Nintendo Switch Online 2023 Winners & Losers

[@prime7213]

A change I would love moving forward with NSO is consistency. It’s weird to me that some months get multiple drops and some don’t get anything. If we knew better when to expect games it would feel more like a monthly service and less like a random waiting game.

[@DefunctGames]

I wish I could give this more thumbs up. This would be GREAT. And it would greatly improve my sleep schedule.

[@shanelee80]

We get games every month.maybe 1 game maybe 3 games but games happens every month

[@prime7213]

@@shanelee80 we did not get games in November. But even then there is never a guarantee when new games are coming. In 2021 over half the months of the year did not get updates. Nintendo needs to communicate this information and have a consistent release schedule.

[@DefunctGames]

@@shanelee80 I would have to check my chart, but I'm pretty sure there were skipped months. It's especially bad for base level subscribers. They get a handful of games at random times throughout the year.

[@goranisacson2502]

​@@prime7213There were T E C H N I C A L L Y games released in November- in Japan. They got Jet Force Gemini November 30th, whereas it didn't come to the rest of the world until December 8th when we got Harvest Moon and 1080 Snowboarding. Though that is quite the technicality, and makes me wonder why on earth they needed 8 extra days just for the west...

[@tkundnobody]

My biggest issue with NSO is that we don't have the manuals in app like virtual console had

[@DefunctGames]

A disappointing (and frustrating) oversight, for sure.

[@ShadowEl]

Lacking manuals actually provides a problem for some of these games. Zelda 1 is a worse game without its manual (same problem the Classic NES Series release on GBA had) and Startropics is literally unbeatable.

[@kevincullen13]

More graphs? Now that's a new year's resolution I can get behind!

[@ShadowEl]

I will defend Super Mario Advance 4's inclusion. While it may seem redundant with Super Mario Bros 3 AND Super Mario All-Stars already available, Super Mario Advance 4 offers exclusive eReader levels that many players have likely never experienced due to them being on an obscure GBA peripheral, and later on the slightly less obscure Wii U Virtual Console. If you're a Super Mario Bros 3 fan and have never played these bonus levels, they are very worth checking out!

[@AsherTheModder]

fair tho

[@Frigidevil]

Hey man I love the idea of charting the years but could you maybe have descriptions are actually legible? Like maybe just plop a picture of the console onto the corresponding bar graph.

[@DefunctGames]

You're right. I haven't done a lot of graph work on the site and will probably refine it next time. That said, I did try to explain the graphs so that it wasn't just visuals.

[@Frigidevil]

@@DefunctGames oh yeah you did a good job or making it so you don't need to read anything. I'm the weirdo that just wants to pause and read everything on screen lol

[@puffdaddy6488]

10:40 I completely disagree with this portion… Mario Advance 4 was part of the NSO Gameboy Advance launch lineup, and included all of the E-Reader levels that most people didn’t get to play, so that’s an obvious great choice. The other three Mario Advance games all released together on NSO, and didn’t feel like they were take any other games slot on the lineup. Not to mention it’s probably the best version of Super Mario Bros. 2, Yoshi’s Island has some extra levels, and Mario World, while the extras aren’t nearly as exciting in this version, gives an actual reason for collecting the Dragon Coins. I just don’t think there is much to complain about that they were added to the service…

[@DefunctGames]

To be fair, I do make the caveat about Super Mario Advance 4. I think you can probably make a pretty good argument for the inclusion in that game.

[@gligarguy4010]

Bro went crazy with the stats in this one. I wonder where the service goes from here, though, since there doesnt seem to be any other obvious consoles they'd add. I can't see them doing Gamecube and on anytime soon. Maybe my dream of Dreamcast will finally become a reality.

[@AsherTheModder]

probably ds.

[@ShadowEl]

More games for the existing consoles! I think Nintendo of America has been smart to release more import titles for the NES and SNES libraries. Clu Clu Land D has yet to drop on the NES app, despite being essentially 2x the game of stock Clu Clu Land. That one's a no brainer. The GB/Color/Advance libraries are also still woefully barebones. Nintendo could focus on building out those in 2024.

[@AsherTheModder]

@@ShadowEl Agreed.

