Nintendo has released a mobile app for its storefront, the on-the-nose-named NIntendo Store app, for iOS and Android. And while it does a good job of making it easier to browse and purchase games for the Nintendo Switch and Switch 2, the most compelling feature may be one that lays out your Nintendo gaming history by year.
Buried at the very bottom of your Profile page (you can get to it by tapping the icon with your Mii at the bottom right) is an option called Play Activity. At the top, your Recent Activity will display games you played recently and for how long. But scroll down through All Activity and you'll find games and console apps stretching back years and years.
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For me, it was a shock to see Wii U and NIntendo 3DS titles I'd forgotten all about, such as a game my daughters enjoyed — Art Academy: Home Studio — and Chibi-Robo! Zip Lash, which I played in 2015 for 10 days. I have no recollection of playing Steel Diver for Nintendo 3DS, but there's evidence to prove that happened on March 28, 2011.
Why Play Activity matters
If the feature were just nostalgia for nostalgia's sake, that would be one thing, but for anyone who has a long history across multiple Nintendo console generations, this is good information to have. In an era of remakes and re-releases, it's helpful to know what games you actually have played before, what console you played them on and whether you spent much time on them. My Play Activity history is littered with games I only played for less than an hour, such as Ridge Racer 3D, and abandoned for others.
It reminds me that I played Nintendogs, the cute dog simulator, for a full four years, from 2011 to 2015. Why hasn't Nintendo rebooted that franchise?
It's useful that you can sort the play history by most recently played, date first played, total time played and by game system. I was surprised by how many titles I played on the Wii U, but it probably paled in comparison to the number of games I played on the GameCube or the original Wii. The Play Activity doesn't appear to go back that far; for me, it stops at 2011 with the Wii U and 3DS. Games on the Switch appear to show more detail, showing you how much you played for each gaming session.
But most of all, it's nice to have a document that charts your relationship with Nintendo's systems and software, whether it's to see how much time you spent watching Netflix on your Switch or to see how many hours you've logged in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.
What else is in the Nintendo Store app?
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