My nintendo switch collection. How the Nintendo Switch handles your privacy when using the store

How the Nintendo Switch handles your privacy when using the store

When you use the Nintendo Switch eShop (or any of Nintendo’s online services), there’s an understanding that some of your personal information is going to Nintendo. Obviously, your card is being used to make purchases, and with that goes your name and billing address and zip code. and possibly more.

Nintendo has laid out what it does with your info in its privacy policy, but it can be a bit dense. So what’s actually happening with your info when you make an eShop purchase?

What information does Nintendo collect when I use the eShop?

The eShop, like most other online stores, collects a bunch of your personal information. Specifically, this information may be collected and stored with Nintendo as a part of your use of the eShop or any other Nintendo online service. The policy states the following:

• Any information you provide while using the eShop or your account. That can mean your name, email address, phone number, date of birth, country, language, gender, and time zone.
• Information that can be gleaned from how you use the eShop. Nintendo can collect data on your Switch itself (such as its device model and serial number, operating system, Internet provider, IP address, etc), location, and (obviously) the purchases you make
• Your precise location
• Information about how you connect with others, your gameplay, and your history of using Nintendo services
• Anything you upload or have uploaded to Nintendo services, such as text messages, images, or video. These, in particular, aren’t likely to be collected specifically as a part of eShop use, but if you’re using the eShop you’re likely using the rest of Nintendo’s online services, so this data will be collected if you ever upload anything.
• Your purchases, including associated account and credit card information, and your billing and shipping addresses.

How does Nintendo use that information?

Nintendo makes use of your data beyond the initial purchase you make. For the most part, Nintendo uses the information it collects to make internal decisions about things like the eShop and how to market games. It also reserves the right to use your information as a way to share new features with you that, based on data it has collected, it thinks might be relevant to you, and may also tailor ads to your profile. It will also send you emails alerting you to new games or features.

Does Nintendo share my information with third parties?

The short answer is yes, but no more than just about any other online service. The information collected listed above may be shared with certain Nintendo partners, or for what Nintendo refers to as legal and business purposes, which can include enforcing Nintendo’s copyrights, selling company assets, or complying with an investigation.

Your information will also go to any third-party services you opt to connect with, such as by logging into a Hulu or Epic Games account through your Switch, so purchase and download those services knowing that using them will also give them your data under their own privacy policies.

What Nintendo will not do is sell your information to other companies, or share it for the purpose of advertising.

Can Parental Controls stop Nintendo from collecting my child’s information?

To a degree. Nintendo doesn’t knowingly collect information on children under the age of 13, but in order for Nintendo to be aware of a child’s age, you’ll need to use parental controls to define what information is acceptable to collect. You can keep your child from making purchases and control how their information is shared by downloading the free Nintendo Switch Parent App.

Can I opt out of sharing my information?

Not really. The only real way to opt out of sharing information on your Switch is to never connect to the Internet or use the eShop, in which case you’ll only be able to play physical Switch games, and even then you’ll be missing out on any online updates. The best you can do is ask Nintendo not to save your payment information, and share as little information as possible in your various online profiles.

For the full text of Nintendo’s Privacy Policy, check it out on the website.

Explore the vast land—and skies—of Hyrule

An epic adventure awaits in the Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom game, only on the Nintendo Switch system.

In this sequel to the Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild game, you’ll decide your own path through the sprawling landscapes of Hyrule and the mysterious islands floating in the vast skies above. Can you harness the power of Link’s new abilities to fight back against the malevolent forces that threaten the kingdom?

See the sights in Hyrule and learn about game features, including Link’s new abilities.

Learn how to use amiibo figures in your adventure.

Watch the latest trailers and more.

Only on Nintendo Switch

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom game is only available for the Nintendo Switch family of systems.

Choose your system Explore the lineup of the Nintendo Switch family of systems.

Save on this title with Nintendo Switch Game Vouchers!

Nintendo Switch Online members can buy a pair of vouchers for just 99.98 USD / 132.99 CAD and redeem each one for a select digital game, including The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Splatoon™ 3, Pokémon™ Scarlet, Pokémon Violet, and more.

Find the raft parts

Uh-oh. This river is too wide to swim across! Find all five hidden objects on this website to help Link build a raft and earn 100 My Nintendo Platinum Points as a reward.

Don’t have a Nintendo Account? Create a new account

A Nintendo Account is required to receive and redeem points. Terms apply https://accounts.nintendo.com/term_point

Figures shown not actual size and designs may vary. Visit amiibo.com for details on amiibo functionality.

