Friend Codes on Nintendo Switch? Is Nintendo serious with this!?

I can’t believe Nintendo’s back to using the Friend Code system with the Nintendo Switch. I thought we were past this. In fact, Nintendo of America boss Reggie Fils-Aime told reporters back in January of 2017 that the Nintendo Switch would not use friend codes.

Jump to this morning, and reviewers have stated that the Nintendo Switch’s day-one patch adds the inclusion of the archaic friend code system. Really? Another generation of this?

Nintendo created Friend Codes in order to protect the anonymity of young players. That’s always been the assumption. The idea is that Nintendo’s younger player base can stick behind random strings of numbers and protect their identities more easily than is possible with unique and creative usernames.

The trade-off for this system is terrible. If you want to become someone’s friend on the Nintendo Switch and you encounter that person in real life, you have to hand them this extremely long code. Odds are, you don’t remember that code. So you have to look it up.

Screenshot by GamesBeat.

Right, so when your friend texts you and says, “Hey, I just got a Nintendo Switch. What’s your player name?,” you need to fire up your console and navigate to the add friend menu in order to find your own friend code. Unless you write it down somewhere. Which you’re still looking for it in order to give it out to your friends. Instead of just having a name that you know because it’s one that you created like, I don’t know, JoeyPlaysGames, you have to use this randomly assigned string of characters that feel fresh out of 2006.

When Nintendo partnered with DeNA in order to bring their games to the world of mobile gaming and improve their network services, we all assumed that the online space for Nintendo would get better. Maybe some of the stuff is going to get better, but the Switch is only now about to release to the public and reviewers have only today gotten access to the online features. The point is, we don’t know what the future of the Nintendo Switch’s online services look like. What we do know after today is that it’s going to use the Friend Code system. This archaic and ancient system has been frustrating since its inception and first use, and it’s the one thing most Nintendo fans can agree is bad. It’s not a good system. It’s tired.

Article source: https://www.technobuffalo.com/2017/03/02/friend-codes-on-nintendo-switch-bad/