get to download and play a Nintendo Entertainment System™ (NES) or Super Nintendo Entertainment System™ (Super NES) game (with newly-added online play) for free for a month.”
What does that mean? Will you only have access to the game for one month? Is it like a trial period?
I like the idea of online play for VC games. Some interesting possibilities there.
that’s what it sounds like doesn’t it, which is pretty mediocre compared to say PS Plus’ offering. Let’s hope that’s just a very awkward way of them phrasing that you get a new NES and SNES game *to keep* each month.
PS Plus… the regular PSN subscribers don’t get plus content do they? this is nintendo revealing their PSN/Live service. wait for them to announce the PS+/Gold versions..
This *is* their paid service. Are you saying they will have multi tiered paid services? I doubt it.
||Yes, like I told the boy HollowGrapeJ just a while ago, it’s basically a glorified renting system just like the Xbot and Sonyans have…||
Except for PS+ you get to play the game as long as you have a sub and Gold you get to keep the game always. This is just a month and that’s it.
||The Xbot one, are these Xbox One weapons or older ones?…||
From what I recall, both. I don’t use my Xbox One much anyway so I never claim my GwG (also never pay for Gold 😅)
||I see why…||
||Nontheless, even if the Sonyans have the best bargain at its current state from all 3, they are all equally irrelevant to me unless High Command has a maximum fee of 60% of the Sonyan one…||
Just the 360 games you get to keep. The xbo games are just like the ps+ games.
Ah. Okay. Wasn’t sure. Still better than what Nintendo is proposing though.
Oh yeah definitely. Im just going to end up buying the games themselves (of course because we will have to rererebuy them.) *sigh
This idea is not bad at all.
Yeah, I caught that too. Based on the wording, it sounds like you get an online multiplayer S/NES game for the month and then need to buy it to keep it. Hopefully I’m wrong.
Everything (especially the launch lineup) has been pretty meh. There’s nothing to justify non-Ninty fans to buy this console. Gutted!!
Get a life u loser!😂Zelda alone is enought to buy this console at launch!BOTW is easily better than anything released on the PS4 the last 2 years and it’s a day one launch title!
PS4 launch line up was garbage and so was Xbox One’s!
There are so many games coming fit the Switch in 2017,go and cry and play COD on your PS4!😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
Hahahaha this is the definition of desperate fanboy if i ever saw one
And you the definition of a guy who has never been laid!😂😂😂😂
Zelda is definitely not a reason to buy the system at launch considering the exact same game will be on Wii U the same day.
There really is no real reason to get a Switch at launch and this is coming from a guy who already pre-ordred the Switch for launch. The lineup is terrible.
Can you play the Wii U version of Zelda on the go anywhere?No you cannot!Wii U is garbage,people who already have one are laughable.
Wii u has free online woth no other peripherals needed to connect ;)
I feel it’s worth it. I might not ever play a game as beautiful as this Zelda portable when I can play it on a near 50″ HDTV but that HD rumble feature! Ya can’t get THAT on Wii U! And if I can play the game with motion controls for the sword on Switch while Wii U gamers are stuck with the Gamepad, I’m gonna go nuts with the Joy Con that allows motion controls! If not, the HD rumble will be good enough.
super bomberman r though
Mmmm that seems fear but that, I will accepted.
Wow, a temporary pass to play a SNES or NES game each month? Give me a break, Sony and Microsoft rip us off by making us pay for online too, but atleast we get a few games to show for it.
“Free for a month”
Really? Couldn’t be like PSN+ or GWG? Free while you have an active membership? 😳
Hmm. That doesn’t seem half-bad.
Want to know what the fee is though- is it monthly, yearly…?
So you need some stupid app just to chat online?? Please tell me this isn’t true.
No it isn’t true. The app just adds more online features and seeing how the Wii U had voice chat right out of the box I think it’s pretty safe to assume that the Switch will also have it as well
The Wii U did not have voice chat.
Yes it did, but it was limited to lobbies with friends. My friends and I would poke fun at each other after every MK8 race while waiting for the next one (“you got a lucky shot with that shell, you SOB- that’s why I lost.” “You’re the one who drove in a straight line the last 5 seconds!”
Good times.
The voice chat has been confirmed to be through a mobile app which is extremely stupid.
By “Nintendo Account” do they mean “My Nintendo?” Because I’m not interested in that.
I don’t think so. My Nintendo is just their rewards program. You can link your My Nintendo with your Nintendo Account, but you don’t need My Nintendo to have a Nintendo Account.