Paid Nintendo Switch Online membership required at the time of purchase and redemption of Nintendo Switch Game Vouchers. Nintendo Switch Game Vouchers must be redeemed within 12 months from purchase date, have no cash value, and cannot be transferred, returned, or redeemed for cash. Each Nintendo Switch Game Voucher may be redeemed for one game offered as part of the catalog. To receive promotional value, Nintendo Switch Game Vouchers must be redeemed for two games with a cumulative price that is higher than the purchase price of the Nintendo Switch Game Vouchers. Nintendo Switch Game Vouchers may not be combined with any other sale, discount, or promotional offer unless otherwise specified. Game catalog subject to change.

Game, system, and amiibo sold separately.

Intro:

The Nintendo Switch has many regions and for first-time users, and even veterans, it can be confusing as to exactly which region is safe to use, and which region games to buy.

The short answer? Every region is safe, as long as you know your way around the system.

The long answer? Well, this guide is here to let you know exactly how to navigate the Nintendo Switch Console’s region options in delectable detail.

Nintendo Account and Nintendo Switch Console Region:

What’s the difference between your Nintendo ACCOUNT Region and Nintendo Switch CONSOLE Region? Well they work hand in hand. Both needs to be understood to let you fully enjoy the wonders Nintendo has to offer.

Console Region

Let’s start with the most basic region setting any Switch user will encounter on their first step into the Nintendo Switch world, your CONSOLE Region Settings.

Look familiar? On your first time set-up of the console, you will be asked to select a region to choose from. What the Switch does poorly is not fully explaining what choosing a particular region means, and how it will affect your gaming experience.

Let me explain. Firstly, the regions are pretty clear cut, you have:

The Americas (America)

Australia / New Zealand

(And more recently added) Hong Kong / Taiwan / South Korea

Choosing “The Americas” for example, will set your Nintendo Switch Console region to America.

I know at this point maybe about half of first-time users will go,

“Where’s Singapore?” or “No Asia ah?”

And well, sorry but no, Nintendo did not provide a Singapore region for the Switch.

What many users are afraid of at this stage is choosing the “wrong” region, worried that they’ll get region locked, and that they’ll only be able to purchase physical games from that chosen region. However, that is not the case. The Switch IS NOT region locked, and in fact you can swap your console region ANY TIME YOU WANT.

Furthermore, you don’t need your console to be the same region as your game, to play the game. Your console region can be America for example, and you can still pop in a Japan cartridge and play it no problem.

So what exactly does the Console Region settings affect?

It’s mostly for in-game data. For example, in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild the temperature could be listed as either oF (when set to the US) or oC (when set to Australia). Changing your console region may also affect the language choices available. And that’s about it, it doesn’t restrict you from playing a game in any way!

Account Region

Well how about your Nintendo Account region?

For first-time users, you’ll be introduced to the Nintendo Account via set-up. You’ll be asked to “Create New User” and after creating your User, you’ll be prompted to “Link a Nintendo Account”. From there you’ll need to access the internet and set-up your Nintendo Account.

When prompted to key in your region, please select one of the regions previously displayed when choosing your Console Region (e.g. America, Europe, Japan etc). There will be other regions besides this, and you’ll even be able to choose Singapore, but please refrain from doing so.

We used America as an example before, so please choose United States in this case. Time Zone doesn’t really matter. Please note, similarly to the Console Region, you will be able to change your Account Region AT ANY TIME. (Barring a few exceptions, which I will mention in a while)

You’re probably wondering why the need to choose one of the aforementioned regions, and what it all affects? Well in short, choosing a region on your Nintendo Account affects your Nintendo eShop, and the eShop only recognises a select few regions. (and sometimes the cities and states located in these regions)

Nintendo eShop:

For users unfamiliar with the eShop, it’s an “app” in the Switch Console itself, which you can access and purchase and/or download games from. An internet connection is necessary to access it. You can access the eShop from a web browser as well.

You’ll need to register a Nintendo Account before you can access the eShop, so if you skipped the “Link a Nintendo Account’ step, you won’t be able to access it. To remedy this you’ll just need to nagivate to your Switch User settings and link an Account from there.

Furthermore, your Nintendo Account will need to be a recognizable region, so for local users who accidentally selected (or auto-piloted) Singapore as their Nintendo Account Region, you’ll find an error message saying “Nintendo eShop is currently not available in your country/region”.

