Topic: Switch Will Not have VC

I know NOA reps, I know how NOA reps get their jobs. I can verify they aren't necessarily any more qualified to speak on Nintendo than you or I. They largely maintain and manage Nintendo products and advertisement in retail stores, only vague knowledge of said products is required.

That said, this person can only be using "streaming" as a vernacular anyway, because it would be a ludicrously bad idea.

Of course access to a VC library could be included in a subscription model, such rumors have been floated and Nintendo has announced a sort of enhanced VC model with online play being a subscription perk. But this statement is nothing more than an amalgamation of broad rumors and confirmed info with zero enlightenment.

Because there's zero technical advantages in doing it that way. Both for us as consumers and for Nintendo in terms of the costs involved. To put it simply there are two major advantages of streaming a game rather than rendering it locally. The first one is that you don't have to wait for the game to download and the second is that you aren't limited by the horsepower of your local system.

For classic games neither of these things are issues. To use my example from before, even an N64 release with a fully scanned manual is likely to come in at 100MB or so. Even if you have a 2Mbps connection you can download that in under 10mins. And if you don't then streaming the game isn't going to be happening anyways. The equation makes even less sense for SNES and NES titles which would likely be smaller again. This is before we even consider talking about latency and compression.

Really, the only way a game streaming service makes sense is if it's for massive games that the Switch has no hope of running. And this is the console that's getting Doom. On the other side of the equation the only way a subscription service for classic games makes sense is if you're downloading them. And if you're downloading them I don't see why Nintendo would not also make it possible for you to pay for them outside of the subscription.

@Reginald Nothing is known yet, the specific wording has been vague and varied, so it's not clear if they mean simply monthly access or lifetime with monthly additions.

Of course streaming is a nonstarter, not even worth discussing, but I can see a scenario where there is a limit to how many subscription games you could hold at once before having to swap out. This could be construed as a streaming model, I guess, and would have some merit to Nintendo.

Wouldn't love it, myself, but Nintendo has to be wary about their classic games sucking the air out of the eShop... At least they have to be questioning that effect after seeing indies flourish on Switch. Possibly this idea played a part in their willingness to try the NES classic concept, effectively separatng those libraries thereby keeping the eshop focused on fresh releases by third parties. Sort of gives Nintendo an out...

@skywake Precisely. It's a solution that creates more problems than it solves.

Ya... this rep didn't know what he was talking about.

What he likely meant was the Online Classics. The NES/SNES games we get every month as part of the online membership with online functionality added. And no, it's not technically VC. Reggie has gone out of his way to specifically make that point.

Will we get actual Virtual Console in addition to Online Classics? I'm not sure, but if we do it definitely won't be streaming, and it won't be part of the online membership either because that's with the Online Classics are for.

@Tasuki No, but this is different. I'm not playing with or against people online when I'm playing the digital copy of A Link to the Past. You're essentially turning it into an always-online DRM game by turning it into a streaming service. And like @skywake explained, it doesn't make sense for Nintendo, nor for us, the end users. So I fail to see how this would be beneficial to anybody. Except that it saves some of us a few bucks extra a year.

Encouraging to pay for online suggests the service itself isn't worth paying for. And look what's happening to PS+. Sony's increasing the price, not because the online will be better, but so it can offer better games (or let's the real, just so they can make more money, because it's quite a lucrative business). These subscription services get out of hand, you're not paying for online anymore, they're adding unnecessary fluff in order to justify the price point. And I personally don't want to see this happen with Nintendo's service.

My uncle, he works at Nintendo, and he said, that they're making a Jurassic Park, for Koopas.

Hmm...if Nintendo do offer some kind of Netflix service, then ALL of their games should be on it (Mario Odyssey etc) not just their old stuff. I mean, you don't have to buy the upcoming Punisher series separately do you?

I hope this is BS, I prefer to own the games so I can choose to play what I like when I like.
If Ninty choose this route, I guess I will be hacking my Wii or Wii U

Whilst I highly doubt the games will be streamed, a Netflix / PSN Plus system does make sense. Truth is, there are probably many of us who have thought about trying certain VC games yet ended up waiting for sales that never came cos we never felt justified taking the plunge for thr asking rpice for a game we may end up disliking. With a service that gives us access, we could feel justified paying just to access the heavy hitters whilst also having chances to try other titles.

This is my theory why the VC variety plumitted after the Wii. When it started on the Wii, almost everyone was on board and a massive selection of 1st and 3rd party classic titles appeared. Now on the Wii U & 3DS, it has mainly just been the most popular 1st and some major 3rd parties from established franchises. After the Wii, many publishes realised that people were not willing to pay the prices asked (whether that was set by Nintendo alone I can't say). Due to poor returns, they then felt it was not worth the costs releasing them on the Wii U or 3DS.

