This is, uh, interesting...be careful out there Switch 2 physical buyers. https://en-americas-support.nintendo.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/68415

#NintendoDirect

@Ossi Yeah... How do you know?

As in, how do I know if this key has been used?

@jazzburn It's not an actual key that you can view. It's a physical cart that does the authentication for you to download the digital version of the game. Except you have to have it physically inserted each time you want to play the digital game...like what the heck?!

@Ossi buuhhhhh???

@jazzburn yuuuuup

@Ossi Does this key require Internet access?

@jazzburn The first time you put it in, yea. And of course to download the game from Nintendo if you uninstall it. The game is NOT on the physical game card itself.

@Ossi This is so weird. Why does this even exist.

@Radgryd They want to pressure people to spend money on digital versions of games so that they can more easily control what we have access to.

Having to re-purchase your library every console generation like some kind of pseudo-subscription service is appealing to them so they make it hard to protect your purchases.

This Game-Key Card system is worse than just buying digital since there's an extra way to lose access to your games.

Also, you can't dump the card for backups or emulation.

@Ossi @Radgryd We lost that battle long ago anyway, like on PC optical media for games is pretty much dead much stuff is download only.

Though there is atleast choice of store on PC. Especially with indie stuff I can just choose to purchase from a store which has no DRM. GOG and itch come to mind. But yeah this is a fucking problem with bigger Games. Like Ubisoft when they pulled the Plug on the Crew and got a lot of coverage that way. Like bad one. Or I think Rockstar when they pulled licensed music from one of their games cause they did not want to renew.that license.

With Nintendo this stuff will be worse if they decided to just not care anymore. Atleast for their older consoles you had plenty time to download stuff I guess?

@stefan @Ossi It's yet another reason for me not to invest into consoles and/or their games. For PC, although yes, most games are download-only at this point, there are way more and easier ways to preserve these games.

@Ossi imagine buying a game from someone and realising it's this and it was already used

@Ossi btw do I understand that correctly? If you bought a used one, would it not work?

@wuchta This is a good question. I'm assuming since this works the same way as a digital game code that the online authentication ties it to your account. So I doubt someone else could use it. But I don't know for sure.