The Japanese government has enacted lockdowns on the nation due to the coronavirus, and this has resulted in all manner of stoppage of common goods within the industry, including the manufacturing of the Nintendo Switch.
According to Japanese outlet Nikkei, it was revealed that the Switch’s manufacturing has shut down in Japan and no new shipments will be made during these dire times. This means that if you wanted to get your hands on a Switch in the land of the rising sun, you should have done so yesterday!
This also comes shortly after CERO announced that it would be halting office operations, which means no new games will be rated, and no games currently in the process of being rated will be complete until they lift the quarantine.
However, according to Nintendo Smash, the Switch will continue to ship to certain regions during the pandemic, including Europe and America.
So if you didn’t grab a Switch before, you might want to get one now before even America and Europe become affected by the manufacturing shutdown.
This will also clearly impact the potential growth of the Switch throughout the rest of 2020 and heading into 2021.
The holiday season is typically when Nintendo moves millions of units per month, but that may not happen with Mistress Corona-chan running rampant around the world.
Anyway, I’m guessing most of Nintendo’s worthwhile exclusives for the Switch are already out on the market. They have a healthy cache of indie games to play with plenty of split-screen offline options for those of you playing with friends or family locally, and the Nintendo Network for everyone else playing their games online.
If this is the end of the console era due to Corona-chan I say good riddance and goodbye. The best years are behind us.
(Thanks for the news tip Wondy Bergers)