Nintendo Will Not Follow Sony's Example: Physical Game Editions Will Remain

One of the most talked-about news of the week in the gaming sector has undoubtedly been Sony's decision to abandon physical games (from 2028) and focus exclusively on digital distribution. This choice, which follows a policy that the Japanese company has been pursuing for some time, represents a significant turning point for the console sector.

According to Mat Piscatella, an analyst at Circana specializing in the gaming industry, Sony's example, which Microsoft is expected to follow for the future of Xbox, will not influence Nintendo, at least for this generation of consoles.

Nintendo Will Not Follow Sony

Nintendo does not plan to abandon support for physical copies of games. The "cartridges" will continue to be an integral part of Nintendo's distribution model for the foreseeable future, at least throughout the lifecycle of the Switch 2 and for mid-gen variants of the console.

For now, it is still too early to assess what the company's moves will be in view of a future Switch 3. The gaming market is undergoing a phase of profound change, with the memory crisis creating significant problems for producers.

The choice to focus on the digital distribution model is now definitive, with Nintendo almost certainly being the last console manufacturer to support physical games, at least for the coming years. In the meantime, the gaming sector, both on PC and mobile, has long been exclusively focused on digital games. In the future, physical editions could be available only on Nintendo consoles, aside from operations like that of GTA 6, whose physical edition does not contain the disc.