9 ms·

Game preservationists say Switch2 GameKey Cards are disheartening but inevitable

72 points by haunter 2y ago

QuadmasterXLII 2y ago
I can play all the on disk ps3 games I own, the downloadable ones are dust on the wind.
- zirgs 2y ago
  Disc rot is a thing unfortunately. And they are no longer making new PS3s.
  - YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
    GP didn’t say that they were playing them on disk, only that they owned them on disc. Backing up PS3 games is relatively easy these days. I fully expect PS3 emulation to be good enough long before working PS3s are unobtainium.
  - QuadmasterXLII 2y ago
    yet, empirically, the seven or eight disks work, and the downloadables are gone
hombre_fatal 2y ago
With physical games, you're tied to how long your console and cartridge physically last. With digital games, you're tied to how long the console's e-store lasts, which is guaranteed to be sunset. Eventually I couldn't justify buying the console version of a game that I was willing to play on Steam.
- wiktor-k 2y ago
  > Eventually I couldn't justify buying the console version of a game that I was willing to play on Steam. I do that too but doesn't the same rule apply to Steam, too? (that is if it goes down, you can't download the games anymore?).
  - gjsman-1000 2y ago
    Steam is always given an exception in these conversations because they’ve generally behaved - but that can easily change overnight from a black swan event.
    - 2mlWQbCK 2y ago
      Some future manager will look at a graph and think monetization can be improved X% while only losing an estimated Y% of users. It is guaranteed to happen. Question is only if most in the current generation will outlive free access to their entire Steam library or not.
      - luma 2y ago
        Valve quite famously doesn't have managers and instead runs a "flat" org chart.
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
        gjsman-1000 2y ago
        This can easily be changed if Gabe Newell dies, commits a crime, or gets divorced, his estate or trust wants a change in direction, a lawsuit costs Steam a ton of money and they need to get cash quick, take your pick.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
  - kouteiheika 2y ago
    That's true, but in general it's easy to archive games from Steam and (as long as the publisher doesn't use any 3rd-party DRM) they're trivial to crack. I buy my games from Steam because of the convenience and to support the developers, but if, say, Gaben kicks the bucket and Steam suddenly closes/turns evil I can just as easily pirate all of my games back. So from a game preservation standpoint Steam isn't that bad compared to the locked down consoles and their walled gardens.
- kouteiheika 2y ago
  With pirated games, you can play them forever. There already exist games which you can (illegally) play today only because they were archived by pirates. However with the consoles' security getting better, piracy not being as widespread as back in the day and the industry not being interested in game preservation it's also a matter of time before we start permanently losing games again.
- agarsev 2y ago
  Nintendo at least has a good history with this, at least in my experience. Both 3ds and WiiU e-stores were closed, but I can still play all my digital games on both. I can even make backup copies of the game on external media and everything works as you would expect (save online multiplayer, which is a shame but that's a different story)
- reverendsteveii 1y ago
  Back when I was active in the modding scene I was able to get non-console interfaces for xbox memory cards and gba carts. With physical games you're tied to how long the physical medium lasts but not necessarily the console.
addoo 2y ago
The article already touches on this, but in the modern day the games that exist on physical media are pretty much useless without their zero-day patches. Putting physical media aside, companies rarely make older builds available, so even when media contains a game and servers are up there is already plenty of ‘lost media’ if you consider old and interesting (potentially hilariously broken) old builds of virtually every game. I’ve realized this at some point, but video games are ephemeral and should really be enjoyed in the now. Even if you can perfectly preserve a game, and the means to play it, tastes change so quickly in gaming that a game that’s fun today might not be enjoyable even a year later.
- horsawlarway 2y ago
  No real offense intended, because I understand the feeling here, but this... > I’ve realized this at some point, but video games are ephemeral and should really be enjoyed in the now. Even if you can perfectly preserve a game, and the means to play it, tastes change so quickly in gaming that a game that’s fun today might not be enjoyable even a year later. This is horseshit. It's a defeatist attitude, and it's not reflective of reality. Yes - some things go out of fashion for a while, but trends almost always cycle back. You might think something is out of style right now, (and that's fine) but to be facetious: One man's trash is another man's treasure.
  - AkBKukU 2y ago
    > Yes - some things go out of fashion for a while, but trends almost always cycle back. Exactly, this is even supported by Nintendo's own services offering emulation of their older systems. There is clearly demand for the ability to older games. Capitulation to an "inevitable" fate of download only games is just taking the easy way out by not sticking to your own core values. I have personally pre-ordered a Switch 2, but I will not being purchasing any online only cartridges or download only software. We haven't had the watershed moment that brings it into focus for gamers at large yet, The Crew was close. But Nintendo has kept the download servers going for all of their systems which has provided a false sense of security. Once those start being shut down maybe we'll see some actual response. Though with the introduction of Gamecube emulation on the Switch 2, they are only a small step away from emulating the Wii and giving people another scapegoat for their lazy acceptance of lack of ownership.
mysteria 2y ago
In the computer games industry pretty much everything has been download only for some time as the assets are too large for DVD and BD never caught on for PC. Places like GOG provide unrestricted offline installers but the majority are provided via a storefront like Epic or Steam. The worst case scenario for preservationists is for games to become a streaming service via cloud gaming, which publishers may like since it pretty much prevents piracy and allows them to charge a monthly fee rather than a one time license fee. For movies and music streaming exclusives aren't a new thing and improvements in network latency and bandwidth are making game streaming more and more viable.
