Sad news for fans of older Nintendo games

This Monday, April 8th, will be especially sad for Nintendo fans, as online services for the Wii U and 3DS systems will be shut down for good. Shutting down online services is an unfortunate reality of modern gaming, preventing players from enjoying the online components of various games, and in some cases wiping entire games out of existence. This isn't the first time Nintendo has shut down online services for its consoles, so many fans are expecting the same fate for the Wii U and 3DS.

The Nintendo Wii offered players a variety of online services, including online multiplayer and a store that allowed players to download exclusive WiiWare games and retro games through the virtual console. Unfortunately, Nintendo discontinued online multiplayer for the Wii in 2014, and the store was discontinued in 2019. Similarly, online services for the Nintendo DS were discontinued in 2014. Now the same is happening with Wii U and Nintendo 3DS.

While the Wii store remained open for some time after most other online features were shut down, the opposite was true for the 3DS and Wii U. The 3DS and Wii U stores were shut down last year, although online services for various games were still available on those two platforms. That will soon be over as the online services for Wii U and 3DS will shut down on Monday, April 8th. From now on, the online features of all 3DS and Wii U games will cease to exist, so anyone interested in these features should find some free time to get their hands on their old consoles.

The good news is that the vast majority of Wii U and 3DS games don't put much emphasis on online multiplayer. For the most part, the online features complemented the core games and weren't entirely built around them. However, there are some exceptions to this rule, such as Splatoon. The original Splatoon game has a few offline modes, but the core of the game is the multiplayer PvP experience.