When it comes to selecting a video game console for your children, there's really only one answer: Nintendo. No matter what the most recent Nintendo console is, it's undoubtedly your best bet. However, the Nintendo Switch is a bit different. Is it still host to Nintendo's exceptionally-made and long-beloved franchises like Super Mario, The Legend of Zelda, Kirby, Animal Crossing, and Pokémon? You bet your keister it is. Unfortunately, Nintendo's potent portable is also host to the Nintendo eShop.
Via the eShop, you can purchase video games digitally if you'd like to save some shelf space for something other than plastic cases, or if you really want to avoid visiting your local, condescending GameStop. Convenient! Yet, parents should know that the eShop comes with a lot more than Nintendo's friendly, plumbing mascot. In fact, it has plenty of content that's downright nasty.
The eShop has some mega-icky games
Allow me to briefly explain my poorly taken photo here. One day, while perusing the eShop's "Great Deals" section, I came upon this disturbing sight. To my shock and horror, the "game" Hentai World was listed right next to Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games. Not only that, but it wasn't even hard to find! It wasn't buried somewhere that only the depraved target audience could locate it, no! It came onto my screen in less than one minute of having opened the eShop app!
For those unaware, "hentai" is a word you should never google. It is, essentially, pornographic anime.
"What?! On my Nintendo Switch?!" I hear you hypothetically screaming, "It can't be!"
Oh, but it is, hypothetical reader. It's real, it's on the Switch, and here's what its eShop description reads, "Feast your eyes with Akane, Rose and Nanami in the most sensual puzzle game experience Nintendo Switch has to offer." While you try to keep your lunch down from having read that disturbing and actual product description, the worse news is that this disgusting excuse for digital entertainment is but one of many similar titles on the Nintendo Switch eShop. When I stumbled upon this egregious store display, I couldn't stop thinking about the poor parents out there that have no idea how easy it is for their children to potentially stumble upon such mature content on their Nintendo console.
With this in mind, I took it upon myself to find the best possible solutions for keeping kids safe when gaming on Nintendo Switch. For now, we'll attempt to look past the issue that Nintendo allows endless amounts of smutty shovelware to be published on their system, and we'll focus on what parents can do to ensure their child isn't suddenly exposed to naked anime women.
Now, if you have a Switch already and young children that enjoy playing it, they're not suddenly going to be directly exposed to pornographic drawings. Rest assured that younger gamers are most likely concerned with turning on the Switch just to play it rather than browse an digital store. None of that unwanted, gross stuff is even possible to view until the Switch is connected to the internet, but we'll discuss that more later. The main question here is thus: what options do parents have to best prevent unsavory sights from being seen?
Parental Controls on Nintendo Switch
Shortly after the Nintendo Switch was released in 2017, Nintendo released a mobile app that links directly to one's Switch. This Nintendo Switch Parental Controls app is actually the biggest step that's ever been taken in giving parents of gaming children some truly useful tools. Bowser and Bowser Jr. demonstrate the app's utility rather well in this video, but I'll give a quick summary of the app's features.
Through the app, parents can set daily play limits, set software age restrictions, view their child's total playtime, what games are played, and even set restrictions for online functionalities such as voice chat. Compared to every console that ever came before the Nintendo Switch, these options are huge and definitely welcome, but there are still some issues.
First off, the Nintendo Switch Parental Controls app applies all of its settings to the entire Switch console —not to specific users. To access any game on a Nintendo Switch, the console requires one to choose a Player Profile similar to the way that a computer will ask you to select a User Profile. So, if you have one child that's fourteen and one that's eight you wouldn't be able to apply different parental controls on the same Nintendo Switch console that tailor to them specifically. That's a big bummer. The app does, however, allow parents to set options for multiple Nintendo Switch consoles which is a nice option for those that enjoy vacationing in Dubai.
Secondly, remember how this article began with the uncomfortable content that's viewable on the eShop? The Parental Controls app doesn't have any options for parents to place restrictions on the eShop. Not cool. Luckily, parents may not even have to worry about this! By default, Player Profiles on the Switch can only play games and that's it. They can't access the eShop or any other type of online functionality.
Hearing this, you might be thinking, "Well, cool! It sounds like we're done here," and you'd be correct if you weren't wrong. In order to use the Parental Controls app, parents will have to make a Player Profile on the Switch and link it to their phone with a Nintendo Account. This means going to Nintendo's website and using one's email to create an account.
"Ugh, another password to keep track of, but nothing too bad I guess." Wrong again, friendo.
Once that account has been created and linked to one's Switch, that particular profile will be able to access the eShop. Parents can, of course, make it so this profile can only open the eShop when a password is used, but this highlights the biggest issue with all of this tangled, internet, profile, password, parental control, yadda-yadda nonsense: your child can easily create their own Nintendo Account with a linked email and access the eShop. There are no settings for the Switch that prohibit Player Profile creation nor linking email accounts. This may be more difficult for younger children, but creating an email and linking it to a Nintendo Account is easy peasy. Nintendo's red lettering that reads "Please show this to a parent or guardian" wouldn't really do much to stop the most determined children either.
The best solution: Constant Vigilance
With how easy it is to link Player Profile accounts to an email, it seems that the most valuable asset for any Nintendo Switch parent is the Parental Controls app. At least through the app, parents can monitor exactly what games are played, when they're played, and even if anything is downloaded through the eShop. What it doesn't do, unfortunately, is screen what your child can see on the eShop.
There are settings on the Nintendo website that will completely block a specific Player Profile from being able to view the digital storefront, but A: it still requires Player Profiles to have full emails and easily-forgotten passwords attached and B: this option restricts eShop access based on the age of the user of the Player Profile. You might not want to divulge your child's birthday, and you may not feel that your child's age has anything to do with their particular maturity-level.
What's all of this mean then? That gaming for children in the modern age is messy and tricky. Gone are the days of the non-online consoles that simply fired up games and nothing more. For the most part, parents shouldn't need to worry unless/until a Player Profile is linked to an email-having Nintendo Account, and, for most families, this may never even need to happen. At least not until one's child is old enough to have an interest in online games like Splatoon or Fortnite that they can use to play with distant friends or family.
Once there is at least one linked Nintendo Account however, the best solution for locking down access to more mature content is to fill up the Switch's total Player Profile capacity and manage the passwords and emails for each one. That would mean eight emails, eight passwords, and eight times the headaches.
Perhaps, more than anything, it's best for parents to know that gaming on the Nintendo Switch is perfectly safe so long as parents practice constant vigilance. Watching your child and talking to them about the games they play and are interested in will keep you well-informed about what's going on.
Have any questions, comments, or concerns? Topics that you'd like to me to spend more time on? Leave a comment below, and I'll happily reach out with specific steps, guidelines, or create an additional article. Navigating the modern gaming world is tricky for parents, but you don't need to be a gamer to raise a healthy one.
This was super helpful! I didn’t even know there was a parent app for the switch! Definitely using that for our boys.