The news that Nintendo’s new online service for Switch will include cloud save support has been met with plenty of praise, as with the current system, all game data is tied with the console on a hardware level. If you lose or damage your Switch, you lose your save data, too.
It’s great that Nintendo is finally adding this much-requested feature to the Switch, but there are hints that not every game will showcase cloud save support – very much like not every Switch game currently supports video recording.
The official Japanese Nintendo Switch Online website states that “some software” will not use cloud saves. It’s worth noting that this text has been obtained using Google Translate, so some of the meaning may have been lost.
It’s also worth stating that “software” on Switch can mean a range of different things; Nintendo may not be referring to games in this case, but apps. The worst case scenario is that cloud saves have to be enabled at a software rather then system level in each game, and that some developers may choose to restrict this feature to avoid anyone altering save data and cheating in certain games.
Hopefully, this won’t be a massive issue and the vast majority of games on Switch will support cloud saves – we’ll no doubt find out more as that September launch approaches. In the meantime, let us know your thoughts with a comment below.