The Nintendo Switch Online subscription offers virtually no social features. First, users are required to add friends through frustrating means. It requires players to either be local, to have recently played a game together, or a 12-digit Friend Code of randomized numbers. Once on a player’s Friend’s List, friends can see their avatar, what game they’re currently playing, and a list of games they’ve played. There’s no messaging, no party system, no inherent game invite system, or any meaningful social features.

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The problem is that Animal Crossing: New Horizons offers many of these things. Also, Animal Crossing: New Horizons is a Nintendo game. In other words, Nintendo is more than capable of creating such a system. More importantly, Nintendo clearly understands the value of such features even in a very simple game intended to be played by young children.

Part of the answer, of course, is that Nintendo isn’t a monolith. The developers of Animal Crossing may understand the value of social features, but that doesn’t mean those working on the software for the Nintendo Switch do. And there are likely dozens of other reasons, too, tied to various limitations of the Nintendo Switch’s hardware and software or Nintendo’s online infrastructure.

That isn’t going to stop Nintendo fans from questioning, however. It took years to get Nintendo to add as much online functionality as the Nintendo Switch has. It’ll likely take years before they add more, and only then due to continued pressure from fans.

Unfortunately, acknowledging the frustrating situation on the Nintendo Switch won’t result in any meaningful change for the foreseeable future. While it’s very unlikely that the Nintendo Switch may ever receive an update that introduces direct messaging and social features, there is still a positive outlook. Animal Crossing shows that games can handle these features perfectly well on their own. If players use them, and if they speak about them positively, then maybe more Nintendo games (and other games) will build them, too.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is out now on Nintendo Switch.

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