By this point I'm sure you've been called out on this more than once, but In a word, Bollocks.
The online play come2018 will be exactly the same as it is now, and if you believe otherwise, to quote you, you are "insane". Nintendo isn't going to massively revamp two of its three existing big pillars of online play that they're releasing in 2017 (kart and splatoon), plus the new game in ARMS.
There's these things, they're called "software patches". How they work is that they take an existing piece of software and replace existing code and "patch in" a replacement code.
And I can guarantee that their existing games will get such software patches to conform to Nintendo's online services as they're rolled out.
We live in an amazing era, don't we?
You're right, what you'll get once it rolls out is voice chat through your phone and next to no online functions from your switch.
Tell me the stock prices for the day you're currently situated in, future man.
Besides, you forgot subscriber-only eShop discounts. Which is an online function from the Switch. But I won't split hairs, you're doing just fine at that.
Wii U at least didn't had friend codes, you're right it's not an apt one.
It's hilarious that you think friend codes will survive the entire generation and be the only option to find friends online.
Vita's 1st party support has nothing to do with it's online fonctionnalities. The truth is, in 2011, it was able to do more than Switch in term of connectivity, so Nintendo has no excuses. Free of charge.
The fact that it had bombed or not is irrelevant to the day one fonctionnalities. So Nintendo should be able to provide the same.
It has a direct relation. If Vita had been a success, you bet your ass Sony would have killed free online on Vita when PS Plus was announced. But they had to sell the thing desperately somehow, so it was left alone, because they weren't likely to collect much money from the pittance of people who bought it, anyways. They were incentivizing a dying platform with a really low amount of online players. That plays a big factor.
Beside the fact that some of their online service will be free before the paywall goes up.
Also, no, online multiplayer wasn't always free on PC, especially when MS tried to make it pay with GFWL.
Yeah, and that died on the vine.
And you know what ? Online multiplayer was always free with Nintendo. Heck, it IS free right now with Switch. What's the argument to make it pay in 2018 ? Providing services not on par with a 2005 console and a 2011 handheld ? Renting 25 years old games ? This is BS.
I don't have one. You'll have to ask people paying $50 a year for something that's not on par with PC offerings and why they blithely accepted it for generations. I don't have the answer. I want these things to be free, too, with the features that can be expected. But I'm not so naive as to think they can be anymore, because it's been allowed, accepted and, in some cases, championed elsewhere. I only really hoped we wouldn't have to pay the same $50 a year, even if it meant fewer bells and whistles, because paying something was expected.
Also, considering none of these Switch online services currently exist for us to sample, how are they not on par? It's not like we can compare them. I don't know what I'm getting for what I pay for, I'm going to find out like everyone else.
You're saying it's a standard on consoles, but I thought Nintendo didn't had to be up to standards ? I mean, it's okay for Nintendo to not be up to standards when they have subpar services, why should they have to be up to standards when it comes to online paywall ? People keep arguing Nintendo is doing their own thing to excuse when they're late in major stuff and now people are arguing that others are doing it, so Nintendo is following.
Nintendo has been ignoring realities for years, even today. Can't they ignore another one ? Or is it okay for them to ignore it only when it's to defend them when they're late ?
Ignoring the realities of the console hardware market is partly why Wii U sold like garbage and partly why 3DS underperformed, so they got what they deserved, in that regard.
But with Switch, they're starting to accept certain market realities; they reworked their whole approach to hardware because of it. This just happens to be another.