Reminder: Nintendo Is Ending 3DS And Wii U Online Play Early Next Month

At first I thought this was Nintendo shutting down online play earlier than scheduled. Glad to see we still have 12 more days…

Now to grind 100 Mario Challenge costumes until it’s gone.

Hopefully Pretendo will be able to finish their own servers, it would be a shame to forever lose the ability to experience the online modes in these games, especially the ones that focus heavily on multiplayer like Federation Force and Triforce Heroes!

Trying to get through dragon quest 7 twice. Not sure if i will make it.

I've been playing Splatoon nearly every day for weeks. The lobby is usually full, so I guess a lot of folks are also trying to get every last minute out of this.

nothing lasts forever i guess...

Steel Diver: Sub Wars' servers already got the axe, loaded it up for the first time in a while last month... boom. Hopefully third party servers for that will exist one day in the not far future. For 3DS online multiplayer I never had more fun than in those waters.

fitting this is the same day as the eclipse

Sadly, this is the future of gaming from here on out.

It used to be you bought a console, some game carts/discs, and could play as much as you wanted until either of those things broke or died.

But now, with the emphasis on "always online" and frequent updates, there comes a point where the servers shut down and the game loses some functionality or even becomes unplayable.

Thank god there's a dedicated fanbase of hardcore nerds who can find ways to circumvent this, but even they can only do so much (provided they aren't slapped down by the Powers That Be).

I haven't been able to redownload wiiware titles on my wii U the past few days. I wonder if it's temporary or what? I should probably just mod my wii u and use the free online stuff (which I'm sure is way faster too)..

I've been playing mario kart 7, pokemon x and fire emblem and few others. It's a nostalgic trip to my early teen years and will always be my favorite nintendo era.

I've also played some Splatoon 1 and Mario Kart 8 over the past couple days. Looks like there will be people playing until the last minute. Hopefully enthusiasts will keep it going after Ninty shuts their servers down.

It's Sad to see this happen. Just please add 100 Mario to Mario maker 2 please once it's down. Oh yeah and costumes and Lanky Mario 😊

@HylianFox,

You can carry on playing until your console dies..... just not online.

@Burning_Spear Good to know. I think I'll set up my Wii U for a final hurrah.

Like some others have mentioned, I’ve been playing Splatoon 1 for the last week too (still my favourite Splatoon), and will hopefully be playing until the servers are literally shut off.

Lobbies are pretty active so if anyone is on the fence about jumping back in, dust off your Wii U and hook it back it up!

This is why I collect for PS4/5 not switch. Nintendo is solely business oriented. With the switch 2 Nintendo will cease support for the old switch right away.

@dr-gorgo Wdym by "cease support"? Stop releasing games on the Switch 1? They definitely are not going to immediately shut down online play for all Switch games and shut down the eshop.

They shut down online play for these two consoles seven years after they got replaced. You don't know what they are going to do with the old Switch once the Switch 2 releases.
Clearly you don't know what you're talking about.

If history is anything to go by the Switch 2 is going to be backwards compatible, which means them continuing to use the same eshop on there is not far fetched and online games are going to be playable on there too. Any severs will get shut down many years after the Switch 2 releases.

Makes me wonder if Xenoblade Chronicles X can still be played after this. I never did beat that game.

@Ryu_Niiyama why do you say that? you have some online DLC stuff to get or what?

@dr-gorgo,

I would suggest them supportiing the Wii U for as they did, considering it only sold 13 million consoles, and it's best selling game around 8 million copies, is being very customer orientated. Even the 3DS was well down on DS numbers.

@dr-gorgo Sony lack 'customer focus' or however you want to put it every bit as much as Nintendo, in different ways. They're all huge businesses, none of them care about their customers beyond how they can get money out of us.

@SteveDaSteve Both of those games were abysmal and are blemishes on their respective franchises.

@johnvboy ...but a physical copy can be played on any 3DS or Wii U whereas digital copies are tied to one console. In other words, with digital copies, the games die with the console but with physical copies you need only replace the console.

Is this when we lose the ability to download games we have purchased or was that taken already? Or is that not being touched?

I had a lot of fun with the 3DS and Wii U over the years. Fortunately the damage is somewhat reduced given all those Wii U ports to Switch and that's somewhat starting to happen on the 3DS side like MK8 Deluxe has a fair amount of tracks that appeared in MK7 and LM2 is incoming but it's still sad to see those systems further coming to an end.

My biggest hope at this point regarding 3DS/Wii U online is that Splatoon 3 rescues Urchin Underpass and Saltspray Rig (the 2 missing Splatoon 1 stages) at some point before Splatoon 3 support ends.

@Crono1973,

Don't by digital for the main games, we all know Nintendo's account sytem is not up the the standards of Microsoft etc, why this is still a surprise to people is a mystery.

@AG_Awesome That's not being affected. You can still redownload your previously purchased digital content and will be able to after the shutdown of the online play.

I don't play online from my Wii U and 3DS games anymore so I don't think I will miss them.
Also, it will make Splatoon 1 Wii U completely feels like demo version of Offline style Ratchet & Clank game on Wii U. You can't even buy any outfits or weapons if your Wii U is Offline.

@Bluerangervegeta I disagree. Both were very fun games and I remember having a ton of fun playing both of them, particularly Triforce Heroes. There is no way they are a “blemish” on the series, as both series have continued to produce great and successful games (Unless you look at Metroid Prime specifically, come on Prime 4!)

@Bluerangervegeta Nah, Federation Force was great fun in co-op. Never played Triforce Heroes.

I've just got two Super Expert costumes to go in Super Mario Maker.

@SteveDaSteve In my experience the official Triforce Heroes servers stopped being able to find me other players to quest with by mid-2016...I can't see unofficial servers being very active for that reason haha

@Big_Fudge as opposed to paying extra for high speed internet, then paying extra for online service, so you can play with people not in the same room as you....

I've also never had a game stop working. Whose breaking their games all the time?

Point is, we used to buy games and that was that....we owned them. Didn't have to wait for a download, didn't have to pay for a service, didn't need to pay extra for in game accessories or outfits, didn't need to pay extra to unlock content that may or may not already be available at launch, didnt have to worry about servers being shut down or anything else that could remove features of the game we bought, and we could actually sit down In the same room as someone and play together. Most of that is gone or on its way out. It's sad, don't try and minimize it.

@dr-gorgo first off, all corporations are only business oriented. Especially Sony.

Second, you must not know any of Nintendos history, cause they definitely don't shut down support after the new console is released. Pretty obvious given that this is happening 7 years after they discontinued the wii U and 3DS. If the switch 2 is backwards compatible (like it probably is) we'll be even better off.

@Ryu_Niiyama I'm the same, need to try and get the extra story DLC before the online ends.

@JohnnyMind Yeah, I'm probably going to mod my 3DS and wii u sometime soon. Sounds like it's faster to download games now using the unofficial shops.

@Predator Yeah I don’t usually feel this way but I wish I could download a save file with everything lol. I missed out on the DQ IX DLC (didn’t know about it until it was too late) so I am trying not to do that again but the fact that this is post game…is making this difficult.