Nintendo to end eShop purchases on Wii U and 3DS next March
The inevitable has happened. Late last night, Nintendo announced that starting in March of 2023, it will no longer allow purchases to be made on the Nintendo 3DS eShop and the Nintendo Wii U eShop. It will also cut off access to downloadable free content, including game demos and free-to-start titles, and will no longer allow people to make purchases in certain programs, such as Wii Sports Club, Pokémon Bank, and StreetPass Mii Plaza.
As was the case when Nintendo shut down the Wii Shop Channel and said goodbye to WiiWare games, anybody who has purchased an eShop game on either device will still be able to download it after March 2023. Nintendo says the ability to do so will continue into “the foreseeable future” and that Wii U and 3DS owners will still be able to receive any software updates that have been released and play their games online.
Prior to the March 2023 cutoff date, Nintendo will remove the ability for players to add funds to their eShop account using a Wii U or 3DS. Starting May 23, 2022, you will no longer be able to use credit cards to add funds on these devices, and on August 29, 2022, Nintendo will stop allowing you to add funds using a Nintendo eShop card on the hardware. If you have linked your Nintendo Network ID wallet that you use with your Nintendo Switch to your Wii U and/or 3DS, you will still be able to use funds from that wallet on either device. However, after March 2023, those funds will only be able to be used on Nintendo Switch. Players will also be able to redeem any download codes up until the March 2023 cutoff.
Obviously, this sucks. Despite Nintendo saying it’s “part of the natural lifecycle for any product line,” you would hope that maybe we could develop a way to not lose access to
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