 Welcome back to another spooktacular video for you guys today in the month of October, my favorite month of the year. I'm so excited to be talking about this news today that we have coming from Nintendo. Although it's a bit of bittersweet news, it is something that is a precursor to Nintendo Switch 2 coming out. Nintendo made a move, maybe you've heard about it, I don't know. We're gonna dive deep though into what exactly Nintendo did, why they're doing it, and why this is likely related to Nintendo Switch 2. Before we do that though, I just wanna remind you, we are on a road to 150,000 subscribers. So I'd really appreciate if you subscribe to the channel, drop a like on this video, and you know what? Maybe ring a ling that ding a ling to be notified of all future uploads. Also by the way, if you guys wanna go down to the comments down below, I would appreciate if you would tell me what game you're most looking forward to this month. Remember we have Detective Pikachu coming out, we have Mario Wonder coming out, Spider-Man 2, I think Assassin's Creed Mirage releases tomorrow, whatever, Sonic Superstars as well. So we got a lot of games coming out this month. Which one are you most looking forward to? All right guys, so Nintendo did something last night and they always seem to do this with their end of day slash nighttime posts. They sneak bad news out there, hoping that by the morning, they can just move on. And they did it again with this tweet from Nintendo America that says as of April, 2024, online play and other functionality that uses online communication will end service for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U software. Thank you very much for your continued support of our products. Find out more here. And oh boy, is there a lot more to find out. But before we dive into those details, guys, of course Nintendo was gonna end these services. They had teased, I don't know, over a year ago, a couple of years ago that they eventually were gonna end these services. And guys, with the Nintendo Switch 2 about to come out, guess what? That would make the Wii U and 3DS three generation old hardware. Yeah, they're gonna stop supporting that hardware. It's unfortunate. And it's really unfortunate because the 3DS and the Wii U were sort of the first systems to have a true account system. Like we had friend codes, something like a Wii and all that, but really the Wii U with the Nintendo network, the Miiverse stuff, online digital purchases, all that really blew up with 3DS and Wii U. And naturally you have some concerns such as, man, my entire library is digital. What now? Well, let's dive into what Nintendo had to put on their website. So they said, the announcement of the discontinuation, they go into exactly what they're gonna be doing here. So this does apply to the new 3DS, the new 3DS XL, the new 3DS 2DS XL, the Nintendo 3DS, the Nintendo 3DS XL, Nintendo 2DS Wii U Deluxe and the Wii U Basic. So it says, thank you very much for supporting our products. Now, in early April, 2024, online play and other functionality that uses online communication will end for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U software. This also includes online cooperative play, internet rankings and data distribution. You can find out more information about badges and decorating Nintendo 3DS home menu using the Nintendo badge arcade at a different area. I went through it, and pretty much just getting rid of it, anything that you don't have already downloaded. Now, we will announce a specific date and time at a later date. Here's an interesting note. Please note that if an event occurs that would make it difficult to continue online services for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U software, we may have to discontinue the services earlier than planned. They're just warning you right now. Hey, guess what, guys? We're saying in April, it might be this year. Stay tuned. So I don't know if they're just putting that out there as like a warning shot, but it is what it is. Now, it says we sincerely thank the players for using the online services, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, and this includes software exclusive to the new Nintendo 3DS. Now, if you go to the Q and A section, there are some good answers for some of you. So as an example, will I still be able to play offline? Well, of course you could still play offline. Online doesn't affect offline play. They then ask, will any online services still be available after online services generally end? It will still be possible to use online services for the following software, but that could probably end at some point in the future. So Pokemon Bank and Poka Transporter. So yeah, they're gonna keep the Pokemon game being able to like bank your Pokemon and put them in different games and bring them forward to switch games. They're not getting rid of that. Of course, their warning has someday we might not support it, but for right now, Pokemon companies keeping those services online. Now, here's an important question. What about third-party companies? Are you also ending online services for software from publishers other than Nintendo? They note, with some exceptions, online services will end for all Nintendo 3DS and Wii U software. You can contact publishers