This week, Nintendo made a big announcement: Super Nintendo games will be added to the Nintendo Switch Online classic game library at no additional cost (it’s currently $20/£17.99 a year). As the announcement was made, 20 games were immediately added to the service – many of them from the SNES Mini library – bringing the total to over 60 NES and SNES titles.
However, hidden within the announcement like a Russian doll was another, less exciting update. The year-old tradition of Nintendo adding new NES games every month is no more. “More NES games will be added in the future, but those releases will not adhere to a regular schedule,” a Nintendo representative told Business Insider (opens in new tab). This irregular release schedule will apply to the newly-added SNES games as well.
Since Nintendo Switch Online’s launch in September 2018, the service has grown a fair bit – it started with just 20 games, but has since expanded to over 60 in less than a year. The subscription service also enables online multiplayer functionality in games. You can only find games with people on your Friends List, however, which is pretty limiting.
The general consensus seems to be that Nintendo Switch Online is far from perfect, but for that incredibly low yearly cost, it’s worth it. Will we still be saying that a few months into the new release schedule? I guess we’ll find out.
If you’re looking for a new Switch, or are interested in joining the community for the first time, here’s everything we know about the upcoming Nintendo Switch Lite (opens in new tab).