Switch Online "Expansion Pack" - Nintendo 64 and Sega Mega Drive games to be added

Nintendo Life wrote:
Nintendo 64 And Sega Genesis 'Expansion Pack' Announced For Switch Online, Launches This October

During the latest 'Direct' broadcast, Nintendo dropped some big news - with the reveal of a Nintendo 64 and Sega Genesis (Mega Drive) 'expansion pack' for the Switch Online service.

This will be a "new membership plan" and is launching "late" in October (aka next month). It will come packed with all the base features of the Nintendo Switch Online membership, and more details about the pricing and timing of this release will be shared soon.

twitter.com/NintendoAmerica/status/1441166635801346049

Existing plans will also remain available - so there's no need to worry about losing your old membership or anything like that. As for the games on offer, there'll be a "collection" of N64 and Sega Genesis titles. Here are the ones you can expect at launch, along with some future titles:

Nintendo 64

Launch titles:

Super Mario 64
Mario Kart 64
Star Fox 64
Yoshi's Story
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
WinBack: Covert Operations
Mario Tennis
Dr. Mario 64
Sin & Punishment

Future releases:

The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask
Mario Golf
Pokémon Snap
F-Zero X
Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards
Paper Mario
Banjo-Kazooie
Custom Robo (Japan only)
Custom Robo V2 (Japan only)

Sega Mega Drive

Launch titles:

Castlevania: Bloodlines
Contra: Hard Corps
Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine (Puyo Puyo - Japan)
Ecco the Dolphin
Golden Axe
Gunstar Heroes
M.U.S.H.A.
Phantasy Star IV
Ristar
Shining Force
Shinobi III
Sonic the Hedgehog 2
Streets of Rage
Strider

Figured this was worthy of its own thread, hope that's OK.

Personally I'll be waiting on the pricing news before upgrading my NSO 'tier'. Bit disappointed by the launch range too but perhaps I was expecting too much...

What are your thoughts? How much do you play the NES and SNES games currently available to NSO members? Will you be investing in an N64 or SMD controller to play the games? Would you rather have seen a Mini Console announced? Or a different console range brought to the Switch Online service - Game Boy? GBA?

It all depends on the versions of the games. If they are just straight N64 emulation with the fog I probably won't bother? If it's th 3DS version of Ocarina and Star Fox 64 then it'll be more appealing.

There is already an unlimited number of ways of playing those Mega Drive games.

Good news. Personally I still have my N64 and games and, while I never owned a Mega Drive (always played on friends' machines), I have a few of its games downloaded onto Wii though virtual console. Great chance for people who haven't played on the machines until now though.

The thing is I do have my Megadrive, in fact I still have it set up, but I still think this is kind of cool, one issue is though that I purchased that Megadrive collection digitally for switch so until they start brining out different bits there will be quiet a bit of overlap with that in terms of what games I have.

The good side of the N64 for me is I don't get on with the N64 pad so if I can use the switch controls to play the games it might make me enjoy the games more as thats been true when I played N64 stuff on the wii with the classic controller.

It does all come down to how much extra they want, and as I am on a family account it depends how much extra I have to pay for everyone to have it etc

If I did go for this I would want the Japanese exclusive Sega 6 button pad.

they had my money the moment they showed Ristar. and being able to play Zelda OOT and Paper Mario on the switch is a big yes for me.

I wonder what the other features will be

Seeing as Mario 64 is in this, and 3d all stars was taken off sale, i wonder if that means GC/sunshine & wii/galaxy will be on this at some point.

Last edited by Errkal on Sun Sep 26, 2021 1:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.

shy guy 64 wrote:I wonder what the other features will be

Being Nintendo probably nothing.

I may be the only one but this seems like a piss take, Nintendo Online is a piss poor offering and adding more as an extra cost tier is Nintendo just laughing at everyone.

I can see it being better if you play the games more but it's games they have rinsed a thousand times over and now want to charge monthly for, it should need a damn upgrade.

Godzilla wrote:It all depends on the versions of the games. If they are just straight N64 emulation with the fog I probably won't bother? If it's th 3DS version of Ocarina and Star Fox 64 then it'll be more appealing.

No way they use the 3DS versions, these will be straight N64 roms

I may consider upgrading once stuff like Paper Mario and FZero X comes out, no interest in Megadrive as they have been released so many times before

Shocking it’s taken 5 years to get N64 onto Switch, I wish they had the apps like they are but allowed you to purchase the games rather than the current option where we will lose access again once NSO Goes offline. I wish Nintendo handled legacy content better

Waiting on pricing before getting to interested in this. I'm open to paying a maximum of £10 extra a year for these otherwise they can dream on.

I play a fair amount of the NES/SNES catalogue that's available right now so I'm sure I'd do the same with these

Godzilla wrote:It all depends on the versions of the games. If they are just straight N64 emulation with the fog I probably won't bother? If it's th 3DS version of Ocarina and Star Fox 64 then it'll be more appealing.

It's going to be straight N64 emulation

Herdanos wrote:
Launch titles:

Super Mario 64
Mario Kart 64
Star Fox 64
Yoshi's Story
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
WinBack: Covert Operations
Mario Tennis
Dr. Mario 64
Sin & Punishment

Stop doing the old joke Nintendo Life

For me, I have all those Sega games already, often several times, so they're not a draw for me personally.

N64 is more interesting. But whilst it might be nice to play Yoshi's Story again, I can't imagine it would be for more than a few hours.

Likewise Sin & Punishment - I could swear I already had that as an e-shop purchase on the Wii or Wii U, but I might be misremembering that. It's just I'd need to get them down from the attic.

What I would pay for, though, would be access to my old e-shop games on those systems again, if they could roll that forward somehow, with a reasonable monthly subscription to allow it and pay for its upkeep. I'd lazily choose to do that rather than scrambling about in the loft.

I’m more keen to see GameCube and Wii games at this point, they need to revisit those libraries at some point, they’ll need more work especially Wii games but I’d be willing to buy those per release if that’s the case

Victor Mildew wrote:Seeing as Mario 64 is in this, and 3d all stars was taken off sale, i wonder if that means GC/sunshine & wii/galaxy will be on this at some point.

Yes, but they’ll be in tiers 3 and 4, charged separately.

Contrast it with Game Pass, where they added all of EA Play for no extra cost. I know the Nintendo fee isn’t comparable, but still.

Can you purchase these games outright or are they only available for as long as you're subscribed?

rinks wrote:
Victor Mildew wrote:Seeing as Mario 64 is in this, and 3d all stars was taken off sale, i wonder if that means GC/sunshine & wii/galaxy will be on this at some point.

Yes, but they’ll be in tiers 3 and 4, charged separately.

And exclusive to the more powerful such model

KK wrote:Can you purchase these games outright or are they only available for as long as you're subscribed?

Latter

Switch Online "Expansion Pack" - Nintendo 64 and Sega Mega Drive games to be added

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