It is likely they have the ability to sign the public key of your console with a “Suicide Key” which would signal your console to commit suicide by burning some internal e-fuse.

It is also equally likely this is an over-broad version of “Legal Rear Armor” that means nothing explicitly about what they can do. This is because modifying your system has long carried risk of bricking and their security systems to prevent modifications have only increased in strength.

It’s likely the new security system in the Switch 2 is so naively hair-trigger sensitive that it absolutely will brick you or disable some functionality permanently if it thinks you even so much as modified a backup copy of a save file or encrypted binary stored on your SD card itself. It’s very likely that any kind of attempt to write invalid foreign files onto an SD may result in issues. I’d expect Switch 2 systems to spontaneously self destruct if exposed to bad quality or fake SD cards with insufficient capacity; or an SD card that is failing if what I am guessing is true.

Is this confirmed? No; it’s just idle wild speculation. But it is what I expect from Nintendo; given that their creatives have all been driven away from the executive positions of power and only money driven executives are left at the helm.

Given that the Switch has already been thoroughly cracked; it’s likely now more than a want or need, Nintendo now has a mania or obsession with making their consoles un-exploitable. Likely, this is because they’re too naive to avoid promising their consoles are ‘unbreakable’ to their third parties and publishers.

Unfortunately Nintendo is full of foolish pride and stubbornness. Tinkerers and video game preservers the world over will need to once again break the Switch 2 security to pieces to prove to Nintendo that this endeavor is futile.

In the meantime; don’t tinker with a Switch or Switch 2 you can’t afford to lose. Hell, don’t even buy one if you’re sensitive to it being un-tinkerable. Don’t gift them to any children in your life either. Instead; gift them something more useful; like teaching them how to emulate one of the older Nintendo Systems and gift them a Library of ROMs so they don’t have to torrent it themselves and ‘give the family computer a virus’ or ‘cause a scary letter to be sent to their parents’ with their inexperience. If you can’t bear piracy; then go pick up one of the old legitimate retro systems. Buy it somewhere used and pick up whatever used games you can for them at any occasion.

Nintendo is acting like it doesn’t want us to buy the Switch 2

Nintendo doesn’t explicitly state what it means by making your device “unusable.” However, there’s a strong chance this is merely Nintendo’s polite way of indicating that if a user breaches its user agreement policy, their Switch console could potentially be bricked (rendered inoperable) by Nintendo.

I like how the author’s speculation is used as the headline, as if it were confirmed fact. That’s super cool and useful and definitely not misleading at all.

Realistically, this sort of verbiage has existed on several consoles’ ToS in the past, and I’m pretty sure nothing has ever come of it before. Here’s the full term in question, which the author of this article couldn’t be bothered to include for the reader to easily scrutinize for themselves:

2. License

Subject to the terms of this Agreement, Nintendo grants you a non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable license to use the Nintendo Account Services solely for your personal and non-commercial use. For clarity, the Nintendo Account Services are licensed, not sold, to you, and you may not make use of the Nintendo Account Services except as expressly authorized by this Agreement.

Without limitation, you agree that you may not (a) publish, copy, modify, reverse engineer, lease, rent, decompile, disassemble, distribute, offer for sale, or create derivative works of any portion of the Nintendo Account Services; (b) bypass, modify, decrypt, defeat, tamper with, or otherwise circumvent any of the functions or protections of the Nintendo Account Services, including through the use of any hardware or software that would cause the Nintendo Account Services to operate other than in accordance with its documentation and intended use; © obtain, install or use any unauthorized copies of Nintendo Account Services; or (d) exploit the Nintendo Account Services in any manner other than to use them in accordance with the applicable documentation and intended use, in each case, without Nintendo’s written consent or express authorization, or unless otherwise expressly permitted by applicable law. You acknowledge that if you fail to comply with the foregoing restrictions Nintendo may render the Nintendo Account Services and/or the applicable Nintendo device permanently unusable in whole or in part.

As it’s written, it seems that the actions Nintendo would take are flexible, and would depend on what, specifically, you hacked. And I say “hacked”, because this is referring specifically to unauthorized access of Nintendo’s online services. This isn’t even talking about hacking your actual console, itself.

There’s really nothing out of the ordinary here, and I’m almost positive that the same terms existed on previous Nintendo consoles, just in different words.

Fuck Nintendo.

Edit: I’d be somehow interested in switch-like console and Nintendo exclusive games, but definitely not bundled with horse shit like that.

Read further: I’m sure there is a legal permission to eat your liver somewhere in the pile of the fine font. Nintendo.