Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack will be available on 26th October, the company has announced, building on all the regular features of Nintendo Switch Online with a library of N64 games, Mega Drive games and bundled in access to the newly announced Animal Crossing: New Horizons – Happy Home Paradise DLC (also available as a standalone purchase).
But how much will it cost? That’s been the burning question about this, given that Nintendo want to charge a higher fee for access.
Nintendo has now confirmed the prices break down as follows, with no change to base Switch Online pricing:
| Nintendo Switch Online | Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pass | |
| 12 months | £17.99 / €19.99 | £34.99 / €39.99 |
| 1 month | £3.49 / €3.99 | N/A |
| 3 months | £6.99 / €7.99 | N/A |
| 12 months (family) | £31.49 / €39.99 | £59.99 / €69.99 |
For solo players, the price remains handily lower than PlayStation Plus and Xbox Live Gold, though it is still doubling the cost. Nintendo Switch Online doesn’t work on a console-level like those services, but instead on an account-by-account basis, necessitating the Family subscription. The downside is it’s more expensive, but the upside is that you can have up to 8 family members across as many consoles as you like, all with access to Switch Online features.
Nintendo also promised the ability to upgrade to the Expansion Pass, which will be handled with a pro-rated discount depending on how many days you have left in your subscription.
On day one, Expansion Pack will feature the following games:
Nintendo 64
- Super Mario 64
- Mario Kart 64
- Lylat Wars 64
- Yoshi’s Story
- The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
- Dr. Mario 64
- Mario Tennis
- Operation Winback
- Sin and Punishment
Sega Mega Drive
- Golden Axe
- Strider
- Musha
- Shining Force
- Sonic The Hedgehog 2
- Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine
- Streets of Rage
- Shinobi III
- Ecco The Dolphin
- Gunstar Heroes
- Phantasy Star IV
- Castlevania Bloodlines
- Contra Hard Corps
- Ristar
The library of N64 and Mega Drive games come with many of the emulation features found for the NES and SNES games. You can create save points whenever you like to suspend the game and resume, and there’s support for online multiplayer where there was none before. Mega Drive titles will also let you rewind the game.
It was recently confirmed that European gamers will have access to the 60Hz NTSC versions of N64 games, with select titles then offering the option of the localised 50Hz PAL versions that run slower.
So what do you think? Is that a fair fee for Nintendo to charge for a year’s worth of access to classic titles such as these? Would you rather be able to just buy the ones you want outright?