- mystified5016 2y ago
  Fortunately for everyone, all of the "stream games as a service" initiatives failed completely. Consumers aren't really interested due to obvious drawbacks, and vendors aren't interested in provisioning enough or good enough hardware to solve those drawbacks.
  - ApolloFortyNine 2y ago
    Imo if Gamepass is allowed to survive, it's end game is a tier, or maybe included at no extra cost with some limitations, a cloud gaming component. Gamepass is the biggest threat in turning games into subscriptions, and unfortunately a growing subset of people will only play games on Gamepass. We've dodged Gamepass exclusives for now, but for how long?
    - autoexec 1y ago
      Game pass doesn't seem terribly popular. Xbox in general isn't doing very well compared to the other consoles. I think they'll keep pushing for games as a service though. It's too tempting to keep all that control out of the hands of players.
      - Cipater 1y ago
        It's only available in 40 out of 195 countries in the world and they have zero plans to expand it. They must not care much about it.
proc0 2y ago
I think it's silly that the conversation on preserving games revolves around hardware. The hardware is irrelevant. It's about the right to create digital backup for personal use. Whether the game is downloaded or burned on a disc, it's just software. The main problem used to be about piracy, but I think now it's really about making games as a service (even if they're not online for gameplay) because it allows more forms of monetization. The conversation should be about making games into a digital product that you can download and own the files. Piracy still happens anyway, and maybe this could make companies solve the problem differently, like only allowing digital backup for trusted players.
- Y_Y 2y ago
  Wouldn't it be nice if the Library of Congress or the Bodleian or some other prestigous clouty institution could demand that these published artworks be given to them as an unencumbered copy? I know that such a thing might have to include server code and some agreements on runtime environment, but I don't see that as insuperable. This is culture and it's part of our patrimony. The privilege of getting to publish thinga and having copyright protection ought to include responsibilities to the society too.
  - dtagames 2y ago
    The problem is the cost and knowledge base required to keep servers running. A game server is a big proprietary ball of spaghetti with hundreds of API endpoints and only the people who built it really know how it works[0]. It's expensive to keep those folks around and expensive to pay for the cloud services and SaaS tools they need to do their jobs. All software has a "lifecycle" and has to be turned off at some point because no one is willing to pay the costs of keeping it running (with hosting and client changes as ongoing moving targets). We see this even with games that have sales! So ones that don't have sales are not likely to attract anyone to pay for such staff. [0] Source: I spent 2 years inside a studio owned by "big gaming."
    - proc0 2y ago
      It could be paid by taxes, and run by government. Something like the Internet Archive (not sure if that's public but the entire Internet is much larger than all games put together).
kelsey978126 2y ago
Hot take: when a game is not able to be preserved, it is not worthy of preservation efforts. When it's not worthy of being saved for the future is it even worth playing today? My answer is no.
- autoexec 1y ago
  I feel similarly, but at the same time there will come a point where there won't be any games being made that aren't designed to be unplayable after a certain amount of time. I expect that far more people will suck it up and pay whatever they have to in order to play whatever games they're allowed to today rather than abandon playing video games entirely. I think game companies are counting on that too. If you're counting on gamers to vote will their wallets in order to save video games I think you're going to be extremely disappointed.
mcphage 2y ago
It's an imperfect solution to a real problem—Nintendo wants to use cartridges instead of discs for some good reasons, some not-so-good reasons—but the costs per cartridge are too high for cartridges big enough to hold modern games. But you can look at it as a transferable license to otherwise digital games, and that's not bad. A console with entirely (or almost entirely) digital games would have no used game market, and that sucks both for sellers (which I don't do), and buyers (which I happily do). It would be nice if there was some legal protection for the buyer that, by selling a physical license, that Nintendo be required to make the download itself available for some time period > 20 years.
jsheard 2y ago
I get that Switch 2 games need faster storage, and that makes the traditional model of running games directly from the cart prohibitively expensive, but they could have just copied the Xbox/Playstation model of shipping physical games on slow media (Blurays in their case) and then having a mandatory installation step which copies the data to the fast internal SSD before you start playing. That way you're not entirely dependent on online services to play a physical game.
- mattl 2y ago
  For the Switch any amount of flash memory for those game cards is expensive. They previously offered much smaller, slightly cheaper cards that started at 2GB. Unfortunately this time they’re only offering 64GB cards or these key cards. I’m curious how much storage they have, I’m sure very little.
  - jsheard 2y ago
    Maybe Sony was actually onto something with UMDs :P
  - kllrnohj 2y ago
    Brand name 64GB microSDXC UHS-I cards are $10 retail. Figure Nintendo can get the actual flash storage directly much cheaper than that, probably more like $3-5. That hardly seems like a meaningful cost saving measure for a physical game, especially on a console that's pushing upwards of $80 as the game price.
    - gjsman-1000 2y ago
      > Figure Nintendo can get the actual flash storage directly much cheaper than that, probably more like $3-5 Not necessarily. Nintendo’s variant is built by Macronix under their XtraROM service; a variant of NAND flash designed to be a reliable Mask ROM substitute (including only being writable once, automatic repair afterwards, etc). Officially, their chips are rated to last 20 years at 85 degrees Celsius, which is insane. This isn’t your off the shelf SD card chip built by a no-name Chinese design company that fails after 3 years of not receiving power. Combine the niche flash with a custom security chip (Lotus3) on every game card; that’s not cheap. While we don’t know the exact pricing, the rumors are that 64GB is somewhere in the $15-$25 range per cartridge. At those prices, even if I ran a game company, I’d be reserving the non-game-key versions for a Deluxe Collector’s edition.
