Nintendo Switch: No Virtual Console At Launch, Day One Patch, And More

Nin­ten­do has released details about online fea­tures avail­able when the Switch launches. 

A day one patch will be need­ed to acti­vate many of the Switch’s net­work fea­tures. Here is the full list giv­en by Nintendo.

• Nin­ten­do eShop access
• Online mul­ti­play­er
• Shar­ing images to social networks
• Link­ing Nin­ten­do Accounts
• Con­nect­ing to pub­lic inter­net hotspots

The patch can be down­loaded in the back­ground and Nin­ten­do states that the process is “designed to install quick­ly and does­n’t dis­rupt gameplay”. 

Pur­chas­es from the Nin­ten­do eShop will now be tied to user accounts instead of spe­cif­ic hard­ware. This uni­fied account will also be used for mul­ti­play­er games. The one known lim­it to the account is that dig­i­tal games are only playable on one console.

Beyond the above online fea­tures, there won’t be many oth­ers. The Switch will not have an inter­net brows­er. No stream­ing apps will be avail­able at launch. The vir­tu­al con­sole, Nin­ten­do’s selction of old games, will also be absent at launch.

Nin­ten­do did not give out any details why the vir­tu­al con­sole in par­tic­u­lar would not be avail­able nor did they say when it might appear. In regards to when we might see news about the Vir­tu­al Con­sole, Nin­ten­do stat­ed that “We will share more infor­ma­tion in the future”.

Nin­ten­do Switch launch­es March 3, 2017.