Nintendo closes store and exposes short memory of the games industry

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Nintendo announced last Tuesday (15) that it will deactivate its virtual stores for the Wii U and 3DS consoles in March 2023. According to the statement, as of May 23, it will no longer be possible to make purchases with a credit card in these stores.

The Japanese company justified the measure as “part of the natural life cycle of any product as it is less used by consumers”. In fact, from a strictly commercial point of view, the decision seems to make sense.

The Wii U is one of Nintendo’s biggest failures. 13.56 million units of the console have been sold since its launch in 2012 (its successor, the Switch, has sold 8 times as much in half the time) and since 2020 no games have been released for it.

The 3DS situation is a little better. Launched in 2011 and with 75.9 million units sold, the portable console received new games until last year. However, since the Switch hit the market in 2017, the number of releases has been dropping dramatically.

On the other hand, the store’s closure causes concern in video game history researchers and collectors, as this decision could make hundreds of games disappear forever.

According to a survey by the Videogame Chronicle website, more than a thousand exclusive 3DS or Wii U games released only in digital versions will be out of the market. This is the case of games like “Dr Luigi” and “Pokémon Rumble U”, for the Wii U, and “Pokémon Picross”, for 3DS, among others.

In addition, not even the physical versions of the games are safe as the natural degradation of the discs and the electronic components of the consoles and cartridges can make them unusable in 15 or 20 years.

One of the solutions pointed out for this problem is that the big video game companies invest in emulators for their old consoles. These computer programs allow games to run on platforms other than the one for which they were originally developed.

Phil Spencer, CEO of Microsoft’s gaming division, for example, said in an interview with Axios that he sees these shows as a good way for the industry to better preserve its past.

“My hope (and I think I have to present it this way from now on) is that as an industry we work out a form of legal emulation that allows modern hardware to run any older game (within reason)” , he said.

The word “nice” is important in the executive’s sentence. Offline console emulators are already widely used, but are seen as a form of piracy by the video game industry for violating intellectual property and copyright laws.

According to the Washington Post, even requests for exceptions to these laws made by researchers and academics interested in studying the history of video games have been met with strong opposition from the ESA (Association of Entertainment Software), an organization that represents the main distributors and developers of games. video game in the United States.

“As a paying member of the ESA, Nintendo funds lobbyists to prevent even libraries from giving legal access to games [de consoles que saíram de linha]. Not providing commercial access is understandable, but, in addition, preventing institutional works to preserve these titles is to destroy the history of video games”, highlighted on social media the Video Game History Foundation, a non-profit entity dedicated to preserving the history of video games, after the announcement of the Japanese company.

In the current situation, if the video game industry itself does not give real importance to the preservation of its products, more and more games will be forgotten and erased from history.

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game tip, new or old, for you to test

super Mario world
(Super Nintendo)

Since we’re talking about classic games… Released in 1990, “Super Mario World” was the best-selling title for the Super Nintendo and is considered one of the best platform games of all time. In addition to having exerted an immeasurable influence on the industry, he remains current and entertaining to this day. It can be played on the Switch and is one of the 50 Super Nintendo emulator titles available to Nintendo Switch Online subscribers.

update

news, launches, business and what else matters

• Former CD Projekt RED employees who participated in the development of games like “The Withcher 3” and “Cyberpunk 2077” came together to form a new studio called Rebel Wolves. According to Konrad Tomaszkiewicz, who is in charge of the project and was director of “The Witcher 3”, the new studio based in Warsaw (Poland) is already working on a new RPG game.
• Wired Productions, developer of the game “Martha Is Dead”, stated on Twitter that the title will have parts censored in its versions for PlayStation 4 and 5. The studio does not explain the reason for the censorship, but states that it always warned that the game, described as a dark psychological thriller set in WWII period Italy, it contains sensitive scenes. PC and Xbox console versions will be released unmodified.
• Nintendo has announced that “The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask”, a game for the Nintendo 64 released in 2000, will arrive next Friday (25th) on the Switch Online subscription service. To access the title, however, it is necessary to subscribe to the extended version of the service.
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• A day after its release, on February 11, the RPG “Lost Ark”, a free game from Smilegate and distributed by Amazon, reached a peak of 1.32 million concurrent users on Steam, surpassing the best game brands like ” Counter Strike: Global Offensive”, “Dota 2” and “Cyberpunk 2077”. The title is second only to “PUBG: Battlegrounds”, which holds the record of 3.25 million concurrent players on the platform.

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games that will be released in the next few days and promotions that are worth it

22.feb

• “Destiny 2: The Witch Queen”: BRL 119.99 (PC, PS 4/5, Xbox One/X/S)

24.feb

• “Martha Is Dead”: BRL 51.29 (PC), BRL 149.50 (PS 4/5), price not disclosed (Xbox One/X/S)
• “Never Alone: ​​Arctic Collection”: BRL 76.45 (Switch)

25.feb

• “Elden Ring”: BRL 249.90 (PC) and BRL 299.90 (PS 4/5 and Xbox One/X/S)
• “Grid Legends”: BRL 249.90 (PC), BRL 299 (Xbox One/X/S), BRL 299.90 (PS 4/5)