If you were hoping Nintendo had finally decided to step into the modern era of online purchases, you might be disappointed to hear that, according to a Q&A session at the NYC Nintendo World Store, digital Switch games will only be able to be played on one system at a time, and that multiple purchases will be needed to play your digital games on separate consoles. The context of this comes from a YouTuber asking Nintendo's GM of Planning and Development, Shinya Takahashi, if a Nintendo Account's digital games could be shared between two Switch consoles. The response is as follows:

Consumer: “If I want to take my system with me… if I were to buy a digital game, could I buy it once, or would I have to buy it multiple times so they can use those games?”

Takahashi: “Currently we don’t have a system like that in place for Nintendo Switch, but we haven’t made any final decisions about how we would approach that going forward in the future, so unfortunately I can’t provide any concrete answer for you right now.”

While this doesn't mean games are forever locked to a console, and you will likely be able to use a system transfer feature, this is a much less accessible way compared to how competitors Xbox, PlayStation, and Steam allow consumers to download their titles to multiple systems.

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[Zense]

I think the reason people are up in arms about is it because it seems like an inconvenience, when Sony, Microsoft, and even Valve do seamless account transfers for example, I used Steam on my old shitty laptop in 2014, when I got my proper desktop and used my account I only had to type in a pass code. For Sony and Microsoft, you can transfer your account to multiple consoles if you see fit, I don't see why Nintendo can't do this, and having to call them up sounds like a hindrance.

I can say that it'll at least be the same way it is for the 3ds's and for them it works this way.

Many people on this forum have changed their 3ds's and just made the call to Nintendo to have them tranfer their digital games over to their new console. (Like if they had theirs stolen or broken).

I agree that it's tedious, but it's ways better than what system most people seem to think that the Switch is gonna have. I mean, of course it's not gonna be tied directly to the system like for the old Wii. The Wii U happened in between and connecting games to your account works exactly like it does on the 3ds....

I kind of hope that there will be a system for connecting your physical games to you account (if you want to), since for me I don't really care about sharing the cart if I can have it saved to my account forever. I'm probably not gonna buy any physical carts anymore though.

 

[SnAQ]

I'm fine either way, never had the need to download my games at someone else's house and if you think how easy it is to transport a Switch it doesn't really matter if digital downloads are console locked.

 

[LuxerWap]

It's nothing new really. They've done this before on other consoles. The reason? Sharing data to other systems is way too easy and it'll make Nintendo lose more money.

 

[A Plus Ric]

Just because you can do the game on a second console, it's not like anyone but your account can play it, so, you aren't sharing anyways. I have to be logged out of my living room xbox one, to play in my bedrooms xbox one. Also, it's carts....why would u buy digital. And u can literally MOVE THE SWITCH wherever you go. So it's kinda useless.

 

[LegendAssassinF]

"modern era of online purchases"... What console lets you play the same game across multiple consoles with the same ID? As far as I know you can't do this with any console... I can't log into my PS4 and log into another PS4 so my friend and I can play the same game, I can't log into Xbox Live on another console and play the same game either, and I definitely can't do this with Steam... So what modern era did I miss? I know you can put your log info onto other consoles and download stuff but there has never been any console that would let you play together with 1 game purchase.

 

[WolfSaviorZX]

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[LegendAssassinF]

You can do it with Xbox One/360. Xbox One has a "Home Console" which allows you play digital games on that console with an account other than what you brought it. So for example you can play Xbone 1 (Home Console) using Guest Account while playing Xbone 2 (Guest Console) using Original Account at the SAME TIME and Play together. I don't know about playstation but I think it works the same way. Steam let's you play offline on as many computers as you want but yeah only 1 Account play online at the same time.

So in other words it isn't modern considering Xbox One is the only console to do this.