qbane 2y ago
> Even when a cartridge does contain data on day one of release, games are so often patched, updated and expanded through downloads that the cart very often loses its connection to the game, and functions more like a physical copy protection dongle for a digital object From preservation's perspective even the day-one release, no matter how buggy it is, is worth preserved. The speedrun community, for instance, often need to fix on an exact version of the game to compete, and a physical copy (implying a pinned revision) is often easier to agree on. There are exceptions to this, when the day-one release is not playable. It is the trend happening in the software industry -- release early, even if it is literally unusable, because we can push a patch via the network -- that is disheartening.
ferguess_k 2y ago
I think Switch is just following the other consoles eventually. This lead me think, is there any 8-bit/16-bit/32-bit native handheld (not Pi emulation) market? I guess the primary difficulty is to make games for them, so most likely just a small hobbyist market. I still think kids don't really care about graphics though, at least when they are young.
- loloquwowndueo 1y ago
  There are a few handhelds that can play pico-8 games. I think it’s done by running pico-8 itself on the handheld which can also run other emulators so I’m not sure it meets your criteria but there’s that at least :)
- Tijdreiziger 1y ago
  Yes, the good old Game Boy(/Color/Advance) consoles still work. Hobbyists are modding them with better screens, and are still creating new games.
- kcb 1y ago
  There's this, https://play.date/ https://play.date/. Haven't heard much news about it lately though. Feel like any handheld built around a relatively cheap microcontroller should be shooting for a much lower price point.
  - rincebrain 1y ago
    Economy of scale only saves you so much at small batch sizes, plus I assume the unique input setup drives up the BOM price a fair bit. I think they did a few blogposts about having initial teething troubles getting consistent manufacturing, so they might have a significant upfront expense cost to subsidize (which probably explains why they're raising the price again...)
kmeisthax 2y ago
> So far the vast majority of third-party Switch 2 games are Game-Key Cards, with only a few exceptions such as Cyberpunk 2077 and the Western version of Daemon X Machina: Titanic Scion. AFAIK this is only in Japan. The Japanese Switch 2 experience is going to be vastly different from the international one in ways the average Japanese player won't immediately notice, because Japan's economy is in the toilet and Nintendo is engaging in several desperation moves to avoid selling a product nobody living on a Japanese wage can afford. If you're wondering what I mean by "vastly different": the Switch 2 you can buy at Yodobashi or Bic Camera is going to be region- and language-locked to Japanese only. You will only be allowed to sign in with a Japanese account, which can only be funded with Japanese credit cards. You can't change the system language to anything other than Japanese, and any games that rely on the system language will consequently be locked to Japanese, too. In exchange, the system is $100 cheaper[0]. Switch 1 also had Game Key Cards, but they weren't branded this way. Instead they were games that required a software update containing the rest of the game in order to work, with an appropriate warning on the box about this. For the record, Switch 1 updates could be downloaded peer-to-peer, and I'm assuming this carries forward for Switch 2, but I have no idea if Game Key Cards work the same way. [0] If you live in Japan and want an international-spec Switch 2, that's an exclusive My Nintendo Store item that costs the same as it does in the US.
dmwilcox 1y ago
I guess I'm the odd duck with a switch that has never been online. It sounds like the switch2 isn't for me. Sad but I don't want another device that wants to be more than it is, I basically want an updated version of my gameboy from the 90s and that's it. No downloads, no network, no social, just a game you can quietly play anywhere when you have a bit of time, no nonsense
- manojlds 1y ago
  This thing already happens with download only games being sold. At least with the game cards you can sell the card again which you can't with the keys. So essentially this is an improvement and you won't even know it if you only buy first party games.
- whitehexagon 1y ago
  Hah, I thought it was just me. Mine was the same, never online, and this key based card thing makes me think that my next, and probably final console purchase, will be a replacement Switch 1. Although I saw the prices just went up, and I didnt even know about the oled version. The main thing that holds me back is the dof blurr in Links Awakening. I imagine that Nintendo want a slice of this subscription based gaming scam. The HD versions already feel like a step in that greed direction. And I think I saw a collection of Mario 3D games that fell into that same repackage-and-sell-again category, with crazy pricing. You might like the DE10-nano Mister project. I manged to get some old arcade cabinates running on a big monitor, no frame drops or lag like most emulators suffer, and no stream of 10p coins required. FPGA feels closer in terms of preservation.
  - dmwilcox 1y ago
    That's amazing! Thanks for the tip!
nokeya 1y ago
If I give this GameKey card to the friend, will he be able to download and play it? With card inserted, of course. If not - these cards are just glorified activation codes
- ThatPlayer 1y ago
  That's exactly what separates this from activation codes, yes.
junaru 1y ago
> should the Switch 2 shop servers ever close down in the distant future – and therefore no longer provide the downloads necessary – those cartridges may become unplayable. > may Weasel 'game journalists' like this is the reason gaming is dying. The world is WILL not may. It happened before and it will happen again because publications like this are nothing more than pr department for gaming companies.
supermatt 1y ago
