It's that time again.
Nintendo, continuing their decades long tradition of whittling away at the goodwill they earned in the 90s, made another harsh announcement last week.
Over the next year, Nintendo will be gradually shutting down their eShops for the Wii-U and 3DS family of systems. After that, it will no longer be possible to purchase downloadable games or content. Once that happens, it likely won't be long before the servers supporting the existing libraries will go down and it won't even be possible to re-download or update games in your library.
This means several things.
For starters, it turns every single Wii-U and 3DS into a ticking time bomb, counting down the days until something inevitably fails due to the ravages of time and your digital library falls to oblivion.
That seems like it should be expected, and to an extent it is. For years we've known that when you buy digital media, you're really just buying a long term rental with an indeterminate end-date. Nobody expects Nintendo to keep their 3DS servers going in perpetuity.
However, there is a certain sting in having your digital purchases so abruptly abandoned with no contingency for digital migration.
I bought my first PC game on Steam more than ten years ago. Three computers later, I can still download and install it at my discretion. There is little doubt that Valve will continue to support my purchases for as long as they are in business and they've made it known that, in the event of some catastrophe that would force them to shut down, they have a plan to make sure that people will be able to preserve their libraries on the way out.
Nintendo, on the other hand, has not been that forward thinking. Their philosophy has always been that when you buy a digital game, you buy it for the specific system you download it on. As a result, purchases made on the 3DS and Wii-U will simply stay there until the systems no longer function.
And that is only if you have the games to begin with. Once the eShop goes down, it's estimated that more than a thousand digital only games will be lost to the aether while hundreds of others will be permanently hobbled without the ability to download updates or additional content.
Most striking though is that, beyond simply eliminating access to digital Wii-U and 3DS games, this also appears to be the final nail in the coffin for Nintendo's Virtual Console.
Launched in 2006, the Virtual Console program has been the only legal way to purchase some of the most popular games from the 80s, 90s, and early 00s. Instead of finding an old Super Nintendo and paying exorbitant prices for a long discontinued cartridge, you could spend a few dollars and play it on your Wii-U.
However, in spite of its popularity, Nintendo has steadfastly refused to continue the legacy of the Virtual Console on the Switch. Instead, they've pivoted their attention to the subscription based Nintendo Switch Online, which offers access to a curated library of games that, while is nice enough and has most of the essential titles, is still dwarfed by the Virtual Console's offerings.
As a result, there are hundreds of classic retro games that will become effectively unavailable for purchase next year.
Now, to be fair, this is all Nintendo's prerogative. They have no legal or moral obligation to make their classic library of games conveniently available to future generations. Likewise, it is will within their rights to leverage that library as a way of boosting the proposition value of their subscription service, which they clearly believe will be more profitable than facilitating individual digital purchases.
At the same time, the gaming community will always take the path of least resistance. If a game is unavailable through legal channels, gamers will seek it out through other avenues.
Nintendo spends a lot of time fighting piracy but the most effective way to combat piracy is to eliminate the need for it by offering a better alternative. It's a reality they've been forced to confront before and, likely, one they will soon be confronting again.
Travis Fischer is a news writer for Mid-America Publishing and is not at all concerned about not being able to play classic Nintendo games, regardless of what Nintendo makes available.
