Funny joke, Nintendo

 Now get serious

Oh, excuse me but I appear to have be grasped by the spirit of the giggles for a little bit, because I just heard the incredible joke that they're telling over on the Nintendo forums about how they intend to go about marketing their new online option. (Do you know this, have you heard about this?) Basically it goes thusly, Nintendo already charge a premium price in order to access their lacklustre online infrastructure that's so spotty that mobile Fortnite has a better competitive scene than the Switch version. This is the great conceit of bowing to a company as huge and successful as Nintendo, they have the money and the influence to make decent internet infrastructure, but why bother when the fans will pay them for the crap they currently have anyway? So this is something we've all swallowed from the last generation of consoles, and the one before that, onwards to this new gen. But where I must have lost sight of the joke is at the point that a new £50 a year option was conjured out of thin air without seeing it coming.

It's just so funny to think that Nintendo aren't just happy charging us for a service so pathetic that I can achieve a more reliable peer-to-peer communication using smoke signals, and they want to try and shoot for more. I mean these guys should really sign up for stand up, because they've got some side-splitters over there! When compared to the Microsoft and Sony platforms, both of which hold their online ecosystems to significant standards, trying to price match them with a notably inferior product is... well is shows gusto. And then try and throw in the PC platform to the mix which, as I'm sure everyone remembers, requires no subscription charge, what can you do but laugh at the callous absurdity of it all? I mean you might as well, seeing as how Nintendo management is currently looking down at all us millions of customers and seeing only the red noses and white face paints from a gaggle of clowns.

First of all, what the heck is 'expansion pack membership'? Are you microtransaction-ing subscription offers? That- that doesn't even make sense. Just call is a 'premium membership' you bunch of weirdoes! Secondly, I am to understand that this price point covers a whole separate subscription that covers all the membership of basic paid subscription, right? Because otherwise you're asking me to shell out £65 a year for the pathetic offerings on the virtual console and online net-code on par with Diablo II. Now I like the virtual console, I really do. Heck, every Saturday I play a Legend of Zelda game whilst pretending to watch trash TV with the rest of my family, it's practically a tradition at this point. But the second you start charging a subscription fee to access decades old games that run just fine on emulation software, (oh yeah, I'm going there, Nintendo!) you're treading on eggshells. Or in the wake of this recent news, I suppose it might be more accurate to say that Nintendo is break-dancing ontop of them.

Because, yeah, if you take a look at the resources detailing exactly what this extra £50 a year is doing for you, it isn't too hard to spot that it isn't really much of anything at all. Do we get cloud saves for every game? No. Fast tracking to a better online infrastructure. No. (Although thank god on that point. That would be a super screwed up subscription incentive and something I wouldn't put past these suits) What you get is access to the new N64 virtual console. And that's it? £50 for a year's access to a 20 year old library of games? I could buy an N64 for that money, and I'd still be over paying! There's talk of some virtual console online capabilities, but that seems not to be retroactive to other virtual machines, as well as voice chat that you need an app on your phone in order to use. (At that point I might as well just call them on Zoom) Do I get a complementary slap in the face from Nintendo management too, or is that just implied?

I mean just get real- yes, we all know the incredibly important place that the Nintendo 64 had in video gaming history, but that is in the past, it's behind us now. You can't be swinging around the old N64 like it's the new hotness and expecting the fanbase to obediently dance behind you to the tune of your rat-flute. We reserve the right to go "Hang on, this is worth an extra £5 at a stretch; what you're asking for is bloody extortionate!" The list of games coming straight away isn't even that wacky either. You've got Star Fox 64, Ocarina of Time, Mario Kart 64 and- Dr Mario 64? Really? You just had to drag Dr Mario out of retirement for this one? Making him sacrifice his medical licence in order to whore him out to the mobile store gods wasn't enough for the Nintendo Pimps?

There is another huge boon coming to this price point, however. Something huge that'll absolutely make up for the brand new £50 hole in everyone's wallets. You ready for this? You get free access to the new Animal Crossing New Horizons DLC. That's- that's also a thing I guess. Something literally no one asked for, because New Horizons is really on the down swing of it's popularity ride, is being included in this price point. You can buy the DLC separately as well, this is just a bizarre addendum to try and justify the extortion under the warped belief that everyone receives their money's worth even if they didn't explicit ask for this. Hey Nintendo, I don't own Animal Crossing New Horizons, so can I get a twenty quid discount seeing as how that part of the deal is utterly meaningless to me? I'm guessing that's going to be a no.

And do you want to know the worst part about all of this? The thing that makes it just all that more unpalatable? I mean- I bet if you're at all familiar with fandom and the industry you already know the worst thing, but let's say it together anyway: Nintendo fans are going to buy it. That's right, Nintendo's bad behaviour is going to be rewarded with financial gains which is going to encourage them to do this more. Do you think the Gamecube emulator is going to be attached to this expansion pass? Hell no, that'll probably be an expansion expansion, something that requires you to pay atop the new price so that you're dropping something close to £100 a year, all for the pleasure of heaving Nintendo spit on you from atop their ivory tower whilst you thank them for it.

By merit of pure nostalgia, I find it hard to chide Nintendo nearly as thoroughly as I always do with EA or Activision. Even this move here I can sort of- if not justify- make sense of it in my head by figuring that it is entirely optional. It's not like the old EA crap of "We give you the option of spending money and not spending money. Whilst doing everything in our power to ensure that the free option makes your life as miserable as possible." What Nintendo have here is actually just a terrible deal that isn't worth the price, so I don't feel bad for ignoring it. I just wish that Nintendo respected it's loyalists enough to not take advantage of them like this, and respected their missions towards 'fun' enough to be positive role models in the industry. But I guess this disappointment is just my due punishment for the sick crime having any sort of expectations, huh.