I was under the impression that the games would download and be stored on the card. Is this not the case? My current collection of game cards exceeds any expanded storage by quite a wide margin… Edit: I guess not: “you must have enough free space in your Nintendo Switch 2 system memory or microSD Express card” https://en-americas-support.nintendo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/68415/~/nintendo-switch%26nbsp%3B2-game-key-card-overview https://en-americas-support.nintendo.com/app/answers/detail/... FFS. I never thought this day would come with Nintendo.
timnetworks 1y ago
It CAN be used to give you a WHOLE new experience without any additional hassle! But it WILL be used to lock you out of your $85 instead.
reverendsteveii 1y ago
This way nintendo can take the games you bought for any reason or no reason at all. You'll own nothing and like it!
znpy 1y ago
> "You would hope that a company that big, that has such a storied history, would take preservation a little more seriously.” Why would one hope that? Nintendo has never ever shown any kind of sign of even remote interest in anybody not-Nintendo doing any kind of preservation.
j1elo 1y ago
It's not fun how the trend is to force everybody to have internet, as if it was an essential service like electricity or water. Some argue it is, but I'd say we're generally far from there. I wanted a console to play when I go to my out of town apartment where we don't need nor want to contract an internet line. And now it means I cannot even bring some cartridges with me and swap them as I please, because they are always requiring internet connectivity for everything. What hasn't failed me is to hack my devices and use pirated versions of my content. Ironic that this method works much better. All games I want, locally, in a pack of SD cards I bring in my backpack, ready to install and play 100% offline at any moment in a train, a flight, a boat.
AStonesThrow 1y ago
There are a couple of elephants in the room here. Firstly is the proliferation of games and their quality. Anyone can make a new game, given an engine and a few art assets. It doesn't take a lot of capital or know-how to release a new game. Therefore, there's a glut of games on the market, from high to low quality, and there are far more than any rational human could ever purchase or play. This was a problem from Day One: When I purchased my Atari 2600 console (or rather my parents purchased for me) my sister and I quickly filled up a 50-cartridge shelf with games where we barely even played or scratched the surface. They were disposable! When we got a Commodore 64, there were more 3rd parties on the market, making games we never heard of, and these games were so deep and thick that one of them could've kept us occupied for 6 months, but still we chewed through them as fast as we could afford. Secondly, aren't most all the games now oriented around MMOG "communities" and multi-player-based? That makes preservation practically impossible. If you've not only got to keep the game servers running, but you've also got to preserve the community that goes with them... well, forget it. Gamers grow up, their tastes change; they move on. I enjoyed a few games, years ago, that basically turned into ghost-town servers. Many of us were so tenacious and dedicated to that specific game as it was, yet the new influx of players dried up, and nobody could prevent that from happening. Every newbie was a ban-evader. Every rich opponent was paying real $$$ just to stay competitive. Our precious game jumped the shark and we couldn't let it die. But die they must. I propose that most games are not worth preserving. Perhaps games should be enjoyed where they are, and then left to die, because they will never be the same again.
rootsudo 1y ago
Wow this website does pop up ads on mobile devices in 2025.
xg15 1y ago
> “seeing Nintendo do this is a little disheartening”, adding: “You would hope that a company that big, that has such a storied history, would take preservation a little more seriously.” I don't see why preservation (outside their own archives) would be a goal for Nintendo. The reality seems to be the opposite: They'd like the branding and memory of old games to be preserved, but please not the game itself - because then they can re-release it for every new system as a "remastered" variant.
- musicale 1y ago
  > they can re-release it for every new system as a "remastered" variant Nintendo's strategy seems to be working. For example, I seem to have purchased Super Mario Bros 3 multiple times, in physical and digital form, for multiple systems (Wii, 3DS, Wii U ...), and I'm also renting it as part of Nintendo Switch Online. On the up side, I don't have any problem emulating it. Actually all of those versions are emulated, come to think of it.
musicale 1y ago
It's a shame. The beautiful thing about Switch game cards is that you can just pop them in and play. Compare that to PS5 where you have a lengthy installation followed by a 40GB download...
- rincebrain 1y ago
  As other people have observed, some Switch games did this too, in part or whole, it just wasn't branded as a distinct feature like this, the games just said "you need to download a day 1 update", like in your example.
  - musicale 1y ago
    I have yet to run into a single-player or local multiplayer Switch game that is not playable offline with just the cartridge. Some single-player games have updates, but I think you can usually play the original version while you download the update, and the update usually isn't 40GB.
    - rincebrain 1y ago
      At least personally, I've resigned myself to games being purely digital and most of my games aren't carts for the Switch, but I believe a number of the smaller indie games were basically just download codes in a box, or a cart that required downloading some of the core functionality. (I wanted to say it was Goat Simulator for Switch that I was thinking of, but I can't find any proof of this.) https://old.reddit.com/r/NSCollectors/comments/dzquth/physical_games_with_required_download/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NSCollectors/comments/dzquth/physic... is a thread about this, and it lists that the Spyro collection only allowed you to access the first world of each game in the collection without a download.
_imnothere 1y ago
Things like this happen at least partially because of people who'd blindly pay greedy companies like Nintendo, let 'em grow and have their way with their dark patterns.
ksec 1y ago
Does the GameKey Cards allows me to play the game offline??
MoonGhost 1y ago
Why don't we just keep as much of high-resolution gameplay videos as possible. This makes reconstruction possible at least in theory. Not now, but with the time it should be possible to reconstruct similar experience even for multiplayer online games. Not the code, of course.
monicaaa 1y ago
[dead]

