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FeedSource: [ArsTechnica]

Time: 2017-06-02 04:33:55 UTC

Original URL: https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/06/nintendo-switchs-paid-online-service-gets-delay-and-substantial-content-boost/ [arstechnica.com] using UTF-8 encoding.

Title: NES Classic will return (kind of) in updated Nintendo Switch online service

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NES Classic will return (kind of) in updated Nintendo Switch online service

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story [arstechnica.com]:

Nintendo's first foray into a paid online gaming service received two major shake-ups on Thursday: a delay and a content upgrade.

In good news, that means Nintendo won't charge for online Switch gaming for at least a few more months. (The paid service will eventually be required to access newer games' online multiplayer modes, though Nintendo still hasn't clarified whether older, pre-service games will be affected.) In bad news, the original plan was for the service to launch as a fully working free trial by this summer, including ties to the Nintendo Switch Online smart device app. Now, Nintendo says the only thing to expect by this summer is a "limited" version of that app. Nintendo did not clarify which of the app's advertised features (which include online matchmaking, voice chat with friends, and game-invite management) will make it into the limited version.

The much better news comes from a tweak to one of Nintendo Switch Online's advertised features: access to classic Nintendo games, complete with online multiplayer upgrades. Those games are still coming to paying subscribers, but originally, Nintendo said players would only get to access one classic game per month this way [arstechnica.com]—and that the access would expire at month's end, unless Nintendo fans paid up to buy the game in question. Now, Nintendo is making this subscription feature a lot simpler: so long as you subscribe, you get access to the service's entire slew of classic, online-boosted games in perpetuity. (Cancel your subscription, on the other hand, and your access to the games goes away.)

We don't know how many games Nintendo will stick in this classic-games "compilation," nor whether its games will be unlocked at once or be added over time. And there's no telling whether we could expect, say, anything close to the 30-game selection on the discontinued NES Classic. But the first three announced games—Super Mario Bros. 3, Balloon Fight, and Dr. Mario—all happened to be part of the NES Classic, and the company's use of the word "compilation" has us hopeful that subscribers will get access to a decent number of games at the very least. (Before the NES Classic, the company's last major classic-game compilation was a 20-game gift for 3DS owners [arstechnica.com] who bought the system before its incredibly early price drop [arstechnica.com].)

When asked by IGN [ign.com], a Nintendo spokesperson said the compilation would be limited to NES games at first. "Super NES games continue to be under consideration, but we have nothing further to announce at this time," the representative said to IGN.

Still, Nintendo has done right by fans with this change to the service, which originally would have teased, then yanked, access to so many classics. (And it's a great about-face after Thursday's awkward headset- and app-related Switch news [arstechnica.com].) Nintendo, you may be idiots for cancelling the NES Classic [arstechnica.com], but if this just means you're done making extra money on old NES games, we'll accept the trend.

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