I don’t know why people are bitching and complaining about Nintendo having a paid online service. These are the same ones who forked over cash to play online on PSN and XBLA but when Nintendo does it it’s a problem. For anything people should be excited that there’s a new Nintendo online service that will rival the likes of PSN and XBLA. Now we get to send friend invites, universal voice chat, set play appointments, Virtual Console games will now have online multiplayer and so on. I think having a paid online service is a great idea and so should the ones who cried about how terrible the Wii U’s online offering was
||Except most who complain or similar are the ones that are against this sort of thing since the Wii generation, otherwise you would see Kalas and his kind complaining right now about it…||
Forcing you to pay to be unbanned from online services after you’ve already shelled out for a $60 game, along with a small fortune for internet each month, is a scummy tactic that’s only proliferated because people bent over and accepted it. I’m pissed Nintendo stooped to this new low. What’s even worse is their games utilize p2p connections, meaning it costs them nothing to provide online. Also, unless the switch does actually get and maintain real third party support, expect to be paying for a service you won’t even use that often outside of the occasional first party title with online support.
These are the details of the service: granted access to something you’ve already paid for twice over (no mention of any actual improvements to that infrastructure, which is notoriously poor), a few extremely basic online features tied to a smartphone app (seriously), 1 20-30 year old NES/SNES game a month before they’re deleted from your system, and some vague “deals”. That comes nowhere close to what PSN and XBLA offers, and even those are still very dubious in principle.
In terms of competitiveness, Nintendo don’t even get close with their prices when they run their own store deals on games. So the discounts need to be pretty substantial to even begin to compete.
So basically like PS+ and XBOX Live.
At least Nintendo goes with the times and wants to make some more money with online stuff.
I was already turned off by the paid service, but you only get to keep the NES/SNES games for A MONTH? That, my friends, is a deal breaker, and I bet Iwata never would have wanted that.
well, I already pay for my ps4 online service and i will not bother to pay for a nint one. ^^
great, i hope the service will be great with that.
Please, … add NintendoArcadeGames/ArcadeMode
in clear
Add all Nintendo Arcade machines. (Like : Arcade Mario Brother, …)
Made it use Nintendo Coins, like use “5 Platine coins” to play a single Nintendo arcade game. if you play two time it cost each time in example “5 Platine coins”.
HighScore Local/Country/World
This sounds awesome! NOW TO WAIT FOR SMASH BROS.! PLEASE HAVE BANJO & KAZOOIE IN IT!
I guess I’ll NEVER play any games online, even if I wanted to. Not if I have to pay.
Absolutely WILL NOT PAY FOR this.
Think its a disgrace to even charge and to seriously think giving us free NES and SNES titles is a good USP then they are seriously not in touch with their customer base.
Nintendo are notorius for having the worst online service. Absolute muppets.
Nintendo BETTER not end their browser on the Wii U. I NEED that browser. It’s how I get anything done anymore (Google search, shows, shopping, etc).
The Switch won’t have a browser but the Wii U still will. The browser on the Wii U isn’t a service, it’s an app. As long as you have internet access it’ll work.
Nope,.just won’t by games that require online play.
No, thanks. I’ll pass.
What’s up with the “chat from your smart device”? Are they seriously not doing in-game live chat yet?
I won’t be paying.
}{ Initially I was going to putchase a switch as a toy alongside my PC… But if they are going ti charge me for multiplayer I do believe I’ll be passing… }{
Nintendo is in the business to make money. And let’s admit, they saw how much money Sony was making from their online services ALONE and they got rightfully envious. (I would too). Firstly, I think charging just to play with your friends online is a scam as it is. This goes for ALL THREE console makers. Next, if I wanted to play Nintendo’s dated classic games, I would sure as hell pirate them first. NES and SNES games (games created more than 30 years ago) do not in ANY WAY justify paying for Nintendo’s sorry excuse of a paid online experience.
Paid Online ? Oh, boy this will either make or break The big N
This might back fire om them. Why some many of us has kids and now adults went with Nintendo because it was free. Now we have to pay for the bad servers :/ Idk if I’m getting it maybe for splatoon2 its the only thing holding me to nintendont
In case anyone hasn’t caught on, it sounds like you need a smart device to chat, send game invites etc. Doesn’t that make your service null and void since I can do that with my phone to begin with without paying for your service? This is miserable utter shit. Come on Nintendo get it right once and for all. If I need my phone next to me to see my friends online and to chat and whatever else then is a ridiculous joke.
why is this quadraxis guy/girl treating the console war like a an actual war when all it really boils down to is Fanboys of their chosen platform saying ” Xbox,Sony,Nintendo or Pc are the master race. This however is just childish and needs to stop each system has good points and bad can we just drop this stupidity?
You have to ask him, but I can pretty much guarantee you won’t be satisfied with whatever answer he gives you.