72 points by haunter 2y ago

QuadmasterXLII 2y ago

I can play all the on disk ps3 games I own, the downloadable ones are dust on the wind.

zirgs 2y ago
Disc rot is a thing unfortunately. And they are no longer making new PS3s.
- YurgenJurgensen 2y ago
  GP didn’t say that they were playing them on disk, only that they owned them on disc. Backing up PS3 games is relatively easy these days. I fully expect PS3 emulation to be good enough long before working PS3s are unobtainium.
- QuadmasterXLII 2y ago
  yet, empirically, the seven or eight disks work, and the downloadables are gone

hombre_fatal 2y ago

With physical games, you're tied to how long your console and cartridge physically last. With digital games, you're tied to how long the console's e-store lasts, which is guaranteed to be sunset. Eventually I couldn't justify buying the console version of a game that I was willing to play on Steam.

wiktor-k 2y ago
> Eventually I couldn't justify buying the console version of a game that I was willing to play on Steam. I do that too but doesn't the same rule apply to Steam, too? (that is if it goes down, you can't download the games anymore?).
- gjsman-1000 2y ago
  Steam is always given an exception in these conversations because they’ve generally behaved - but that can easily change overnight from a black swan event.
  - 2mlWQbCK 2y ago
    Some future manager will look at a graph and think monetization can be improved X% while only losing an estimated Y% of users. It is guaranteed to happen. Question is only if most in the current generation will outlive free access to their entire Steam library or not.
    - luma 2y ago
      Valve quite famously doesn't have managers and instead runs a "flat" org chart.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - gjsman-1000 2y ago
        This can easily be changed if Gabe Newell dies, commits a crime, or gets divorced, his estate or trust wants a change in direction, a lawsuit costs Steam a ton of money and they need to get cash quick, take your pick.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- kouteiheika 2y ago
  That's true, but in general it's easy to archive games from Steam and (as long as the publisher doesn't use any 3rd-party DRM) they're trivial to crack. I buy my games from Steam because of the convenience and to support the developers, but if, say, Gaben kicks the bucket and Steam suddenly closes/turns evil I can just as easily pirate all of my games back. So from a game preservation standpoint Steam isn't that bad compared to the locked down consoles and their walled gardens.
kouteiheika 2y ago
With pirated games, you can play them forever. There already exist games which you can (illegally) play today only because they were archived by pirates. However with the consoles' security getting better, piracy not being as widespread as back in the day and the industry not being interested in game preservation it's also a matter of time before we start permanently losing games again.
agarsev 2y ago
Nintendo at least has a good history with this, at least in my experience. Both 3ds and WiiU e-stores were closed, but I can still play all my digital games on both. I can even make backup copies of the game on external media and everything works as you would expect (save online multiplayer, which is a shame but that's a different story)
reverendsteveii 1y ago
Back when I was active in the modding scene I was able to get non-console interfaces for xbox memory cards and gba carts. With physical games you're tied to how long the physical medium lasts but not necessarily the console.

addoo 2y ago

The article already touches on this, but in the modern day the games that exist on physical media are pretty much useless without their zero-day patches. Putting physical media aside, companies rarely make older builds available, so even when media contains a game and servers are up there is already plenty of ‘lost media’ if you consider old and interesting (potentially hilariously broken) old builds of virtually every game. I’ve realized this at some point, but video games are ephemeral and should really be enjoyed in the now. Even if you can perfectly preserve a game, and the means to play it, tastes change so quickly in gaming that a game that’s fun today might not be enjoyable even a year later.

horsawlarway 2y ago
No real offense intended, because I understand the feeling here, but this... > I’ve realized this at some point, but video games are ephemeral and should really be enjoyed in the now. Even if you can perfectly preserve a game, and the means to play it, tastes change so quickly in gaming that a game that’s fun today might not be enjoyable even a year later. This is horseshit. It's a defeatist attitude, and it's not reflective of reality. Yes - some things go out of fashion for a while, but trends almost always cycle back. You might think something is out of style right now, (and that's fine) but to be facetious: One man's trash is another man's treasure.
- AkBKukU 2y ago
  > Yes - some things go out of fashion for a while, but trends almost always cycle back. Exactly, this is even supported by Nintendo's own services offering emulation of their older systems. There is clearly demand for the ability to older games. Capitulation to an "inevitable" fate of download only games is just taking the easy way out by not sticking to your own core values. I have personally pre-ordered a Switch 2, but I will not being purchasing any online only cartridges or download only software. We haven't had the watershed moment that brings it into focus for gamers at large yet, The Crew was close. But Nintendo has kept the download servers going for all of their systems which has provided a false sense of security. Once those start being shut down maybe we'll see some actual response. Though with the introduction of Gamecube emulation on the Switch 2, they are only a small step away from emulating the Wii and giving people another scapegoat for their lazy acceptance of lack of ownership.

mysteria 2y ago

In the computer games industry pretty much everything has been download only for some time as the assets are too large for DVD and BD never caught on for PC. Places like GOG provide unrestricted offline installers but the majority are provided via a storefront like Epic or Steam. The worst case scenario for preservationists is for games to become a streaming service via cloud gaming, which publishers may like since it pretty much prevents piracy and allows them to charge a monthly fee rather than a one time license fee. For movies and music streaming exclusives aren't a new thing and improvements in network latency and bandwidth are making game streaming more and more viable.