for information about online services for there. So if there is a game that's gonna keep their online going, it's gonna be outside of Nintendo's purview because it's not gonna be up to them. Now, this is the most important one. Will it still be possible to download update data or purchased software? For the foreseeable future, it will still be possible to download update data and redownload purchase software and downloadable content from the Nintendo eShop. So yeah, they got rid of our ability to buy stuff a while ago, but if you have digital, they're basically saying, we're not getting rid of your digital games. You are going to be able to update your games. You're going to be able to download the games you already bought digitally. This is actually pretty good news. So online services go away, but your games aren't necessarily going away. Of course, for games like Splatoon 1, no online service, I feel like the game is gone. Now, they do go into detail, StreetPass and SpotPass. StreetPass uses local communication, so it's not really going anywhere. SpotPass was obviously online, so SpotPass will be gone. However, this is a part that sucks and I wish they gave a better solution. You will be able to use StreetPass in StreetPass Mi Plaza, which is pre-installed, but you will no longer be able to use features that use online communication, such as receiving new panels and puzzle swap. I wish they would just let us download all the puzzle pieces and then modify the software to still unlock them for us with StreetPass, but it is what it is. Yes, it's been around a long time. I don't know how many people are still using this feature. So this is obviously incredibly sad news, but also expected news. Again, Nintendo warned us this was going to happen eventually and no surprise that April 2024 is when it's happening. You know why that's a very interesting date? April 2024 begins their brand new fiscal year. What's probably happening in fiscal year 2024 to 2025 for Nintendo? Nintendo Switch 2 is very, very likely to be coming out. I don't think that this is a coincidence when they're ending these services because they're going to mask the closure of these services with the hype for Nintendo Switch 2. Now, it's going to be curious how long they obviously keep the Nintendo services for Nintendo Switch going, probably much longer because we pay a subscription fee. So the subscription fee and the money behind it is going to lead to Nintendo Switch services probably being available, maybe even another decade, who knows? But yeah, this is obviously sad. Of note, that doesn't mean online is going to weigh entirely for 3DS and Wii U. If you want to get involved in the modding community, there are places that are preserving this, setting up servers. Pretty much as soon as Nintendo turns the lights out, there will be communities online that you'll be able to play these games through if you want to modify your platforms. And one of them that seems to be trending a lot lately is at one named Pretendo. But look, I don't really know much about this stuff because I don't modify and hack my systems. But obviously they're going to come back in some form through that community, if that is something that you happen to be interested in. And modding Wii U and 3DS has been really never easier than it is today if that's something you are interested in. Anyways, guys, obviously I feel like this all has to do with Nintendo Switch 2. They have a new platform coming. It's time to phase out the old, in with the new. This is expected behavior. We've seen other companies do this. A little bit more difficult when Sony was trying to do it because again, people paid for the service back on PS3. We didn't pay for access to anything on Wii U. We didn't pay for access for anything on 3DS in terms of online connectivity. So Nintendo, they're just going to get away with this. One Wii U didn't sell very well. So most people won't even miss the Wii U, unfortunately. And then the 3DS, which is a bigger deal, again, they're pushing everyone. They want people to buy Switch. They want people to move on to Switch 2. And this is just the reality of these online services. And we do have to remember this, that hey, even with Switch, some day they're going to shut down the online servers on Switch. It's going to happen. It's just the reality. Welcome to online, I guess is the new age of online. Or I guess what online was always going to be. I mean, this happens at PC game servers as well, right? As soon as certain PC games drop in popularity, usually the servers get shut down. But anyways, you guys let me know if you think about this news down in the comments below. Obviously I am a little bummed, but I'm not going to miss it. I haven't turned my 3DS or Wii U on in ages. I'm probably not really going to miss a whole lot here. Although Nintendo Network, I mean, that was the best name for an online network Nintendo had. This whole NSO thing, you're really tying it to Nintendo Switch. Hey, whatever, if they're going to keep the Switch brand going into the future, just like Xbox Live or Xbox Games of Gold and you know what? Hey, if Switch is going to be your brand for a while, I guess NSO can continue to work. Anyways guys, thank you so much for being here and I'm going to catch you in the next video.