Update April 6th 2:05PM: Nintendo's emergency maintenance for the Nintendo eShop has concluded, with another bout of maintenance scheduled from Monday, April 12, 2021 3:00 PM to Monday, April 12, 2021 5:00 PM (PST). During this two hour period, Prepaid Funds Cards and Download Codes will be unable to be used, and all network services will be unavailable for the Nintendo Switch, 3DS, and Wii U.
The original article is below:
Ongoing emergency maintenance for the Nintendo eShop has meant that it's been down for the past five hours. Nintendo hasn't indicated when it'll be back either, giving this terse explanation for taking their eShop down:
Nintendo eShop
Due to emergency maintenance, Online services are unavailable.
We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and thank you for your patience.
Date and time
- Tuesday, April 6, 2021 2 :40 AM Pacific Time Ongoing
This comes after the relatively recently released 12.0 patch for the Nintendo Switch that doesn't appear to do much at all except fix the save backup feature. Usually, a new major number means there's something fairly big under the hood, but this appears to be a bug fixing update, which was unusual for them, but it may have had significant back end changes that didn't really lend themselves to public discussion, especially from a company as secretive as Nintendo.
Now Nintendo's eShop is undergoing emergency maintenance, and has been for a significant period of time without any clarity on why it has been down. While server downtimes can happen for any device, emergency downtimes of this length are often the result of some significant vulnerability is discovered, a cyber attack, or a major bug is uncovered causing issues. Any of these are possibilities, but it would be speculation to guess if its any of that.
As for now, we'll keep eyes on Nintendos server status and update you when the eShop is back online, along with whatever other information we are able to drag up about the situation overall. Just probably don't expect that emergency maintenance is tied to any sort of new online interface.
Were you picking anything up when the eShop went offline? Has it impacted you in any way? Do issues like this worry you about a more digital heavy future? Let us know in the comments below!
