Nintendo Switch Online announced

Today I received an e-mail about Nintendo Switch Online.  This is Nintendo's take on PSPlus and Xbox Live Gold.  Like PSPlus, you'll need it to play online games, and you'll get the ability to cloud save.  At the moment they haven't said you'll get new games every month, but the service will give you access to a library of classic Nintendo titles.  It's launching with 20 NES games: Ice Climber, The Legend of Zelda, Balloon Fight, Soccer, Tennis, Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros., Dr Mario, Super Mario Bros. 3 and Donkey Kong, plus 10 more titles.  There will also be exclusive offers for members, which presumably are reduced price games, and a iOS/Android app that offers different in-game features and voice chat whilst playing on your Switch.

The service will launch in September 2018.  Individual membership for a year will cost £17.99 and a Family membership will cost £31.49.  From May 15th there will be an account setting that allows you to group up to eight Nintendo Accounts (including Child Accounts) together as one Family Group.  With PSPlus, though I'm the member everyone else on the PlayStation can play the games I've downloaded/bought, and play online, but they don't get the cloud saving.  With Nintendo Switch Online it sounds like you'll all have to be part of the Family Group to play the games with your own account (though if you don't care about playing under your name, I suppose you can just use the member's account).

Xbox Live Gold is £39.99 a year, PSPlus is £49.99 a year, and this will be £31.49 a year (with the Family option).  So whatever the fine print, it does come in cheaper than the other consoles.  It very much depends what ends up in that game library.  I'm quite excited to play old games on the Switch, and Seb will definitely want to play the Mario games...