[@avery-u1w]

this year we already have 35 new games

[@goranisacson2502]

I think the lack of NES & SNES games, and partially the Mega Drive, is easily explained by the changing tides of retro-games valuation. Back in the good old days of the Virtual Consoles every damn company shrugged their shoulders at offering Nintendo their old crap for a pittance. But then? Then they saw that old crap sell well, and realized how much money they were leaving on the table by letting Nintendo be the only store they sold to when they COULD be selling those games as part of retro-packages with THEM getting the majority of the income! Fast-forward to now, and I'm looking through the eshop and see Blizzard sell Blackthorne, Rock'n'Roll Racing and the Lost Vikings as part of a retro-compilation. Flashback and Another World are plainly sold as the older games. Disney gathered all it's 16-bit games in one collection, and even Jurassic Park did the same. And Sega have packaged ALL the 16-bit Sonic games in one retro-compilation. What possible reason would they have to give those games away as part of a monthly rental compilation were Nintendo receives the major cut? No reason. No reason what so ever. As such, I have ZERO expectations of deluges of games for the SNES or NES or Mega Drive now that the majority of the big games Nintendo themselves published / made are available, and SEGA might just prefer selling their own compilations. What we will get are VERY small licensed games from the third parties that don't have the sort of games it'll be worth putting on a separate collection (minus perhaps Capcom who're surprisingly generous with their Demon's Crest and Breath of Fire offers). This will happen to the N64 and Game Boy / GBA when Nintendo have put out all their own games for it, and sad as it is to admit I don't see them putting out GC or DC formats ever because of the size-issues. I don't think Nintendo thinks it'll be efficient to let people download / stream such big games. So alas- we'll take up to 32-bit, if even that since I doubt Sega are eager to let Nintendo emulate the Saturn, and we'll just have to like it. Coming to peace with this is why I am pretty pleased with what we have and what we'll get- I just do not see drastically expanded game selections here as a viable path forward taking the business realities behind Nintendo's actions into account. Boring, yes. I'd love to have the VC-roster back. But I doubt Konami will let Nintendo have TurboGrafX-16 or SEGA let them handle Saturn, so what we see is what we'll get... though maybe we can at least possibly have Game Gear or Master System, somewhere down the line. Pokemon though, I must admit, Pokemon is a mystery. It could be that due to the unique owner-ship split Nintendo can't just do as they please there. And because Pokemon can be sent to Bank and carried through generations, maybe the Pokemon Company has decided they don't want to offer people anyway to grow their collection for "free" through Nintendo NSO, buuut maybe they'll offer their old games for actual sale? I don't know- I feel like that part of Nintendo is the most obtuse mystery of all.

[@AsherTheModder]

they never said golden sun or f zero gx in 2023 they said it would be added "in the future" so that ones on you.

[@DefunctGames]

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[@AsherTheModder]

@@DefunctGames thanks for the quick response.

[@ShadowEl]

Honestly F-Zero 99 satisfied me way more this year than an F-Zero GBA (GX was the GameCube game) port would have. Sadly Nintendo seems to have already ended supporting FZ99 with new content.

[@AsherTheModder]

@@ShadowEl Thats fair.

[@thedude3445]

Mario Party 3 and Pokemon Stadium 2 means, for party games at least, this was a wonderful year. Sad we won't get Advance Wars with its wonderful hotseat multiplayer

[@ShadowEl]

I'm optimistic we might get Advance Wars this year once the remake cools down. Hype for it kinda disappeared after the indefinite delay anyway.

[@poil8351]

i suspect that sega genesis will pick up soon with the recent stuff going on with sega, i get the feeling that sega are making a big play on retro games.

[@ShadowEl]

Genesis app is missing a bunch of must-play games. The absence of Sonic 1, 3, and Knuckles makes sense when you consider SEGA trying to sell Sonic Origins. But where are Streets of Rage 1 and 3? Shadow Dancer? the Toejam & Earl sequels? Golden Axe 3? The Ooze? Any of the Ecco games? The list goes on. The Genesis/MD app has some gems but the list of even SEGA's own first party releases is far from complete.

[@poil8351]

@@ShadowEl i think some of those are in the mega drive/genesis collection.

[@ShadowEl]

@@poil8351 Some of them are. But then, the emulation is better in the Switch Online app.

[@poil8351]

i suspect that we will get either ds or 3ds and possibly some wii and wii u games soon. with the recent closure of the ds and wii stores i suspect they will gradually port some games over to the online service.

[@AsherTheModder]

full price wii u ports say otherwise. strongly doubt 3ds but maybe ds could happen.

[@poil8351]

@@AsherTheModder i suspect some of the more niche wii or wii u might make an appearance or some of the wii versions of games that have switch versions.

[@Cyberpunknut]

It was a good year. I was very happy with the releases but still very very irritated that they won't release any damn pokemon games on it. I know people that didn't manage to download poke-transporter on the 3DS would like to be able to just automatically upload pokemon to pokemon bank. I expected maybe some sort of extra fee to allow you access to something like those on the switch plus the games themselves but still no show.