mystified5016 2y ago
Fortunately for everyone, all of the "stream games as a service" initiatives failed completely. Consumers aren't really interested due to obvious drawbacks, and vendors aren't interested in provisioning enough or good enough hardware to solve those drawbacks.
- ApolloFortyNine 2y ago
  Imo if Gamepass is allowed to survive, it's end game is a tier, or maybe included at no extra cost with some limitations, a cloud gaming component. Gamepass is the biggest threat in turning games into subscriptions, and unfortunately a growing subset of people will only play games on Gamepass. We've dodged Gamepass exclusives for now, but for how long?
  - autoexec 1y ago
    Game pass doesn't seem terribly popular. Xbox in general isn't doing very well compared to the other consoles. I think they'll keep pushing for games as a service though. It's too tempting to keep all that control out of the hands of players.
    - Cipater 1y ago
      It's only available in 40 out of 195 countries in the world and they have zero plans to expand it. They must not care much about it.

proc0 2y ago

I think it's silly that the conversation on preserving games revolves around hardware. The hardware is irrelevant. It's about the right to create digital backup for personal use. Whether the game is downloaded or burned on a disc, it's just software. The main problem used to be about piracy, but I think now it's really about making games as a service (even if they're not online for gameplay) because it allows more forms of monetization. The conversation should be about making games into a digital product that you can download and own the files. Piracy still happens anyway, and maybe this could make companies solve the problem differently, like only allowing digital backup for trusted players.

Y_Y 2y ago
Wouldn't it be nice if the Library of Congress or the Bodleian or some other prestigous clouty institution could demand that these published artworks be given to them as an unencumbered copy? I know that such a thing might have to include server code and some agreements on runtime environment, but I don't see that as insuperable. This is culture and it's part of our patrimony. The privilege of getting to publish thinga and having copyright protection ought to include responsibilities to the society too.
- dtagames 2y ago
  The problem is the cost and knowledge base required to keep servers running. A game server is a big proprietary ball of spaghetti with hundreds of API endpoints and only the people who built it really know how it works[0]. It's expensive to keep those folks around and expensive to pay for the cloud services and SaaS tools they need to do their jobs. All software has a "lifecycle" and has to be turned off at some point because no one is willing to pay the costs of keeping it running (with hosting and client changes as ongoing moving targets). We see this even with games that have sales! So ones that don't have sales are not likely to attract anyone to pay for such staff. [0] Source: I spent 2 years inside a studio owned by "big gaming."
  - proc0 2y ago
    It could be paid by taxes, and run by government. Something like the Internet Archive (not sure if that's public but the entire Internet is much larger than all games put together).

kelsey978126 2y ago

Hot take: when a game is not able to be preserved, it is not worthy of preservation efforts. When it's not worthy of being saved for the future is it even worth playing today? My answer is no.

autoexec 1y ago
I feel similarly, but at the same time there will come a point where there won't be any games being made that aren't designed to be unplayable after a certain amount of time. I expect that far more people will suck it up and pay whatever they have to in order to play whatever games they're allowed to today rather than abandon playing video games entirely. I think game companies are counting on that too. If you're counting on gamers to vote will their wallets in order to save video games I think you're going to be extremely disappointed.

mcphage 2y ago

It's an imperfect solution to a real problem—Nintendo wants to use cartridges instead of discs for some good reasons, some not-so-good reasons—but the costs per cartridge are too high for cartridges big enough to hold modern games. But you can look at it as a transferable license to otherwise digital games, and that's not bad. A console with entirely (or almost entirely) digital games would have no used game market, and that sucks both for sellers (which I don't do), and buyers (which I happily do). It would be nice if there was some legal protection for the buyer that, by selling a physical license, that Nintendo be required to make the download itself available for some time period > 20 years.

jsheard 2y ago

I get that Switch 2 games need faster storage, and that makes the traditional model of running games directly from the cart prohibitively expensive, but they could have just copied the Xbox/Playstation model of shipping physical games on slow media (Blurays in their case) and then having a mandatory installation step which copies the data to the fast internal SSD before you start playing. That way you're not entirely dependent on online services to play a physical game.

mattl 2y ago
For the Switch any amount of flash memory for those game cards is expensive. They previously offered much smaller, slightly cheaper cards that started at 2GB. Unfortunately this time they’re only offering 64GB cards or these key cards. I’m curious how much storage they have, I’m sure very little.
- jsheard 2y ago
  Maybe Sony was actually onto something with UMDs :P
- kllrnohj 2y ago
  Brand name 64GB microSDXC UHS-I cards are $10 retail. Figure Nintendo can get the actual flash storage directly much cheaper than that, probably more like $3-5. That hardly seems like a meaningful cost saving measure for a physical game, especially on a console that's pushing upwards of $80 as the game price.
  - gjsman-1000 2y ago
    > Figure Nintendo can get the actual flash storage directly much cheaper than that, probably more like $3-5 Not necessarily. Nintendo’s variant is built by Macronix under their XtraROM service; a variant of NAND flash designed to be a reliable Mask ROM substitute (including only being writable once, automatic repair afterwards, etc). Officially, their chips are rated to last 20 years at 85 degrees Celsius, which is insane. This isn’t your off the shelf SD card chip built by a no-name Chinese design company that fails after 3 years of not receiving power. Combine the niche flash with a custom security chip (Lotus3) on every game card; that’s not cheap. While we don’t know the exact pricing, the rumors are that 64GB is somewhere in the $15-$25 range per cartridge. At those prices, even if I ran a game company, I’d be reserving the non-game-key versions for a Deluxe Collector’s edition.

