As for the lifespan of the game cartridges themselves, it's hard to say, though progression in technology and approach will hopefully make them even more reliable than their predecessors. An extra back-up is cloud storage for saves, but of course this is behind the Nintendo Switch Online paywall at present. The memory is provided by Macronix once again, and in the case of Switch rather than store save data on the cartridge itself the games put our saves on the system memory or specified MicroSD. But the key point is that it is a lifecycle just like retro game media, it'll eventually stop working.Īs for the Nintendo Switch cartridges, it's early and difficult to say as, again, they're bespoke cartridges. How long, though? Only time will ultimately tell, and guesswork based on cycle-data can give you estimates from 20-50 years, potentially longer. Major players in the space continue to develop and enhance the number of 'cycles' before their memory degrades, and this includes progress from Macronix. A lot depends on the quality of materials and manufacturing, and flash memory in particular degrades at varying rates with each read/write in other words, every time you save and load a DS / 3DS game you take a tiny amount off its life. There can be some scary statistics thrown around about memory lifecycles, but the reality is that the range is extremely broad.

This, in reality, should be a rare issue that will nonetheless disappoint anyone affected. In terms of flash memory it can be prone to accelerated deterioration or wear, so the aforementioned ORAS issue could be down to a poor batch of memory, and if the component failed it could take the game's functionality with it. In the case of the 3DS it appears to be purely flash memory, albeit with different types handling game and save data, for example. It seems that DS cartridges may have a form of masked ROM for media up to a certain size, which is non-writable, with a small amount of flash memory at the very least for save data. However, the perceived make-up of those generations of cartridges seems to vary depending on source, without a great deal of clarity in any case both generations of the cartridges / memory were supplied by Macronix. With DS and 3DS cartridges, it's worth highlighting that doomsday scenarios of swathes of game copies dying imminently seem very unlikely. In the case of the physical box and cartridge existing, yes, that could be true to a degree, but the functionality of the technology is something else entirely. There's a tendency, especially in debates between those that prefer digital game purchases to physical copies, for collectors to suggest their copies are 'forever'. So what sort of lifespans are we looking at? Well, it depends. It's important to recognise that cartridges, like their disc-based chums, will encounter reliability issues down the line due to acknowledged lifespan limitations. That's the difference between modern media and our example of books, of course technology based on memory cards or discs aren't forever, they're mechanical devices that will fail. However, it's important to recognise that cartridges, like their disc-based chums, will encounter reliability issues down the line due to acknowledged lifespan limitations.

It seems early for these games to be failing, and seemingly in reasonable numbers one possibility is that a specific PAL manufacturing run had either cheap or faulty components in the process, as even the memory associated with DS and 3DS cartridges shouldn't be dying this early. In case you missed it, this has come into rather sharp focus with talk online of numerous PAL copies of Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire starting to fail, with some players stating their copies have long since died.

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