Upon choosing America as your Account Region, the region of the eShop you will be accessing will be America. The currency will be in USD, and any purchases you make from this eShop will be recorded as US region games.

If you choose Japan as your region the currency will be Yen and the games will be Japan region games and so on. (Although the Japanese eShop is well, entirely in Japanese)

What if I purchase a game from the US store, and change my Account Region to Japan?

You’ll still be able to play the game no problem.

If you delete it and want to re-download it, you don’t need to change your Account Region as well.

What if I want to play my Europe Game online?

You can play your Europe copy of Fifa, NBA, or any game online, even if your eShop region is set to America, or Japan.

So why would I want to change my Account Region (eShop region)?

Well there could be a number of reasons, but we have two really good ones.

Great Deals

Sometimes different eShop regions will run specific promos on games. For example, the US eShop may run at USD 7.99, while the other eShop regions will have it at normal price. You could simply change your eShop region to US and hop on over to get the game.

Sometimes certain game releases are region specific as well. The US eShop may get a game that isn’t out yet on other regions. You can change to that region to get a game ahead of your friends!

DLC

The other huge reason is DLC, or Downloadable Content.

For example, you purchased a copy of Warriors Orochi 4 – Europe. You heard DLC packs are coming out for the game, and you go to your US eShop store to purchase the DLC packs. When you try to boot up your game, you find that the DLC packs you just purchased are not available in the game!

Sometimes, certain games have DLC packs that are region locked, meaning for the example above, you would have needed to go the Europe eShop store to purchase the DLC packs.

HOWEVER, certain games have region free DLC.

Mainline Nintendo published games (read: Nintendo Originals like Mario, Zelda, etc) tend to have DLC that is region free, meaning you could take a copy of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate – US, go to your Europe eShop store to purchase the DLC, and still have it turn up in the game! Other third-party games (read: Non-Nintendo published games) sometimes have this feature as well.

It’s easy to check, all you need to do is press the “plus” button when selecting your software, go to “Software Information” and click on “Support Information”. For most games, supported regions for that software will be displayed here.



While it’s always good to do some research ahead of time to save you some region hopping, if you are not that tech savvy or are unsure if the game has region free DLC, it’s always safer to stick to your game region when getting DLC.

How do I know which region my game is?

USA: North America

AUS: Australia

CHT: China / Hong Kong / Taiwan

For physical cartridges, it’s easy to tell as the region will be printed on the cartridge code, and on the case as well.

For digital games as mentioned before, head to the Support Information. A more tedious way of checking is entering an eShop region and checking if that particular game title is labelled “purchased”.

I can’t seem to change my Nintendo Account Region:

So you’ve fully understood the steps, you tried to change your Account Region to Japan to get that Japan-only game, but for some reason you can’t as the region settings are greyed out.

Well, you could check the following:

• Check if you have a Nintendo Network ID linked to your Nintendo Account. If you do have it, unlink it.
• Check if you have Funds in your Nintendo eShop account for your current region. If you do have it, uhhh spend it?
• Check if you are the Parent Account of a Nintendo Online family group, it is possible one of the “child” accounts has funds in their eShop region.

One of these should be the culprit. If you’ve checked and it’s none of these reasons, well, we can’t help you, but possibly reddit can.

Conclusion:

Understanding how to navigate the Nintendo Switch Console’s region settings will take some time and effort on your part, but once you get the hang of it, you’ll be buying and identifying games from different regions like a pro in no time!

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So you just got a Nintendo Switch…these are the first things to do

Just unwrapped a Nintendo Switch this Christmas? Lucky you: with versatile controls and a portable build, Ninty’s modular masterpiece is one of our favourite ways to game on the go.

Keen to get switched on? Whether you’re unboxing a standard Switch, a Lite version or the lovely OLED edition, this guide will help you get up and running with your new Nintendo device.

From tips and tricks to games and gear, we’ll walk you through it all.

Which Switch?

Nintendo now offers three versions of the Switch. Unlike the standard edition (on shelves since 2017), the Nintendo Switch Lite does away with TV docking and modular controls in favour of pure handheld play. With Joy-Cons permanently attached, there’s no assembly to think about.

2021 also saw the arrival of the Nintendo Switch OLED. Broadly identical to the original, it introduces the rich, vibrant depth of OLED display tech (plus an improved standard and expanded storage) for a more immersive gaming experience that’s still a cinch to set up.

