My Nintendo's online suboption is a bandage for its unambitious rewards



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If I own this Nintendo, then why do not I have stocks in the business?

For months, we've been hungry for information about the Nintendo Switch Online subscription service, and even now that it's launched, we're feeling "and what else?". The details until the day of its launch were rare and not very accurate. One particular piece of information we learned before it started was how the service was linked to one of Nintendo's other services. My Nintendo, Nintendo's replacement rewards program for Club Nintendo, will allow you to spend gold coins earned when you buy games on Switch Online subscriptions.

Technically, it's only about spending gold on the eShop in the same way as anything else. For technical reasons, I will continue to talk about a "reward" even if it is not listed as a reward as it is an option for exchanging coins, and coins n & # 39; 39 really exist only to be exchanged for gratifying things. But it's not really a reward that most of us want, but it's a reward we need to get the basic features we had previously.

That does not mean that I do not like the option. In fact, this is perhaps the best idea that Switch Online and My Nintendo currently offer. But this is only a good idea in that it covers some of My Nintendo's vulnerabilities and allows us to avoid spending money on a poor online subscription rather than turning us into a positive experience. . It's a step in the right direction, but their legs are just as deep in their own problems.

Many of our recent articles and comments concur that Switch Online's features are not up to par, so I will not beat this deadly horse more than I've done before. My Nintendo could use more projectors, mainly because this is the first time that many of us have been thinking about it for months or more. Not only are there very few interesting rewards for the program, but among those few interesting rewards, the only one that complements its design is the one we just got. And it is not so complementary as that.

Most of My Nintendo's rewards are discounts on games (and some full downloads that we only received in July). Most of these games are several years old before they are available, but they are a great option for late users. The problem is that My Nintendo coins expire over time – gold coins in one year and platinum coins in half the time. The program is built around winning coins and trading them in less time than it takes for most of the potential software rewards to be available. So, saving coins in anticipation of a given match to get a deal later is a questionable point.

Most of the other rewards are digital themes / backgrounds and mobile gaming booty. The former are interesting to have, but they are less interesting than the themes purchased on the eShop, which makes them easy to ignore. These are just handfuls of items that can be acquired by playing Nintendo's mobile games normally, assuming you play them in the first place.

There are also a handful of simple software downloads, which have not been updated since the program was launched. These are Zelda Picross (in fact, a good offer, just a very small one to be the most expensive platinum award), Flipnote Studio 3D (It's good to have the back, but to focus on the "have it" part), and a Smash controller app to use your 3DS as a controller on the Wii U (. .. wait, why?).

Compare that to the old Nintendo loyalty program. Club Nintendo had more original games like The punch of Doc Louis and Grill-Off with Ultra Hand, in addition to its growing lineup of full-featured game downloads, and continued to get more original content over time. In addition, while Club Nintendo's grading systems encouraged many pieces in a given time frame, these pieces did not disappear over time.

This just leaves the option of using gold coins for eShop Switch purchases. It works at a 1 cent exchange rate for 1 piece of gold, which is not a valuable exchange rate, since they are earned at a rate of 5 coins per dollar spent. This is by far the least profitable use of parts compared to the discounts on 3DS and Wii U software. It is extremely disconcerting that the Switch is Nintendo's most conspicuous console for over a year, but that it has the least valuable support of the Nintendo Customer Rewards Program. There is not even a discount for the Switch on My Nintendo site.

But this option offers Nintendo Switch Online subscriptions. Given the expiry date of My Nintendo coins, the most effective way to collect them is to spend them continuously within this time frame. The gold coins last about as long as an annual subscription. Even if buying a subscription with nothing but gold is unrealistically expensive, gold can be used to partially cover any online shop purchase, thus placing each piece to use even if it is not enough on its own.

Since this is such an essential service, it makes sense to make a Switch Online subscription one of the first things to spend on gold coins. Even if the parts can not renew the submarines (but why), it is possible to continually buy new subscriptions and to guarantee the use of these parts (make sure that your hardware backups are up-to-date first ). It's a safe bet that it will prevent large stocks of coins from disappearing due to negligence over time.

The least convincing part (aside from the ineffective exchange rate) is that this purchase takes us back to the status quo before this option is available for purchase, rather than giving us something we did not have before. That's what makes most of these rewards so insurmountable – there's nothing ambitious enough to be attractive compared to what we had before My Nintendo. The status quo is lower than it was back when we had Club Nintendo.

I'm aware that by excluding integration with Switch Online, many of my points compare this program to another that has long since disappeared, but that's sort of the problem. We have a reference framework to something that Nintendo has done once before, and this frame of reference offered a lot more. I did not even mention the plethora of physical activities such as playing cards, bags, accessories and other things completely missing from My Nintendo.

The online purchase is a bandage for the symptom of not spending coins. But this has never been the real problem with My Nintendo, otherwise we would celebrate the horrible exchange rate of the gold coins of the eShop. The real problem is that when we compare the Nintendo Club to My Nintendo after this one, the former had a wider choice of unique rewards with a system that rewards patience and saves coins instead of punishing it. In other words, the old system is a more rewarding rewards program that gives users more options and freedom to use their rewards as they see fit. This new program has little or no ambition to provide everything that people can not get anywhere else, but it punishes indecision and frugality.


I guess Nintendo closed Club Nintendo because it was getting too expensive to keep running. Nintendo has never provided an official explanation, but it is the most logical assumption I can make. These rewards programs are bizarre business practices in that, while obviously designed to encourage people to spend more money, their costs are becoming more difficult to maintain as their clients redeem them. I imagine that the thought process of anyone who designed My Nintendo was to make something less ambitious and make it safer with expenses, from which 99% of these rewards are content downloads already. existing. The problem is that this program does not feel like wanting to play safely.

Not that we need a better rewards program for ourselves. It is unhealthy to sign up for a rewards program and buy a lot of things that you do not want just because you want the rewards. Most of us do not subscribe to rewards systems just to get rewards, we register because we already buy related products. And Nintendo's exclusive games for two years are among the best. As long as Nintendo keeps its current A-game, we do not need those imaginary coins (and even if they are not, it's not like Nintendo's Bitcoins were a compensation suitable for lower games). . A good rewards program should be designed as a supplement, and no longer.

But Nintendo has the impression of wasting resources and time to continue promoting a program that sparks so little interest. It's inherently embarrassing to think that something you collect is wasted, even if you do not use it anyway. And the current state of My Nintendo is causing bad public relations with Nintendo's most loyal customers. Nintendo earns more money than it has done for a long time thanks to the incredible success of the Switch. It is hard to imagine that they can not meet the demand that their Club Nintendo request, or at least that they could not partially compound it instead of pushing the brakes thoroughly.

Since we do not spend anything to participate, it is reasonable to say that neither the average consumer nor Nintendo want a customer loyalty program that we do not appreciate. We do not necessarily need Club Nintendo 2.0, but this seems to be the simplest solution to My Nintendo's problems. Until then, I plan to buy as many Nintendo games as I would otherwise. I would feel a little happier if all those imaginary pieces I collected could be better used than buying an online subscription service.

And no, smash do not count until we know if it is dedicated servers.

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