This is addressed to everyone and anyone from the EU; we're gathering signatures to ban the deletion of games that exist only in digital form! This will ensure the perservation of countless games if it goes through. We're already very near the completion goal, but the more the merrier.
The deadline is July 31st. Don't forget to sign this!
EDIT: I couldn't blaze this for some reason (apparently they can't verify my address even though I bought stuff before) so I tag people I follow instead. I don't know where all of you are, but I need the signal boost. Please, this is important.
The news that Sony will no longer be making physical discs for new games starting January 2028 makes me doubt we'll get a physical disc release for Horizon 3...
Personal rant below the cut
I absolutely hate this trend of phasing out physical media. Sure, it has its uses like being able to access media from anywhere and not taking up much physical storage space. But physical media should always be an option. We live in a time where digital media can be taken away from us. Titles are pulled from streaming services, purchased media can be removed from our personal libraries without a refund because publishers/studios stop supporting it, transfers between devices fail (years ago, my original iPod kicked the bucket and Apple said my songs couldn't be transferred and I was out the cost of thousands of 99 cent songs; yes, I'm still bitter about it).
Physical games should be an option, especially for AAA titles. Physical discs means gamers with bad internet connection or low digital storage can still play. It means that people own their games and can lend/sell/trade them as they please; we can't lose our games because the studio removed it from service. Also you'd think removing the physical aspect of printing and shipping a game would at least have the advantage of lower costs for us consumers but nope, still paying $70-$80 for a digital AAA game is ridiculous.
Even dumber is that they'll probably keep going with the trend of physical game sets with merch like statues and art books, and they'll include the empty steelbook case for a physical game that doesn't exist. I don't want an empty box on my shelf; I want the actual disc!
>>> he / him ☆ 28 ☆ energy manipulation ☆ onychinus's leader ☆ n109 zone ☆ dragon ☆ lads boys
"You know, Tarus City can have flowers bloom everywhere, as far as the eye can see. But only for one person." [from Abyssal Blossom]
i love love and deepspace game so much <33 the game's plot and graphics are very nice...but i wish they would bring more chapter updates to the game's main story, and i would like to be able to choose my character's evol. anyway, i wanted to draw my favorite character in this game but i was too lazy to paint it... so it was just a sketch :(
Virtual Game Cards, a detailed explainer, and other thoughts
As of this writing, we're a few days after the March 2025 Nintendo Direct, and a few days before the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct of April 2025, and in the last Direct, Nintendo announced a new optional feature that will apply to Nintendo Switch 1 & 2 systems starting late April 2025.
This feature is the Virtual Game Cards. Many people got confused about it, and to be honest, so was I initially. The video is not really well thought out, though, after watching more than one time, you might get it, but still, it's not a very good explainer from Nintendo, so first of all, we need to set things straight for anyone who doesn't get it and reads this blog somehow.
I also want to talk about what it means for the future, and my personal impressions of it.
The Current System
For explaining what this is about, we need to dispel one notion that I saw a few times: This new system has NOTHING to do with your physical game cards, and ONLY has to do with digital games and nothing else. And no, this is not evidence of Nintendo putting physical game cards away. Stop.
Now we need to talk about the current system that we've been using for playing digital games to this day, because many people can take quite a few things for granted. This system is also in place for PlayStation and Xbox consoles.
All digital games are owned by an account, and for the sake of explaning things, I will refer to that about your account and your games from there on.
There is a concept called the primary console, and it basically means the main console linked directly to your account. It has several benefits:
Your digital games can be played without an Internet connection to boot them.
Other accounts on that console can play your digital games.
If you buy a digital game from Nintendo's webpage, your primary console would automatically start the download.
Meaning, if you have a second, third or however many consoles you own with your account in them, that it doesn't have those benefits, you would require an internet connection anytime you want to boot your digital games, and other accounts on those consoles cannot play them.
That's the old system.
Virtual Game Cards
Now that we got the old system out of the way, we need to explain the new one. Now forget the old system entirely, this new system is a completely optional replacement, with its own completely different logic with different pros and cons compared to the old one.
The goal of this system is for accounts to use more than one console at a time, without a huge dependency on an Internet connection at all times, and I really wish Nintendo pushed these benefits in their video.
With this new system of digital game access, all of them would be considered as Virtual Game Cards that can only be inserted in one console at a time. Your account can only have up to two consoles linked this time around where you can access your digital games.
Because Nintendo insists on this system to not be abused: You would need to link both consoles locally (+ online for security), only the first time though. After that you can just freely manage what digital games you want access for on each console, and you can even use a website for that, so an internet connection is required to transfer games around both.