With a service model, Nintendo will probably end up paying them a set amount for the license to put their game up that will then need to be renewed. Nintendo would probably keep track of how often people keep playing it and then decide if it is worth playing. Of course that means it could be removed in the futur but perhaps people can still download it.

Anyways, in a nutshell, I like the idea of this service although expect it to be downloadable rather than streaming. Although I think the OP should mark this topic as a "Rumour" in the title.

My prediction is that Nintendo simply expands My Nintendo and integrates it into the eShop better. And then if you're a subscriber you get access to an extra tier of content. Possibly via something like a new tier of coins which you can accumulate every month you're subscribed. And it's there where they have these "online classics".

The Virtual Console itself? It just comes back more or less as it was. The only interaction it has with the online subscription is that maybe there are few games you can redeem coins for on My Nintendo. Not unlike how you can do that already on My Nintendo.

I don’t see how they could justify having to stream them as it would mean you couldn’t play them on the go. It would be a massive own goal.

Streaming games on a portable device? That makes no sense at all.

I don’t believe the rep, since many times they have said stuff that turned out to be false.

It would be better to wait for official confirmation that hearsay.

The whole NESFlix idea as a whole sounds like garbage. Im sick of NES games actually. I want NGC and N64 stuff

Plot twist, Nintendo announces that if you want VC, buy a Wii U.

I guess what it comes down to in the end is money. Yeah they can charge per game but a subscription based model is guarnteed.

I guess what it comes down too is how much Nintendo has made with VC sales over the past few years. Obviously they probably made a killing with the Wii considering even if a fraction of Wii owners bought VC games. Wii U not so much, considering that

1) The amount of Wii Us sold
2) The selection of VC titles compared to Wii
3) Making people rebuy VC games that they owned on the Wii

Add those up and they probably didn't make all that much on VC sales of course it's all speculation as I don't have the numbers in front of me, but that might be a reason for Nintendo to please their stockholders going with a Netflix subscripting based plan guaranteed to at least $10 or whatever it is a year.

Not only that but maybe they will have it like Netflix where you can stream the library to your phone through their app, thus solving the Switches problem of no internet connection.

@Tasuki A subscription based model isn't guaranteed. Who said that is gonna happen?

What do you think would make more money, realistically?

A monthly fee to play all the games you want, say, $20, which would equal at most the fee x number of potential users

OR

A one off fee per game so the user can choose what games they want, and lets say it kept the current pricing model. You'd end up with the fee x number of games on the system x number of potential users.

One of those is a significantly bigger number than the other. And given how VC titles ended up on the top sellers list, often at the top of the charts, routinely on 3DS and Wii U, do you want to tell me its better for them to pay the licensing fees for these games (which can be multiple parties remember), get them rated again, pay the people to get them into the emulators, and then charge a flat rate across the board that covers every single game as it comes?

Lets break that down.

So if we paid $20 a year to access this entire service, in the first year that could be 100 games. And then 200, 400, 600. At some point, not everyone is going to bother with them all. Then you factor in Nintendo has to license those third party games again. That's actually the most costly part after developing the emulators.

There will come a point where it will cost more to keep putting games in that no one will ever have time to play because there will be literally hundreds, than the money they will get back. Think about it. In the first year that's 100 games for $20. Divide that $20 up between all the games. Then send the relevant parties their cuts. Then divide it up even more for every game added, even if those games are never ever played, third parties or Nintendo will get absolutely paltry money for their investment at that point, even across millions of users.

Or, the user can choose what game they want. Pay $5. Boom, you've got it. The third parties if relevant to that game get their cut, and they get a cut because it was their game sold, not because it was Nintendo's own games people wanted and were playing, and they get a measly cut of the $20 service fee for their game just existing on the service, even if their game wasn't used.

You have to remember how VC works. Sure, a subscription model could work, but Nintendo would have to pay the relevant parties upfront for X years out of their own pocket, per game to have that game on the service.

Then they'd have to hope that not only enough people pay the fee for this service to offset the millions they'll be paying out just to have each third party game there, which will increase and therefore require more people to pay the more games they add, but they'll also have to hope people actually play those games when using the subscription to make the investment worth it in the first place!

@BLP_Software Netflix subscription model Vs Steam %age model. I have no idea lol but hope they go the Steam way (with 1000's of games)

@BLP_Software But how many people will buy Super Mario World for a third or second time especially if they bought it on the Wii or Wii U or even both? Who says that they would even buy the VC games? If it's tied into say the online service like pay $20 for a year to play games online and get a huge catalog of retro games they will get people paying for the retro games whether they want them or not because they will want to play online with friends.