It’s over. The Nintendo eShop for the 3DS and WiiU consoles has had its day, and the doors are shut for good.
We knew it was coming, of course, with gamers having plenty of warning to get their last-minute purchases in (or stock up on physical titles before they soar astronomically in value at resale) before everyone’s favourite, happy orange shopping bag says its final goodbyes.
The 3Ds eShop opened its digital doors in 2011, while the WiiU did the same in 2013, meaning both had at least a decade of service before being shuttered. According to Nintendo’s data (as reported here by VGC), there were over 1000 titles on the 3DS eShop with just over 600 being download-only games not available by any other means, while on the WiiU there were just over 800 games in total with around 450 digital-only titles (depending on regions).
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This also means that a huge number of Virtual Console titles will be disappearing, leaving only the library of classic games on the Nintendo Switch for NSO subscribers to hold the retro Nintendo game torch – with a significantly smaller library than what was on any previous systems.
To mark the sad occasion, fans on social media have already posted countless tributes to both the consoles, the stores, the games and of course, the friendly eShop bag who would once greet players, guide them through the store, answer questions and more.
There are countless artistic odes:
good night 3DS eshop guy.. I'll miss u the most pic.twitter.com/bhctmQUzhb
— vi ? (@starozoa) March 26, 2023
Rest well, little prince ;w;!!
Everybody downloaded with they needed before the 3DS Eshop went offline?#Nintendo3DS #eShop pic.twitter.com/6o2qV6YIqR— Vlinderdas – Graduated!! (@ItsArtJo) March 26, 2023
time to go, kiddo ?#eShop #3DSeshop pic.twitter.com/SSkCbt70J5
— ? MicahTheBrave ? (@MicahTheBrave) March 27, 2023
And even musical tributes:
The time has come.
A piano tribute to the 3DS and Wii U eShop.Fly high ? pic.twitter.com/SVELz823TG
— Sword (@MasterSwrdRemix) March 26, 2023
Our pals over at Vooks did… this. Why is this so emotional??
rip eshop pic.twitter.com/vtD5iVh5sy
— Vooks (@vooksdotnet) March 27, 2023
We hope everyone managed to pick up any games they’d like to play in the future before the cut-off, and of course going forward, for the foreseeable future, it will still be possible to redownload games and DLC, receive software updates and play 3DS and WiiU games online.