qbane 2y ago

> Even when a cartridge does contain data on day one of release, games are so often patched, updated and expanded through downloads that the cart very often loses its connection to the game, and functions more like a physical copy protection dongle for a digital object From preservation's perspective even the day-one release, no matter how buggy it is, is worth preserved. The speedrun community, for instance, often need to fix on an exact version of the game to compete, and a physical copy (implying a pinned revision) is often easier to agree on. There are exceptions to this, when the day-one release is not playable. It is the trend happening in the software industry -- release early, even if it is literally unusable, because we can push a patch via the network -- that is disheartening.

ferguess_k 2y ago

I think Switch is just following the other consoles eventually. This lead me think, is there any 8-bit/16-bit/32-bit native handheld (not Pi emulation) market? I guess the primary difficulty is to make games for them, so most likely just a small hobbyist market. I still think kids don't really care about graphics though, at least when they are young.

loloquwowndueo 1y ago
There are a few handhelds that can play pico-8 games. I think it’s done by running pico-8 itself on the handheld which can also run other emulators so I’m not sure it meets your criteria but there’s that at least :)
Tijdreiziger 1y ago
Yes, the good old Game Boy(/Color/Advance) consoles still work. Hobbyists are modding them with better screens, and are still creating new games.
kcb 1y ago
There's this, https://play.date/ https://play.date/. Haven't heard much news about it lately though. Feel like any handheld built around a relatively cheap microcontroller should be shooting for a much lower price point.
- rincebrain 1y ago
  Economy of scale only saves you so much at small batch sizes, plus I assume the unique input setup drives up the BOM price a fair bit. I think they did a few blogposts about having initial teething troubles getting consistent manufacturing, so they might have a significant upfront expense cost to subsidize (which probably explains why they're raising the price again...)

kmeisthax 2y ago

> So far the vast majority of third-party Switch 2 games are Game-Key Cards, with only a few exceptions such as Cyberpunk 2077 and the Western version of Daemon X Machina: Titanic Scion. AFAIK this is only in Japan. The Japanese Switch 2 experience is going to be vastly different from the international one in ways the average Japanese player won't immediately notice, because Japan's economy is in the toilet and Nintendo is engaging in several desperation moves to avoid selling a product nobody living on a Japanese wage can afford. If you're wondering what I mean by "vastly different": the Switch 2 you can buy at Yodobashi or Bic Camera is going to be region- and language-locked to Japanese only. You will only be allowed to sign in with a Japanese account, which can only be funded with Japanese credit cards. You can't change the system language to anything other than Japanese, and any games that rely on the system language will consequently be locked to Japanese, too. In exchange, the system is $100 cheaper[0]. Switch 1 also had Game Key Cards, but they weren't branded this way. Instead they were games that required a software update containing the rest of the game in order to work, with an appropriate warning on the box about this. For the record, Switch 1 updates could be downloaded peer-to-peer, and I'm assuming this carries forward for Switch 2, but I have no idea if Game Key Cards work the same way. [0] If you live in Japan and want an international-spec Switch 2, that's an exclusive My Nintendo Store item that costs the same as it does in the US.

dmwilcox 1y ago

I guess I'm the odd duck with a switch that has never been online. It sounds like the switch2 isn't for me. Sad but I don't want another device that wants to be more than it is, I basically want an updated version of my gameboy from the 90s and that's it. No downloads, no network, no social, just a game you can quietly play anywhere when you have a bit of time, no nonsense

manojlds 1y ago
This thing already happens with download only games being sold. At least with the game cards you can sell the card again which you can't with the keys. So essentially this is an improvement and you won't even know it if you only buy first party games.
whitehexagon 1y ago
Hah, I thought it was just me. Mine was the same, never online, and this key based card thing makes me think that my next, and probably final console purchase, will be a replacement Switch 1. Although I saw the prices just went up, and I didnt even know about the oled version. The main thing that holds me back is the dof blurr in Links Awakening. I imagine that Nintendo want a slice of this subscription based gaming scam. The HD versions already feel like a step in that greed direction. And I think I saw a collection of Mario 3D games that fell into that same repackage-and-sell-again category, with crazy pricing. You might like the DE10-nano Mister project. I manged to get some old arcade cabinates running on a big monitor, no frame drops or lag like most emulators suffer, and no stream of 10p coins required. FPGA feels closer in terms of preservation.
- dmwilcox 1y ago
  That's amazing! Thanks for the tip!

nokeya 1y ago

If I give this GameKey card to the friend, will he be able to download and play it? With card inserted, of course. If not - these cards are just glorified activation codes

ThatPlayer 1y ago
That's exactly what separates this from activation codes, yes.

junaru 1y ago

> should the Switch 2 shop servers ever close down in the distant future – and therefore no longer provide the downloads necessary – those cartridges may become unplayable. > may Weasel 'game journalists' like this is the reason gaming is dying. The world is WILL not may. It happened before and it will happen again because publications like this are nothing more than pr department for gaming companies.

