Topic: The Nintendo Switch Online Subscription Service Thread

@Moshugan I agree. I’m getting the sub but dedicated servers would’ve been great.

@1UP_MARIO I'm not arguing against that. It would be great. But, I can also kind of see why they didn't go that route.

And now comes the information that NES games can be played offline only up to seven days. Isn't it just great?

Let's be fair @AlexSora89, how often will your switch be unable to connect to the internet at least once every seven days if you're subscribing to the online service?

This. As someone who used headsets for 8 years on Live, I don’t mind the fact that I’m not using them anymore. Is it different and weird? Sure is. Is it unreasonable? Not really. If if online I’be got wireless, so I’m already using wireless on my phone. Whenever I play Fortnite with my friend, we just FaceTime and set the phone up next to a soda or something anyway.

@FaeKnight
It depends on where I have to go. We might live in the age of the internet, but said internet is still nothing to be taken for granted.

Maybe @AlexSora89 but even McDonald's has free wifi these days. it might be crappy wifi, but it's there.

@AlexSora89 You can't play XB1 Games With Gold at all if you're offline (possibly the same with PS+) so needing 7 day online checks for NES games is slightly better.

@Grumblevolcano
Yes, but that's not taking into account the slight detail that the Switch is also a handheld.
If you have no connection at home, it's another thing entirely. I'm talking about connection not being something to be taken for granted anywhere; at home, it's (usually) kind of guaranteed.

@FaeKnight
Sure thing it is, but mostly due to being what I call "fake free wi-fi" ("it's free as long as you open our portal first").

@subpopz
I wonder how they calculated a week to be the perfect amount of time...

@ReaderRagfish
Look up Italy's current progress with internet connections in general. You're in for some laughs.

@ReaderRagfish
How old is the article? Because the situation has started to improve just recently.
Just to give you an idea about how much of a big deal this was, they hired Bruce Willis to do commercials for optical fiber.

I think I’m just gonna take this thread off my watch list until the service is actually available. It’s healthier that way. See you in a few days, “Dump on NSO Thread”

@HobbitGamer
We're dumping on vagueness.

I don't think using dedicated servers for online play has to have anything to do with playing via local connection. They're different protocols. Dedicated servers for some games, peer-to-peer for others and local wireless can all exist simultaneously.

For the sake of this debate speed has nothing to do with it. A country as small as Italy I can't think you'd be in many scenarios where there are zero options for internet. Maybe you go to an area that has poor mobile coverage but good luck also being a long drive away from a McDonalds or even a Cafe with free internet.

Now as someone from Australia I can think of places I could go where I'd be in that position. It wouldn't really take much at all to find yourself somewhere where there are zero options for internet. Go on any reasonably long road trip and you're going to find yourself in one of those places. Though why you would willingly stay that far away from civilisation for weeks at a time if you were the type of person who cared about playing games on the Switch I have no idea.....

If you think of this NES service in terms of what it actually is the outrage about it kinda falls apart. This isn't a Virtual Console, these aren't games you "own", this is like Spotify or Netflix for classic games. Frankly I wouldn't be at all surprised if you can't play games you haven't played before if you are offline. That this "offline mode" is more along the lines of the My Downloads section in Netflix. And when you look at it in terms of what it actually is? An expiry when you're offline makes sense.

I don't see what the issue is here. To be honest I wouldn't even have an issue if the service was even more like Netflix. If it took it a step further and had a rotating library of content where some games fall off the list. Hell, why not make that the way they "charge" for something more like an actual Virtual Console. At any point let us purchase one of the games on the list so it's not tied to online. Make this an option for non-subscribers also, let them browse the releases and purchase these games outside of the sub.

Actually, you can. Microsoft's "Games with Gold" isn't a game rental thing. It's "We're giving you these games free, if you're a paid member." Once you have the game, it's yours. You can play it offline or with a silver (free) membership. How do I know this? Because I disconnected my consoles from the internet towards the end of last month, yet was still playing the games I got via being a paid subscriber in the past.

Indeed. Probably enough people happy with it, or determined to back Nintendo no matter what, that they will have enough subscribers to consider it a success.

It certainly seems like a missed opportunity though. This was their big chance to catch up with their competition or bring something new and imaginative to the table. Instead the only bit where they've caught up is the demanding of subscription money. What they're offering in return is an inferior service and inferior games rental service compared to the competition (and a Retro games selection worse than the Wii launch in 2006). They'd have been better off providing more in return for more money, or at least options offering that.

In a way its a relief though. During the Wii U/3DS era they seemed to have a whole department dedicated to shooting the self in the foot. They've got so much right with the Switch I wondered where the people responsible for all those poor decisions had gone. Now I know, they've all been corralled into the Online department of the company 😜