True, but it’s worth noting that this only applies to playing it on a Switch 2. If we’re talking about an eventual scenario where you lose access to updates someday, at least the carts should still be playable on Switch 1 hardware.
And if this practice continues for Switch 2 games, or was in practice for the Wii U, or etc etc…
It’s a bad practice, even if right now there are ways around it for one game. It’s a bad practice even if it’s only for the current console on the current firmware. It turned a physical copy someone bought into a keycard. I’m of the opinion that all physical console games have been keycards since the day they started having day 1 patches, but at least that argument has the reasonable counterpoint of “you can still play the buggy incomplete v1.0 that’s on the cart/disc, that makes it better than Switch 2 Game Key Cards, which are better than account-locked Digital Games”.
This is direct and complete proof that your physical copy means nothing. The company can still restrict your access whenever they want to. The Switch 1 still gets firmware updates, after all, and firmware updates can’t be rolled back. The physical copy guarantees fuck all in the face of every preservation concern that’s a criticism of digital downloads. DRM-free digital and piracy are the only trustworthy methods of preservation.
FWIW, this likely just has to do with backwards compatibility fixes, since S2 is software emulation rather than hardware. I don’t think they’re likely to go back and intentionally restrict anything on Switch 1 through new firmware updates.
I agree that in an era of patches, physical copies are becoming increasingly imperfect from a preservation perspective, but I hesitate to say they mean nothing. Depends on the game really, and how complete it is at launch.
Correction: Switch 2 Back-compat is not emulation. It is a compatibility layer in the same vein that the Steam Deck runs Windows games despite running on Linux.
For whatever reason, a game company can make your “physical copy” require a digital download to function. If a company decides they don’t want you to play a game (or version) anymore, it being on a cart or disc is not insurance against it.
True, but it’s worth noting that this only applies to playing it on a Switch 2. If we’re talking about an eventual scenario where you lose access to updates someday, at least the carts should still be playable on Switch 1 hardware.
And if this practice continues for Switch 2 games, or was in practice for the Wii U, or etc etc…
It’s a bad practice, even if right now there are ways around it for one game. It’s a bad practice even if it’s only for the current console on the current firmware. It turned a physical copy someone bought into a keycard. I’m of the opinion that all physical console games have been keycards since the day they started having day 1 patches, but at least that argument has the reasonable counterpoint of “you can still play the buggy incomplete v1.0 that’s on the cart/disc, that makes it better than Switch 2 Game Key Cards, which are better than account-locked Digital Games”.
This is direct and complete proof that your physical copy means nothing. The company can still restrict your access whenever they want to. The Switch 1 still gets firmware updates, after all, and firmware updates can’t be rolled back. The physical copy guarantees fuck all in the face of every preservation concern that’s a criticism of digital downloads. DRM-free digital and piracy are the only trustworthy methods of preservation.
FWIW, this likely just has to do with backwards compatibility fixes, since S2 is software emulation rather than hardware. I don’t think they’re likely to go back and intentionally restrict anything on Switch 1 through new firmware updates.
I agree that in an era of patches, physical copies are becoming increasingly imperfect from a preservation perspective, but I hesitate to say they mean nothing. Depends on the game really, and how complete it is at launch.
Correction: Switch 2 Back-compat is not emulation. It is a compatibility layer in the same vein that the Steam Deck runs Windows games despite running on Linux.
For whatever reason, a game company can make your “physical copy” require a digital download to function. If a company decides they don’t want you to play a game (or version) anymore, it being on a cart or disc is not insurance against it.