It’s no secret that Nintendo’s vast back catalogue is among the most untapped troves in modern gaming. But soon, it’s about to be a little less untapped, as games from the Game Boy and Game Boy Colour library are apparently slated to join Nintendo Switch Online, Eurogamer reports.
Nintendo Switch Online — or, as it’s known by its scientific term, Game Pass For Really Old Games (GPFROG) — grants players access to more than 100 games from the NES and SNES, including Super Metroid, Super Mario World, and The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. You also need to sign up for the service if you want to play any, uh, more modern games online. A subscription costs $5.95 a month or $29.95 per year.
Whispers about the addition of Game Boy games started swirling earlier this week on an episode of the Nate the Hate podcast. On Tuesday, Nintendo Life, citing its own sources, corroborated the podcast’s report. And then, this morning, Eurogamer corroborated Nintendo Life’s corroboration of the report. So, yeah, it seems pretty likely we’ll be playing some sort of original Game Boy games via the Switch as soon as this month.
That said, the exact date is unclear. Nintendo didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from Kotaku.
Adding original Game Boy games to the Switch Online catalogue is a natural next step for the service. Originally, it started out with just a handful of NES games. Over the years, it added more games from that platform, and then, in 2019, added a bunch from the SNES. The service turns three years old on September 18.
So, by my maths, if Nintendo continues to go down the line of its hardware chronologically, it’ll only be…76 more years until I can play Kirby Air Ride on my Switch. Hey, who knows! By then, maybe I’ll be playing it on the 4K Switch.
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