In case you forgot, Nintendo warned last year that the Switch 2’s GameChat features would only be free for a limited time.
April Fools’ Day is tomorrow, which means you need to prepare yourself for a flurry of pranks from across the games industry, ranging from the typical fake dating sim announcements to the few legitimately good gags.
What’s no joke, however, is that Nintendo is moving the Switch 2’s GameChat feature behind a paywall. So, you only have until the end of today to make use of it at no extra cost.
Nintendo did warn this would be the case when it announced the Switch 2 last year, stating that GameChat would only be free until March 31, 2026.
Starting from April 1, you’ll need to have a Nintendo Switch Online subscription to use these features which, aside from letting you chat with friends during play sessions, also includes letting you share your screen and, by using a compatible USB camera, display your face.
Fortunately, if you really don’t want to give up GameChat, you only need to pay for a standard subscription of £1.50 a month instead of the more expensive Expansion Pack tier.
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It’ll be interesting to see if this change sparks any sort of surge in subscriptions for Nintendo considering you already need one to play most multiplayer games like Mario Kart World online with friends.
Those without a subscription may have made use of the party chat feature just to hang out with friends even when playing different games offline so the question is whether that’ll be enough to coax them into start forking over extra cash for it.
Speaking of Mario Kart World, the new battle mode Nintendo accidentally leaked earlier this month has just been added to the game and, as fans suspected, it’s the returning Bob-omb Blast mode from Mario Kart 8 Deluxe.
At the time, it was theorised this would be part of the Mario Day celebrations on March 10 and possibly be just one inclusion in a larger update.
Obviously, that didn’t happen and now that the mode’s out, it’s clear it’s only part of a standard patch that’s made further balancing changes, such as reducing the range of the boomerang item, and fixed some issues. You can read the full patch notes over on Nintendo’s support website.
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Mario Kart World has seen several updates since launch, adding quality-of-life touches to the free roam mode and adjusting certain tracks, but there’s still no sign of any major DLC.
There’s also yet to be a Nintendo Direct focused on upcoming first-party games though recent rumours say that the company has plans for a new Star Fox game and a remake of The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time for later this year.
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