My Nintendo Gold Points Can Be Used Towards Your Nintendo Switch Online Subscription

Sounds good to me. I have 500 gold coins just itching to be used

I've got gold coins every account but my UK one, the one I'll need to link to my subscription to.

hmm ... interesting for people, who never ever buy anything on the e-shop, I guess. Not really of any use to anybody else. Still, better than nothing.

I have 2200 coins. They'll be good for something

"They cannot be used for auto-renewal."

Something new to complain about.

@Ralek85 How did they get those gold coins in the first place if they don't buy anything on the eShop? I know that you can redeem physical games as well, but that gives you a lot less.

That's a good thing. Just make a note of the renewal date.

But do we earn gold coins for buying the subscription?

idm paying full - not that its much at all for a years sub.
And if it helps BigN to extrapolate the potential market to port N64-titles in the near future I am up for it.

Oh good. I was hoping this would be the case, since I have no actual money right now, but I do have $26 in gold points.

Yey! a whole 18 pence off, whoopee!

I keep spending gold coins every time I purchase something, so I'm not in the camp of people getting that sub for free.
I don't buy new games often enough to risk my points expiring, so I take a small cut when I can.

Man, that'll be a sphincter shrinker if you let your sub lapse so that you can use your points - don't go juggling your Switch while you're waiting to renew.

I think the real question is, how many more articles can NL extract from a single FAQ page?

@countzero I dunno, like you said, you get points for physical games as well, so I'd assume that is where. I wasn't aware that you get less, but then again, I never buy physial games (with the exception of BotW), so I wouldn't really know. I find it hard to believe that there are really users who need this aka users with zero spending on the e-shop. There are so many good indies games on the e-shop, not to mention DLC that you cannot possibly get anywhere else ... but yeah, this is nice for the rarest of individuals who hates digital with an unreserved passion

@chardir No, the real question is why there are still question about this, considering a Direct had just aired days before supposedly covering all of this.

@Ralek85 Because presenting a bunch of FAQs in a direct would be extremely dull?

I mean this is a nice though but one will you be able to pay the whole cost with them and two why not allow you to decide if you want to auto renew with them?

But at least this decision seems somewhat beneficial.

That will save me a £1.

No it won't, a have read enough poor reviews to convince me that a the moment £17 a year for 20 constantly churned out games is poor value.

Someone will find a way to complai- oh, too late.

@BensonUii it could opt me them all for that though. I wouldn't care.

And to be clear I'm not complaining about this. I'm simply expressing my thoughts. I know anyone saying anything but thank you Nintendo, please have my firstborn triggers people but I don't really care. That's not directed at you specifically.

A cursory thought about how using them for auto-renewal could possibly work should negate any complaints about that.

This is good news. It basically brings my yearly subscription to a tenner, which is a bit of a bargain.

Or you could just use them to get money of a game instead!.

@chardir So? Dull would have been pretty sweet compared to what we got, if you ask me. And no, I am not kidding. The time they spend talking about how great it'll be to be able to play games like Splatoon 2 with friends ONLINE, could and should have been spend on details that do actually matter, like for instance what happens to savegames once your sub lapses ... So yeah, I would have taken dull over the offensive "finally, online multiplayer!"-yadada every day.

@chardir Am I the only one using the articles' comment sections to fill up my ignore list for folks that are getting particularly ridiculous?

@HobbitGamer I'm just happy knowing that the comments sections are not at all representative of the Switch-owning public. I'm certain most people are thinking:

"Subscription to play online, but I get a bunch of free games, cloud saves and offers? Sounds good."

EDIT: or the equally reasonable:

"Nah, not interested, never mind."

@chardir Yup. My bestie isn't someone that would be trawling gaming sites for news, but she's put in over 200 hours on BotW this year. Her birthday is Wednesday, so I offered to buy her a year sub. When I told her how it works and sent her the link to Nintendo's site showing the NES games, she was more than happy with it as a present.

But does buying the subscription earn you any gold coins? That’d be cool to know.

@Ralek85 if you buy physical games you should still be getting some gold coins as long as you claim them. It’s not much but it’s something.

But if your cloud saves are immediately lost when your subscription expires, then this is a terrible way to pay for your subscription, since it requires you to let your subscription expire before purchasing another one.

Do you earn gold coins for buying it online?

@Ralek85 I've been earning near-parity for registering physical games with My Nintendo as I do with digital titles. I think Nintendo saw people getting angry and they've now made it that physical games get almost as much gold coins as digital games do.

Why is Nintendo Life of all places still promoting this false narrative that your Cloud Saves are immediately deleted in you lapse your subscription?

Oh great! This means I can get a huge 59p off! Wow!

@DarthFoxMcCloud it’s not the same claiming physical for gold coins is 1% and 5% for digital games

@KcebEnyaw it’s not deleted, you just lose access to. If you subscribe you get it back. Same as online play. You pay and you have online. You don’t and you don’t get online. Simple

@1UP_MARIO I'm aware of that, but NintendoLife does not appear to be.

"and cloud save data appears to be immediately lost if your subscription comes to an abrupt halt."

with a Link to an Article that still incorrectly state that your Cloud Saves will be deleted.

Finally something to spend them on. I'm assuming the exchange rate is still a pittance but it's not like I was using them on bloody Wii U games.

This is great. Finally something positive (even if minor) from the past week. I had roughly 700 coins saved up. In hindsight I wish I saved mine for a family plan of NSO (would have only been $6/year each in my case).

@AlphaElite It does not require your subscription to expire. You can extend your subscription anytime for up to 3 years in advance.

And even if you do let it expire, Nintendo won't immediately delete your data.

@chardir From the article..

"Gold Points can be used when purchasing a membership in the Nintendo eShop. They cannot be used for auto-renewal."

"...cloud save data appears to be immediately lost if your subscription comes to an abrupt halt."

So if theoretically you want to pay solely with gold points, you have to let your subscription expire because they can't be used for auto-renew. And cloud saves are lost when a subscription ends (or at least, they provide no guarantee as to how long your saves will last after your subscription ends)

Welp with the amount of games I buy a year online is still free for me!!!

@AlphaElite As has been mentioned, the article is plain wrong. According to Nintendo, you can extend your subscription at any time. And they won't keep save data for an "extended period" which implies it is kept for a short period at least.

I am totally ok with the price tag even in Canada. But as the first comment stated... I wish platinum coins weren't totally useless.

Not sure why auto renew can't use your coins, but if I had to guess, Nintendo may have figured people may not want their coins dipped into. Either way, I'm not a big fan of auto-renew so under most circumstances I turn it off.

With that out of the way, I'm glad Nintendo is working on more ways to allow us to use our coins. I've got nearly 1000 of plat and gold coins just collecting dust. The fact they can expire doesn't help, and I would like to spend those babies on something. As of right now, I've been using my gold coins to buy those cheap 8 dollar Neo Geo games, but now I can at least opt to use them on Nintendo Online. It may not be the best value anyway, but it's not like there's anything else to spend these coins on because the rewards system is still a bit crap.

@Matthew010 I'm in the same boat but at least its something to actually use the coins for!

@HobbitGamer "Am I the only one using the articles' comment sections to fill up my ignore list for folks that are getting particularly ridiculous?"

The silver lining amongst all this nonsense.