Nintendo Switch 2 owner banned over second-hand games

Being a Nintendo Switch fan is no easy task with the company rarely discounting its games whilst also discouraging pirating of any sort.

As a result, it is indeed an expensive hobby to own the Nintendo Switch, or more recently, the Nintendo Switch 2, especially with Nintendo cracking down on second-hand games in recent months.

That is what one user learned recently after they were banned for using second-hand Switch games that they purchased on the Facebook Marketplace.

The user, dmanthey, took to r/Switch to share their experience.

“Switch 2 users - be careful buying used Switch 1 games,” they warned.

“You can get banned if a bad actor dumped it. Having said that, Nintendo support is amazing and will help get you back up and running.”

They received the ban after they attempted to download a patch for the Switch games they purchased and although it is unclear what exactly happened, we can assume that Nintendo must have thought that the software was pirated.

Luckily, the user was soon unbanned after showing proof of the Facebook listing and images of the cartridges but it just goes to show how serious Nintendo is about potential pirated software.

As mentioned, purchasing second-hand Switch games is pretty commonplace, especially as some of Nintendo’s biggest first-party titles are rarely discounted so hopefully this will not get flagged for more users in the future.

Either way, the news of the mix-up recently broke over on r/technology and fellow Nintendo Switch users were left feeling baffled.

“Nintendo gets away with so much bulls*it,” one user claimed.

User Microtic agreed, adding, “Libraries have video games for rental. If people renting Switch video games start getting banned then something is super wrong.”

Hopefully Nintendo realises this and will be more careful in handing out bans in the future.