1) Get set up

Unless you’re working with a Lite edition, the Nintendo Switch has a few more bits and pieces to play with than your average console. Luckily, Nintendo’s been doing the handheld thing for decades, so it’s all super user-friendly to assemble.

Your Switch should come with a battery partly charged, but it’s worth fully fuelling before you play. Plug the bundled power adapter into a spare socket, then connect the other end to the USB-C port on the bottom of the Switch (right below the screen).

Ready to start the setup process? Slide the Joy-Con controllers into place on either side of the display and listen for the satisfying click. Then hold the power button on top of the console to kick off. From here, it’s all very straightforward: on-screen prompts will walk you through setting the date and time, connecting to Wi-Fi and configuring your Nintendo account.

Big screen setup

Both the Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch OLED ship with cradles which allow you to play games in 1080p on your telly. Prefer to look at a bigger screen? One of the earliest options in the setup process will ask you whether you’d like to connect to a TV. You can do this right away by hooking up the dock via HDMI, removing the Joy-Cons and dropping in your Switch – or skip to set it up later. If you’re configuring an OLED edition, the Dock features an ethernet port for a wired LAN connection (handy if your Wi-Fi signal is patchy in the living room).

2) Get connected

Four years after launch, the Switch system is stacked with a catalogue of outstanding games. From Nintendo staples such as Mario, Zelda and Animal Crossing to countless indie titles, gamers are spoilt for choice when it comes to entertaining play.

Nintendo Switch Online subscribers also get to explore Ninty’s sizeable back-catalogue, with an increasing library of NES and SNES games available to play, plus a slowly growing collection of N64 games – including the newly released Paper Mario.

There’s a good chance your Switch came bundled with some stellar games. Looking for a few more to try? We’ve picked out a handful of our favourites down below, which are well worth downloading from the Nintendo eStore.

You can have a cracking time with your Nintendo Switch straight out of the box. But after the initial excitement subsides, there’s a good chance you’ll want some accessories to keep your console company. From controllers to cases, here are six add-ons to enhance the gaming entertainment.

Nintendo Switch Elite Edition Deluxe Travel Case (£15)

Some models might work with your TV, but the Switch is also made to travel. Harbour your handheld and all its accessories in this understated case. A rigid shell keeps the contents safe, while slots inside cradle up to 14 games and various accessories. Compatible with all three versions, a lift strap makes it easy to whip out your Switch.

Nintendo Switch Pro Controller (£50)

While Nintendo’s Joy-Cons are nothing if not versatile, sometimes you need the familiarity of a classic controller. Equipped with a D-pad, dual analogue sticks and plenty of buttons to bash, the ergonomic Pro Controller lets you get to grips with a ‘proper’ gamepad – perfect for epic sessions on the TV.

SanDisk Nintendo Switch microSDXC Card (£35)

The Switch and Switch Lite ship with 32GB of internal storage, while the OLED goes bigger with 64GB. Download a few games, though, and you’ll soon max out that space. Unlock more with this microSD card from SanDisk: officially licensed, it comes in four sizes – each with a Ninty theme. 128GB arguably hits the sweep spot of price and capacity.

HORI Switch Compact PlayStand (£10)

The Switch might have a built-in kickstand, but the flimsy prop stops the system from charging while its standing. HORI’s Compact Playstand can support your Switch at one of three selectable angles, while still providing access to the all-important USB-C port. Plus it’s foldable, making it great for on-the-go throwdowns.

Anker PowerCore 26,800mAh PD (£150)

A few hours of battery life is fine for the commute, but you’ll need more for a long-haul flight. Ninty reckons the Switch can go for up to nine hours on a single charge, but longevity can vary significantly. Need guaranteed juice? Anker’s PowerCore PD backup battery packs a punch. It’s not the smallest bank around, but its 26,800mAh capacity is enough to boost your Switch a few times over.

Spigen Tempered Glass screen protector (£11)

Don’t let your Nintendo Switch become like your phone, i.e. smashed and scratched to bits after dropping it on the kitchen floor one too many times. Invest in a decent screen protector, we beg you, and few make them better than Spigen. The Spigen Tempered Glass screen protector is 0.33mm thick, which should defend against a few careless drops here and there. It also ranks at 9H on the hardness level and provides strong scratch resistance. An oleophobic coating means your screen won’t get smudged with your grubby fingerprints, too.