[@wrldonwill]

They're scared to give us Pokemon because they know we wouldn't even be checking for the crap they put out in 2023.

[@HybridAngelZero]

I would say this is probably the very best year for NSO overall, at least as far as value proposition goes. Link's Awakening, both Oracle games and Minish Cap, Wario Land 3 and Pokemon TCG are all huge games with tons of hours of gameplay a piece. Crusader of Centy is more expensive to buy than getting ten years worth of NSO Expansion Pak, and I'll have to politely disagree with you on the Super Mario Advance games, I think they add a lot of value to the GBA NSO. Those specific versions are a lot of peoples' nostalgic versions, the GBA is older now than the NES was when the GBA came out, and I think those versions have enough differences from the original or All-Stars releases to be worth trying the other versions no matter which you grew up with. Having them all in one place is a great thing, especially for those curious to compare from a historical context. Still, not releasing the mainline Game Boy Pokemon games is a baffling choice. Though, the recent reuploads of the NSO trailers for Stadium 1&2 have the little banner about Game Boy connectivity not being compatible removed, so maaayyyybe... 👀

[@AsherTheModder]

Pokemon hates competing with themselves so I'm betting mainline Pokémon never comes.

[@ShadowEl]

@@AsherTheModder if The Pokemon Company is really that threatened by the idea of re-releasing a 30 year old 8-bit RPG, maybe they should give GAMEFREAK the time and resources to make their modern games more appealing.

[@jwrfb26]

Was this a good year for Switch Online? I guess so, overall. I'm still mystified by how Nintendo decides which games to release as they tend to skip over some classics and big-name games. Why pick Wario Land 3 over either 1 or 2? I don't know. I still have hope we'll see these, but with releases still few and far between sometimes, I guess there are no promises.

[@tylerdohoney1544]

Worst part of NSO virtual console is no mappable buttons; screw off Nintendo, I’m not doing it from the main Switch menu and I’m not buying your expensive, barely available NES/SNES/N64 controllers

[@peterbarnes8492]

It could of been worse, however I'm not into RPGS and there were a lot of those. I have most the Megadrive (,I'm English) games already on the collection you can buy. Also a lot of N64 games play terrible with the pro controller imo. They don't update controls and don't translate import games. Sure there a a few extra things I can play and enjoy on nso but for the reasons I've listed above to me no lt was not a good year for what I pay

[@JenMistress]

Yeah, dropping the main feature many would be playing the game for I'll say is a big mistake. That's like if they released one of the previous WWE games that had the My GM Mode, and then dropped that. Anyways, in answer to your question, I'll say with the amount of games, yes, it was. For the quality of games, can be debatable.

[@brandonmatys]

Even though I’ll get blasted for this… yes this was a good year for switch online… As cool as Dreamcast would be on switch online or on switch 2 and I KNOW what I’m about to say is not possible on either switch or switch 2 but… Hot Take: sega Saturn nso>Dreamcast nso only because I’m not paying an arm and a leg for good used sega Saturn games that cost more than n64 games curse you Saturn emulation!!! :( Also: if we can’t get more n64 games at the very least fix up the n64 online emulator…. Seriously Nintendo controller pak support would be nice since *A TON* of n64 games use it for saving progress like mystical ninja and snowboard kids sorry for all the editing

[@ShadowEl]

The lack of peripheral support on N64 app is frustrating. It seems default wired to the rumble pak and nothing more. Mario Kart 64 has been on the service since launch and it's still impossible to save ghost data. Saturn is a pipe dream. Like you said, Saturn emulation is notoriously tricky. If SEGA's on board, I'd be happy with them helping to beef up the standard NSO perks with a Master System app. Get the Alex Kidds, 8-bit Sonics, Phantasy Star 1, and more underrated SEGA classics on there.

[@brandonmatys]

@@ShadowEl the fact winback is on the service without a save functionality makes it even worse than Mario kart 64 at least you can 100 percent Mario kart 64 without needing the controller pak and yes i know Saturn is a pipe dream but despite Dreamcast games being easier to emulate the problem is the size of those games are huge and I mean *HUGE* in other words: Good luck getting those to fit in one app. I do agree with master system and game gear though.

[@ZEKESPILLEDINKMUSIC]

Nintendo is practically punching themselves in the face if they don't release more games published by Rare across all the platforms: Battletoads Killer Instinct The Donkey Kong Land games DK 64 Diddy Kong Racing Snake, Rattle, and Roll Perfect Dark (GBC) There are other publishers that Nintendo also currently has the rights to, like Tecmo and Tecnos Japan. They need to add more Ninja Gaiden and Double Dragon games. Nintendo is sleeping on gold right now, and they need to wake up. They made an estimated $60.96 BILLION in 2023. They can spare change to put those game on NSO. Anything else from them is just an excuse.

