Topic: The Nintendo Switch Online Subscription Service Thread

@Kinoen
No worries. Before the direct, it almost looked like it was going to only be for the month they were out which in that case, would've been a huger bummer.

I would really like GameCube games at some point whether it's part of their online service or some type of digital upgrade that you bought the game. GameCube was the only Nintendo console that I didn't own at some point or play any games on. Wii and Wii U were short lived for me, but I still have a Wii U, so if I really want to I can play any Wii or Wii U game with that.

@Therad

I'm confused. What are they locking behind a paywall that doesn't cost them money? Online servers? Old NES games? Cloud saves? Not trying to be sarcastic. Really don't know what you are referring to.

Games from other companies. As an example, rocket league. Every cost related to rocket league, such as servers or further development, are paid by psyonix.

@Therad because apparently "Sony and Ms charge you more" is a valid defense? Somehow. Strawmanning hard

@Kinoen
I'm talking less about the act of complaining in general and more about using comments sections as if they were a survey. You don't turn up to a town hall meeting about a new building proposal if you are happy with it or if you don't care either way. You turn up when you're outraged by the proposal. The internet is the same but with the added benefit of anonymity

@Therad
It's less about defending Nintendo and more about telling the mob to calm down a tad. It's hardly the end of the world. We're talking $2.50AU/mo for cloud saves, continued access to online, "special offers" and NES-Flix. As someone who paid the full $120AU RRP for the SNES Mini and has a shelf full of Amiibo? I find it hard to understand the outrage about $2.50AU/mo.

I'm a pragmatic person, arguments based on principle don't sway me.

@skywake

That’s why I said provide options, different tiers. They were starting from scratch, they could have gone any way they wanted. Unfortunately they’ve gone for testing the market to see how little they can offer in return for payment.

Well, I decided I'd jump back in to this thread a day before launch, since I'll probably be busy playing games after launch.
Did I miss anything? Anyone else looking forward to an influx of 20 games, regardless of how old they are?

@subpopz Good luck with Gaiden! I don't envy you there. I'm ready for Dr. Mario, for sure. It's one of those sentimental titles for me; My grandmother bought my NES SMB/Duck Hunt set when it came out, then got me a game every major holiday. February, Easter, Thanksgiving & Christmas I'd get an NES or (later) GameBoy game for a few years. Tetris and Dr. Mario were my faves. We all played Metroid at my uncles at holidays in Arizona, and I first played Zelda II when my mother was in the hospital for a bit; they had an NES in the family lobby on the floor.

So the games are offering more than just a free NES game to me, they're like little memory windows. I'm totally embracing that.

The problem with your whole argument is that Nintendo is doing "the basics", they are just doing some of them in a weird and sub-optimal way.

1. They are doing "Play games online" which is the basic industry standard now for what you have to pay for. Online only moba and mmo wont need a subscription, which is also industry standard, but otherwise you'll have to pay to play games online. Central server for a game or peer to peer, it doesn't matter which format the game uses for online multiplayer. What you're paying for is access to online multiplayer.

2. They are doing voice chat, which is an industry standard. Granted they are doing it via a mobile app thus the whole thing is weird and cumbersome. But they are doing voice chat. Sending text messages btw isn't something that's a part of PSN+ or XBL Gold, just the voice chat. In both of those cases it's a service available to anyone. As such saying "but there's no text messaging baked in" isn't a valid reason to say that NSOS is inferior to the other paid online services. I, and most everyone else does agree the app is inferior to built in voice chat, but it is still providing that service, so Nintendo is providing the 2nd industry standard.

3. Access to an assortment of games is covered with the NES games service. You personally might think it's lame or substandard but other people, me included, don't agree. And regardless if your personal view of NES games you can't deny this is covering the fairly recent addition to industry standard of "access to games at no additional cost for members"

4. Cloud Saves is covered too. This has quickly become an industry standard since Microsoft introduced it on the 360. Each company handles it a little differently, thus there is no industry standard for how it's handled. As such you can't really say this is inferior to the competitors. Especially since you haven't been able to even use the system yet. And wont for another day. The games that wont take advantage of it, I can sort of understand why not. Might not like it, but I can understand it.

5. Special members only deals is the final industry standard that's covered. It's again done in a weird way, but it's covered. I was expecting members only discounts, like Microsoft and Sony does. And that may come in the future, we don't know. But having exclusive physical products you can buy only if you're a paid subscriber is kind of weird. Not substandard, just weird.

Don't get me wrong, I'm no Nintendo Fanboy. And I'm not defending the service. I was definitely on the fence about subscribing to it. It's the NES game catalog that convinced me to take the plunge, and having online multiplayer is the bonus perk in my opinion. I sub or don't sub to XBL on a month to month basis depending on what the free games on offer that month are. Which means more often then not, I'm not a paid subscriber. And overall I'm not much of a fan of online multiplayer beyond playing a few MMOs. And those I mostly end up soloing in anyway, so they may as well be a single player game to me.

What I am doing is pointing out some facts, and advocating people to dial back on the reflexive "It's free now, it's been free, IT MUST ALWAYS BE FREE" hate and think about things objectively. Paid Switch Online is coming, it's been coming since the system launched. And Nintendo made no secret about that fact. This has always been inevitable. So rather then the nerd rage about why it should be free always forever and a day, wouldn't it be more constructive to submit feedback on how the service should be improved in the future?

