Nintendo has removed a game from the Switch Online subscription service, setting a bad precedent for the future.

Following yesterday's update about the removal of Super Formation Soccer from the Switch Online Super Famicom service in Japan, Nintendo has now confirmed the local version of the game will also "no longer be available" later this month.

Nintendo is doing something the company has never done before: Next month, it will remove a retro game from its the Nintendo Switch Online’s classic catalog.

Nintendo has confirmed it’s removing a game from Switch Online’s retro library in the US and Europe for the first time. Since Switch Online’s launch in 2018, a steady stream of classic 8-bit and 16-bit games has been added to the subscription service.

Nintendo Switch Online customers in Japan and South Korea will lose access to Super Formation Soccer on March 27th. This is a harsh reminder that subscriptions are not a replacement for ownership, and that legacy game publishers are not motivated by preservation.

Super Formation Soccer is being pulled from the service on March 28th, a Japanese Nintendo support account announced. The game, which seems to be owned by Spike Chunsoft and goes by Super Soccer in the US and Europe,

We’ve become used to the slow addition of Nintendo classics to the Nintendo Switch Online service since it launched in 2018, but some subscribers will apparently lose access to an old-school game on March 28.