When you have access to a digital game in this system (as in, the Virtual Game Card was inserted), an Internet connection is only required the first time you boot it up. It won't be required in subsequent plays.
And all accounts on that console can also play it freely. This means it gives basically the same advantages as a primary console, but per digital game instead.
And then, on top of that, you can lend one of your digital games to another account in your family group (this is not just a Nintendo Switch Online thing, it's a free feature of your Nintendo Account).
Pros & Cons
To sum it up, here's the pros & cons of the old system:
Pro: You can have as many consoles linked to your account as you want, and access your digital games on all of them.
Pro: (Unintended?) You can share your account to another person to let them access your games.
Con: Only one console (primary console) can let other accounts have free access to your digital games.
Con: Playing a digital game outside of your primary console requires an Internet connection no matter what.
Now, the pros & cons of the new Virtual Game Card system:
Pro: On any console where the Virtual Game Card is inserted, the digital game can be played without an Internet connection.
Pro: Likewise, the digital game can also be played by anyone else's account on that console freely.
Pro: You can lend your digital game to another account from your family group...
Con: ...for 14 days, only locally, you cannot lend to anyone in your family online.
Con: You can only link up to two consoles (only locally) with access to your Virtual Game Cards.
Con: Extra Steps? You would need to virtually eject and insert digital games everytime you wanna use a different console to play the same game, and an Internet connection is required for these actions.
Con: (Intended?) You cannot share your account to anybody else to share your games without changing linked consoles.
As a reminder, you can choose between both systems, but they're really completely different systems.
The catch?
As you can kind of tell, it would look like the Virtual Game Card system has more pros than before, but that's kind of the catch here.
For me, this new system actually solves some problems I currently have, but this would bother other people with different needs. That said, I believe Nintendo is still right in assuming one person doesn't need more than two Switch consoles. I don't personally see the use of having even more, unless...
Unless, that is, you're sharing your account with friends to share your digital games. This system is totally made against this use, and I'm sorry to tell you: Nintendo completely forbids this.
And maybe, this is happening too much for Nintendo's liking. So instead of banning people, they devised a system that punishes this use, without making everyone have an entirely worse system, solving other problems that the old system had in the process.
So let's be clear here: this kind of system proves how much Nintendo doesn't really trust their userbase to not abuse the system. But do I really blame them for that?
At this point I just have two questions:
Is the Switch 2 forced to have this Virtual Game Card system?
And how long until this new system is no longer optional?
If you're having a home console, and then a console to play on the go, this can solve the problem of the overreliance on Internet when you're outside of your home. The difficulty of doing a portable console is that you have to deal with the possibility of not always having an Internet connection, and this is clearly a response to that.
What this new system implies can also be the complete removal of the concept of "secondary" consoles. I feel like there would be only one primary console for an account, and linked locally to a secondary console, which, obviously, is supposed to punish those who does account sharing.
The good?
I spent a lot of time talking about the catch, but there is still I think good things about this.
On a personal level, I have two Switch consoles: One of them is purely for myself, the other one is for my mother/father. I could have made the other console my primary console and solve this problem, but for convenience, I would rather want my personal console to be my primary console. Also in this home, it happens that I get power outages or/and Internet outages (sometimes no mobile network in the slightest), so I'd like a solution that doesn't really punish anyone when it happens.
So this new system actually have some convenience for me. I could just switch games between both of them. And on top of that, I can lend my games (and viceversa) with my brother who has his own console. For family users, I think this is nice stuff.
Many people have compared this with Steam. I had to look up the new Steam Families system which replaces the old system I knew:
Nintendo's system is clearly worse than Steam's. Steam just lets everyone in the family freely share their digital library with everyone in the family, and now, there's even less Internet dependency. There's still the idea of only lending one digital copy at a time (meaning if two people in the family owns the same game, two copies can be shared across the family to play together), and it doesn't seem to have a limitation of how many PCs can be used. Steam probably trusts their userbase way too much but it sure is the most consumer friendly of the options.
On consoles, this kind of system doesn't really exist. Sony and Microsoft definitely doesn't, and Nintendo is essentially doing a small dabble, which is still nice, let's be fair here.
Conclusion
It's really hard to say if this system is better or worse to me, overall. It depends on your needs, but I think this is a clear attempt to prevent account sharing, first and foremost, while attempting to give a concept of digital game access in a sort of tangible way, while not requiring a permanent Internet connection.
This is already the beginning of a new Nintendo that will represent the Nintendo Switch 2, and I don't believe this is the only big "change."