supermatt 1y ago

I was under the impression that the games would download and be stored on the card. Is this not the case? My current collection of game cards exceeds any expanded storage by quite a wide margin… Edit: I guess not: “you must have enough free space in your Nintendo Switch 2 system memory or microSD Express card” https://en-americas-support.nintendo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/68415/~/nintendo-switch%26nbsp%3B2-game-key-card-overview https://en-americas-support.nintendo.com/app/answers/detail/... FFS. I never thought this day would come with Nintendo.

timnetworks 1y ago

It CAN be used to give you a WHOLE new experience without any additional hassle! But it WILL be used to lock you out of your $85 instead.

reverendsteveii 1y ago

This way nintendo can take the games you bought for any reason or no reason at all. You'll own nothing and like it!

znpy 1y ago

> "You would hope that a company that big, that has such a storied history, would take preservation a little more seriously.” Why would one hope that? Nintendo has never ever shown any kind of sign of even remote interest in anybody not-Nintendo doing any kind of preservation.

j1elo 1y ago

It's not fun how the trend is to force everybody to have internet, as if it was an essential service like electricity or water. Some argue it is, but I'd say we're generally far from there. I wanted a console to play when I go to my out of town apartment where we don't need nor want to contract an internet line. And now it means I cannot even bring some cartridges with me and swap them as I please, because they are always requiring internet connectivity for everything. What hasn't failed me is to hack my devices and use pirated versions of my content. Ironic that this method works much better. All games I want, locally, in a pack of SD cards I bring in my backpack, ready to install and play 100% offline at any moment in a train, a flight, a boat.

AStonesThrow 1y ago

There are a couple of elephants in the room here. Firstly is the proliferation of games and their quality. Anyone can make a new game, given an engine and a few art assets. It doesn't take a lot of capital or know-how to release a new game. Therefore, there's a glut of games on the market, from high to low quality, and there are far more than any rational human could ever purchase or play. This was a problem from Day One: When I purchased my Atari 2600 console (or rather my parents purchased for me) my sister and I quickly filled up a 50-cartridge shelf with games where we barely even played or scratched the surface. They were disposable! When we got a Commodore 64, there were more 3rd parties on the market, making games we never heard of, and these games were so deep and thick that one of them could've kept us occupied for 6 months, but still we chewed through them as fast as we could afford. Secondly, aren't most all the games now oriented around MMOG "communities" and multi-player-based? That makes preservation practically impossible. If you've not only got to keep the game servers running, but you've also got to preserve the community that goes with them... well, forget it. Gamers grow up, their tastes change; they move on. I enjoyed a few games, years ago, that basically turned into ghost-town servers. Many of us were so tenacious and dedicated to that specific game as it was, yet the new influx of players dried up, and nobody could prevent that from happening. Every newbie was a ban-evader. Every rich opponent was paying real $$$ just to stay competitive. Our precious game jumped the shark and we couldn't let it die. But die they must. I propose that most games are not worth preserving. Perhaps games should be enjoyed where they are, and then left to die, because they will never be the same again.

rootsudo 1y ago

Wow this website does pop up ads on mobile devices in 2025.

xg15 1y ago

> “seeing Nintendo do this is a little disheartening”, adding: “You would hope that a company that big, that has such a storied history, would take preservation a little more seriously.” I don't see why preservation (outside their own archives) would be a goal for Nintendo. The reality seems to be the opposite: They'd like the branding and memory of old games to be preserved, but please not the game itself - because then they can re-release it for every new system as a "remastered" variant.

musicale 1y ago
> they can re-release it for every new system as a "remastered" variant Nintendo's strategy seems to be working. For example, I seem to have purchased Super Mario Bros 3 multiple times, in physical and digital form, for multiple systems (Wii, 3DS, Wii U ...), and I'm also renting it as part of Nintendo Switch Online. On the up side, I don't have any problem emulating it. Actually all of those versions are emulated, come to think of it.

musicale 1y ago

It's a shame. The beautiful thing about Switch game cards is that you can just pop them in and play. Compare that to PS5 where you have a lengthy installation followed by a 40GB download...

rincebrain 1y ago
As other people have observed, some Switch games did this too, in part or whole, it just wasn't branded as a distinct feature like this, the games just said "you need to download a day 1 update", like in your example.
- musicale 1y ago
  I have yet to run into a single-player or local multiplayer Switch game that is not playable offline with just the cartridge. Some single-player games have updates, but I think you can usually play the original version while you download the update, and the update usually isn't 40GB.
  - rincebrain 1y ago
    At least personally, I've resigned myself to games being purely digital and most of my games aren't carts for the Switch, but I believe a number of the smaller indie games were basically just download codes in a box, or a cart that required downloading some of the core functionality. (I wanted to say it was Goat Simulator for Switch that I was thinking of, but I can't find any proof of this.) https://old.reddit.com/r/NSCollectors/comments/dzquth/physical_games_with_required_download/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NSCollectors/comments/dzquth/physic... is a thread about this, and it lists that the Spyro collection only allowed you to access the first world of each game in the collection without a download.

_imnothere 1y ago

Things like this happen at least partially because of people who'd blindly pay greedy companies like Nintendo, let 'em grow and have their way with their dark patterns.

ksec 1y ago

Does the GameKey Cards allows me to play the game offline??

MoonGhost 1y ago

Why don't we just keep as much of high-resolution gameplay videos as possible. This makes reconstruction possible at least in theory. Not now, but with the time it should be possible to reconstruct similar experience even for multiplayer online games. Not the code, of course.

monicaaa 1y ago

[dead]