Speaking of MMOs, I'm kind of hoping that DC Universe Online comes to Switch. And if it does, I hope it'll let you use your PC account (doubtful) instead of having to start from scratch, again.

@Subpopz @HobbitGamer Metroid without a turbo controller is going to be a pain IMO. Bomb jumping to get past a certain barrier was always something I could never get the timing down on. And unless they include a map feature (doubtful) get out your graph paper and be prepared to be a cartographer.

And who knows, maybe I'll finally manage to beat stage 3 (I think) of Ninja Gaiden.

I think it's amusing that there are two camps to the parade of people against this. On one side you have the people who wished it had more and claim they'd happily pay more for it. Then there are others who are simply upset that Nintendo are now charging for online play. To be blunt, the two ideas are incompatible. You can't offer a tiered service when the service people actually want (i.e. online play) is an all or nothing thing. Also you can't make the main part of your paid subscription free and still have people pay for it.

Here's a crazy idea. This is a new revenue stream for Nintendo, a "greedy cash grab" if you want to call it that. It is also not a bad value given what they have included in the package. It is also, to be frank, good enough for the average consumer who's not wading through the fine print like they're health insurance policies.

The funny thing is the Wii U offered better basic services like messaging for free lol. If they brought back miiverse and all of its features I'd probably pay for that alone.

Offering messaging for free shoudln't be a shock. To be honest, I kind of wonder why Switch doesn't allow you to send text messages. I have people I've played with and against on my friends list, as well as people from the site here. But I've not been able to actually converse with any of them due to Voice Chat only working with one game currently without me having that one game, and no messaging service.

Based solely on some of the article comments I’ve read this weekend, I’m sort of relieved there’s no wide open messaging service.
I’m sure it will come at some point, though. Gotta also remember that sort of thing needs an entire department to manage reporting and enforcement.

@FaeKnight While I'm with you on the balance of it having been a known quantity, and I'm with you at not singling out Nintendo, I don't think there's a reason for people to stop raging at the console industry as a whole charging for online access which began as a PC thing, began free, and remains free yet still profitable on that platform. To the point that Microsoft's own "Play Anywhere" first party games require a subscription on XBox, but not on Windows 10. From the same game purchase. Yes it's not Nintendo specific, yes, it's now industry standard, but it only remains industry standard because people simply accept it. Of course you will be abused if you just accept it and take it. And before anyone says "but you can't make a difference with such a big company" the XBox One disastrous DRM abuse reaction had them backpedaling within 24 hours. It only works because people accept it. Nintendo deserves no special hate compared to the other two. They're doing certain things better, certain things worse. But people absolutely should question why they are paying recurring payments into a profit stream that's not providing any value beyond value created through artificial restrictions to require the service. That's for all the platforms. Maybe on XBox that's beyond fighting since it's so entrenched in their ecosystem. But Microsoft also provides dedicated servers for their first party games, so you actually are paying for something of value with them: Server rental. Sony and Nintendo are new to that this generation and are merely charging you for basic outgoing connections from your console. Sony only got away with it because X1 was so bad at launch people adopted whatever Sony said. Pushback is very valid, even if it seems overblown with all the anti-Nintendo rage.

Funny thing is I'd still subscribe for the cloud saves and possibly the VC if it ever gets better. Online play is a basic function today. That shouldn't be gated behind a sub. The sub should be compelling on its own. XBLG is for some, given the dedicated servers. NSW may be for some for cloud saves and NES. PS+ has bigger freebies, and more frequent sales...may be a worthy membership. Competing to sell you a service you want because it provides value is fair. Artificially locking out basic features that will be unlocked via sub really shouldn't be part of gaming. Subs can stay as value added services without having to lock out basic game functions to coerce membership.

I daresay if MS dropped the fee requirement from online but required it for access to dedicated servers, sales, freebies, and maybe a sweetened pot for some Mixpots or something, the subscription base wouldn't really shrink much. And they're the ones that started this mess.

@NEStalgia

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"It only works because people accept it". It's pretty much all that needs to be said. If the main defense of the shortcomings is "well MS and Sony do it and cost more", or even better, "it's only a small amount so it's not a big deal" something is deeply wrong.

I think my mind is made up too now. I've never paid for online play on Xbox or PS before and I'm not going to start now.

I'm still prepared to make an exception for Switch at some point, but right now the offering is not enough for me to finally bend over. Splatoon 2 is the only game I've been playing online recently, so I may sell that and buy it back if I ever subscribe and feel like splatting again.

In the meantime, Fortnite and MK8 on Wii U can quench any online thirst I have.

Well yeah...

"If Nintendo made the offerings better more people would pay" is kinda obvious.

@ReaderRagfish I don't think that's a matter of forgetting complaints and paying. I think that's a matter of being presented sufficient value through library depth that justifies the price to more people.

But following my above: Lets imagine online was not locked behind this and thus no coercion was involved in forcing people to subscribe. Imagine it was just a VC Netflix service. For $35/family with NES+ SNES + N64 games? Sure that would have great value even without the coercion.

Just the inclusion of the current and announced NES games adds enough value for me, and that doesn’t invalidate my opinion or mean that I’m ‘part of a problem’. If I see value in a product or service and I partake in it, that means my needs have been met for the asking price. I’m not gonna disparage anyone for wanting more, just like someone should respect my decision too.

EDIT: So if I'm reading the eShop maintenance notice correctly, NSO actually won't be available until after 11PM Eastern for the US.