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Here's The List Of The Free NES Titles Coming To Nintendo Switch Online
A year and a half after Nintendo announced that the Switch would get a subscription service, and about a year after the company announced it would be eschewing the virtual console in favor of this service, Nintendo is launching Switch Online. The subscription offers players 20 NES games on the outset with promises to add more every month as time goes on.
Beginning tomorrow, with the Switch Online launch, the following games will be available:
- Soccer
- Tennis
- Donkey Kong
- Mario Bros.
- Super Mario Bros.
- Balloon Fight
- Ice Climber
- Dr. Mario
- The Legend of Zelda
- Super Mario Bros. 3
- Double Dragon
- River City Ransom
- Ghosts'n Goblins
- Tecmo Bowl
- Gradius
- Pro Wrestling
- Excitebike
- Yoshi
- Ice Hockey
- Baseball
At an undetermined date in October, the following games will be added:
- Solomon's Key
- NES Open Tournament Golf
- Super Dodge Ball
November:
- Metroid
- Mighty Bomb Jack
- TwinBee
December:
- Wario's Woods
- Ninja Gaiden
- Adventures of Lolo
A message on Nintendo's NES page indicates that 2019's titles have not been chosen yet. It seems likely that future months will have around the same number of additional games.
All the games will have added online multiplayer where applicable, so you're not suddenly going to be playing Metroid or The Legend of Zelda in multiplayer. You can however stream the game to someone, pass the puck to them to play, or otherwise interact with them.
They also have the Virtual Console template features of save states and temporary restoring. The games are stored locally on the Switch, but the console must connect to the internet once per week to check-in on the licenses for the games.
Nintendo's Switch Online service launches tomorrow, September 18. That means this is your last day to play games like Splatoon 2 and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe online for free.
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