For those who missed our earlier report, Nintendo has announced that its customer loyalty program, Club Nintendo, will be phased out over the coming months in all countries and territories, including Australia. Boo! (The good news is that a new membership program is set to replace it. Hurrah!)
Nintendo recently dropped the news that Club Nintendo is to be discontinued. From April 1, Nintendo will no longer include product registration cards with its packaged products which means you won’t be able to register them in Club Nintendo. (Naturally, old unsold stock will still contain registration cards after this date.)
From April 20, the ability to register digital products downloaded from Nintendo eShop will also be terminated.
“Digital products obtained from Nintendo eShop after this date will no longer appear in the My Registered Games & Systems page in Club Nintendo,” Nintendo explained in a statement.
“In addition, surveys for download software titles will no longer be available.”
The final nail will be set into Club Nintendo’s coffin on September 30 2015. All Club Nintendo features will no longer appear from this date.
Somewhat meanly, this includes any accumulated Stars that are still in your account. You will need to purchase items from the Stars Catalogue before September 30: any Stars not used by this date will be lost. Tch.
Here is the official statement from Nintendo Australia, which focuses on the club’s incoming replacement:
We’re working hard to create a new membership programme, which we plan to launch later this year. As a special offer, users who sign up to the new programme during the launch period will be able to download Flipnote Studio 3D to a Nintendo 3DS system for free. Please stay tuned to the Nintendo Australia website for further details.
This new membership programme will replace Club Nintendo, so we will discontinue Club Nintendo according to the schedule given. Thank you for all your support.
As Stars in your account will expire on September 30th 2015, please make sure you use them before this date. There are plenty of unique and exclusive items already available in the Stars Catalogue, and we’ll keep adding more over the coming months, so there’s plenty to spend your Stars on before September 30th 2015.
Please stay tuned for more information about the new membership programme, including its launch date.
Hmm. The complete overhaul of a customer loyalty program is rarely good news for consumers. We’ll report back with details on Club Nintendo’s replacement as soon as it is announced.
[Via Nintendo Australia]
Comments
7 responses to “RIP Club Nintendo”
They’re most likely going to offer digital downloads in place of physical merch. It’s something the US store has had for a while, and fits in with their new web-based eshop structure which is available but not publicly launched.
I was suspicious when my new 3ds couldn’t be registered, and I was 50 stars off the sweet mk8 tshirt. Thankfully there was a ssb survey; this shirt is pretty awesome!
Though, I kinda need the mario hat now…
Thanks for the heads up – Just logged on and bought myself a sweet set of Mario shoe laces.
Lets hope there’s some game sales before April so I can get as many points before it all goes away
Getting the Wii U on Friday pushed me to enough points to get the MK8 shirt. Looking forward to finally getting it. Hope it comes before the 4 week expected delivery time frame. It’s the only thing I’ve ever gotten on CN.
To be honest, it’s not really much of a loss for the Australian Club Nintendo. Our selection of rewards was always paltry compared to Japan and America.
I guess I should register all my games now and see what rubbish I can order.
WHAT?!?!
What happens to all those points I collected over… *Counts fingers* 10 YEARS!
What happens to all those Nintendo games/eshops that tell you to connect your Club Nintendo account?