[@ShadowEl]

I don't know that Nintendo has carte blanche to release Rare's games that are owned by Microsoft. I would love to see NES classics like Slalom, Snake Rattle & Roll, Cobra Triangle, RC Pro-Am, and more...but so far we've only gotten a couple N64 games from them. And even then there are majorly notable exclusions like Banjo-Tooie...I'm not complaining but we really got Goldeneye and freaking Jet Force Gemini before Tooie? Most confusing of all, besides the DKC trilogy, none of Rare's Donkey Kong games are on the service!! That feels like a deliberate and inexplicable exclusion on Nintendo's part. Perfect Dark 64 and Conker won't be coming because the app is rated E-T. But some Rare games I'd like to see in 2024 are Blast Corps, Diddy Kong Racing, Donkey Kong 64, and Banjo-Tooie. Blast Corps and Tooie feel like a no brainer, since apparently Rare is rounding out games that were already released on Rare Replay. But then why not give us their NES classics as well???

[@ZEKESPILLEDINKMUSIC]

​​@@ShadowElThat's right. I forgot that Microsoft still owns franchises from Rare, like Killer Instinct, Perfect Dark, Conker, and Banjo-Kazooie. It's too bad that Microsoft didn't really understand how to approach these IPs, despite their efforts.

[@ZEKESPILLEDINKMUSIC]

Surprise! Today's Nintendo Direct featured more games published by Rare, including Killer Instinct, one Battletoads game and Snake, Rattle & Roll. Of course, the credit goes to Rare for working with Nintendo to add more NES and SNES games.

[@ShadowEl]

@@ZEKESPILLEDINKMUSIC one of the wildest things to me is that the Battletoads game is NOT on Rare Replay, and therefore is a Nintendo-exclusive Rare release from Microsoft.

[@filialuvssquigly7447]

As releases go it was good there were quite a few release. As far as things worth have the payed services for... no...it was bad... well for me it was bad but for me its always been bad...so far they have yet to release anything that i wanted that i don't have access to on orginal (and imo superior hardware). When it started i was they would release rare title or things i was to stupid as a youngling to buy mighty final fight, pocky and rocky 1 and 2 are just some that come to mind. And adding the mario advanced games i feel was a waste and giving there orginal superior vision are on there already without the screen crunch of the gba. I think i have used the switch online service for the games twice with in its entire life span so far lol. I am honestly getting more use out of the mario cart, animal crossing and especially the splatoon 3 dlc they give you access to then i am the actual games and once i stop being lazy and actually buy the dlc myself i wont even be using it for that anymore.

[@ShadowEl]

Why would you buy the DLC if you already have it for free via Switch Online?

[@filialuvssquigly7447]

@ShadowEl because as some point I'm going to down grade back to the normal pass because the expansion is completely useless for someone with a game collection someone like me I mean my game collection is so expensive there is nothing they offer I don't own on orginal and imo superior hardware

[@MCastleberry1980]

Just suck it up and give us Mother 3 lol Every update it feels like we get the random discount bin games you get from your divorced uncle for Christmas.

[@hyruleflower5695]

nes and snes selections are like 90% garbage for some reason but n64 and GBA are way better about it

[@MCastleberry1980]

@hyruleflower5695 I'm sure part of it is that they already had a bunch of bangers and it's harder to get rights to other ones when companies can release collections to sell

[@ShadowEl]

@@MCastleberry1980 this has to be it. Look at how there are NO Castlevania or Contra games on the NES or SNES app. But on Genesis/MD - which is Expansion Pak - Konami was willing to include CV Bloodlines and Contra Hard Corps. Same thing with Mega Man weirdly...no MM or MMX games on NES or SNES, but we got The Wily Wars on Genesis/MD. Not coincidentally, Konami and Capcom sell classic Castlevania, Contra, and Mega Man collections separately.

[@ichI-yb2mj]

I FIND THE MARIO ADVENCE SERIES GREAT...I DIDNT NEED THE ORIGINAL NES VERSIONS OF THE GAME - SPECIAL: "MARIO BROS 3 IN THE NES GRAFICS AND WHITOUT A SAVE FEATURE IN THE ORIGINAL GAME IS VERY VERY W-O-R-S-E ! THE ADVENCE GAMES ARE A LOT BETTER THAN THE OROGINIALS !