Topic: If I lose a physical game for the Nintendo Switch, can I buy the digital copy for free?

I recently just lost 2 physical games for the Nintendo Switch and I cannot find them. Here's my question: Can I buy the digital copy for free, after I already bought the physical copy with money?

@JellySlap No, if you lose a physical game, you'll have to buy it again.

If you replace it, it doesn't matter if you buy digital or physical since game save data is stored separately on Switch internal memory. On the plus side, if you replace the game, you'll be able to resume your game progress where you left off.

@JellySlap Go to the eshop. Search for the physical game you have lost. It will let you download it for free if you have purchased it from the eshop

Welcome to nintendoLife

No, same way you can't do that on other consoles.... How would they do that option? It'd be far too open to abuse

In the same way that you cannot for anything.

Short answer NO. You rebuy them unless they are Digital Games then you redownload them but Physical you rebuy the game.

I ended up having an interesting conversation about this. I assume that when buying a game on a cart, you are buying the actual cartridge - what is on it is immaterial. Therefore it is just a physical item that falls within consumer law.

However, the counter argument I was given was that this was out of date when considering software. If the game was tied to your account, then you should be able to request a replacement cart (say, for a small fee)

I kind of like it. However, there are issues that stop this working (such as tying an individual cart to your account), but I wonder if they could be overcome.

To join in on this here, can I get two of the same game as long as they're physical and digital respectively?

Of course you can, @Fizza .... By buying both! I'm sure there's theoretical ways, @Rambler but the other 2 consoles don't have it, either, so it'd presumably be more complicated than it might seem

@BruceCM
Main stumbling block I can see is having each cart being unique, either via key on the cart or on the label.

Or the cart interacts with your account to generate a unique number that can be used to track your ownership. Somehow you are forced to deregister the cart if you sell it.

Seems tricky.

Yeah, it'd get complicated if the person lost the game & then someone else was trying to register it, too, @Rambler .... How would the owner prove they lost it, not sold it on or whatever?
It'd remove the advantages physical games have with sharing, too! What happens if someone manages to register your game to their account before you knew it was missing?
Shops would have to check trade-ins before buying them.....

@BruceCM
It would be messy, and pretty much impossible. One way would be to centrally regulate games being bought and sold. Like a specific website for reselling games. However, that would end up being very costly in terms of sales, as everybody would dislike it.

Yeah, overall, I don't think it'd be worth it, @Rambler .... Guess that's why it's not been done yet, by either other console
Hopefully, OP learns to be more careful with physical games.....

I think some indie devs back in the Wii U days let you download digital if you had the physical. But that was uncommon as I recall

I had an idea for physical carts where, you could transfer the game from the cart onto your system, essentially turning it into a digital version, but the cart registers as "Transferred" if you pop it in. Then, you could transfer the game back to the cart as well, and the game cart would function as normal, but the digital license would be revoked during the transfer.

The only downside is, selling physically could lead to scams if the game is transferred. A simply check by inserting the cartridge first would be an easy fix for trade ins, but online sales... that would be a problem. And I don't know the answer.

Perhaps seller ratings would take care of the issue, the same as if someone sold a non-functional cart. The good sellers rise to the top with high feedback ratings, and the scammers get complaints and banned from eBay. Idk. Just an idea to explore...

@JaxonH I was thinking if Nintendo could look at your home screen and check if you had the game, then offer the refund / replace for 5$ (if you have the digital copy), and ask for a 20$ refund for the physical copy.

@CactusMan
If so, then my idea would work. The game is registered to a switch automatically for first use, but needs to be deregistered to work in another.
As long as the game is registered to that switch, then a digital copy can be played. When the game is deregistered then the digital version is inaccessible until it is bought.

@JellySlap then everyone would buy physical games and sell them while downloading the digital version for free.

Yes, all cartridges carry unique identifiers and there would be no technical barriers to registering them to an account on first use, so you could then re-download the game if you ever lost the physical media.

The catch would be that you'd have to revoke the registration prior to another user playing the game from the same cartridge. That would essentially kill the used games market as there'd be no way for purchasers to check that sellers had actually done this prior to getting their hands on it.

Microsoft were planning to do something similar to this prior to the launch of the Xbox One. It went down like a lead balloon, there was a swift u-turn, and nobody's dared to go there since.

Maybe, when you deregister, the switch gives you a code, which you add to the listing's description. This you can then lookup on a central database to confirm it. A bit like the eShop codes.

If MS have had this idea, I'm sure they've been through all of this already though.