Can I have 2 of the same digital game? Details below.

[Stella-Io]

Posting here cause thise is Switch console specific.

I CAN NOT FOR THE LIFE OF ME find the answer I need, no matter how many different ways I word it in the search bar of Google. I don't have reddit so I can't ask there either.

What I want to know is can I have two digital copies of the same game, on 2 different (but linked) switches, with each game having its OWN data. I DO NOT WANT to transfer data from my primary to the secondary, I want two 'different' games. Would I need to get a phyical copy to achieve this?

My primary Switch has the digital copy, and I want another copy for my secondary Switch, weather digital or phyical (digital is more convenient but takes up space, and this game uses *alot of space. Phyical reduces space but would take longer to find in stores). Both Switches share the primaries NNID so that I can go online with them both, download games, use the thing where you get new avatars, and so I don't need to pay for multiple NSOs.

I know if I bought multiple phyical copies, each copy acts as it's own game, cause I've done this with NH. However I don't know if it works with digital games or not, like if I bought another digital on the same NNID on the secondary Switch, it'll prompt me to just download the save data I already had on the primary, which I DO NOT want to do.

Spoiler: Questions ppl asked me/suggested

Just put save data to a different save location
-I can't on the primary, both system storage and the SD card are damn near full. I have other digital games downloaded as well. You can't take the SD card out and put it on a different Switch either, it will only work for its original. If I take the SD card out, I'll 'loose' my other digital downloaded games as well.

Archive data
-I don't like archiving data and the games the Switch keeps promoting me to archive are the game I want double of (Skyrim) and NH. These are phyical copy games or keeps asking me to archive. For some reason it never asks me to archive BotW but it must not take up thay much space.

Switch your NH save to the secondary Switch since they share the same NNID
-Not happening. I have two save files, my main and an alt. If I moved the data to the secondary, my alt won't be able to play as they alt has no NNID and I'm not creating a new email just for an alt account.

Since you want another game save, just create an alt and have them play the game
-I already do this. I have like 4 alts and like 10 save files. I can create multiple save files on one account. Refer to statement one, I'm running out of storage.
Also, there is a benefit to buying a new game on a different system. The DLC that I plan to re-download later (I'm pretty sure it'll 're-download' as the HHP does this with NH) breaks some quests in the game. If I wait on re-downloading the DLC, I can do those quests then download the DLC, and still get the rewards from the quests. "It just works."

Edited so it hopefully makes more sense/more cohesive

 

[Stella-Io]

Bump

 

[edenoakk]

If you use your digital copy on another switch i think you should be fine for a new save as I don't think ACNH save data goes to the cloud

Edit: you can fix the settings on your 2nd switch also to disable cloud save data to automatically install

 

[Romaki]

Posting here cause thise is Switch console specific.

I CAN NOT FOR THE LIFE OF ME find the answer I need, no matter how many different ways I word it in the search bar of Google. I don't have reddit so I can't ask there either.

What I want to know is can I have two digital copies of the same game, on 2 different (but linked) switches, with each game having its OWN data. I DO NOT WANT to transfer data from my primary to the secondary, I want two 'different' games. Would I need to get a phyical copy to achieve this?

My primary Switch has the digital copy, and I want another copy for my secondary Switch, weather digital or phyical (digital is more convenient but takes up space, and this game uses *alot of space. Phyical reduces space but would take longer to find in stores). Both Switches share the primaries NNID so that I can go online with them both, download games, use the thing where you get new avatars, and so I don't need to pay for multiple NSOs.

I know if I bought multiple phyical copies, each copy acts as it's own game, cause I've done this with NH. However I don't know if it works with digital games or not, like if I bought another digital on the same NNID on the secondary Switch, it'll prompt me to just download the save data I already had on the primary, which I DO NOT want to do.

Spoiler: Questions ppl asked me/suggested

Just put save data to a different save location
-I can't on the primary, both system storage and the SD card are damn near full. I have other digital games downloaded as well. You can't take the SD card out and put it on a different Switch either, it will only work for its original. If I take the SD card out, I'll 'loose' my other digital downloaded games as well.

Archive data
-I don't like archiving data and the games the Switch keeps promoting me to archive are the game I want double of (Skyrim) and NH. These are phyical copy games or keeps asking me to archive. For some reason it never asks me to archive BotW but it must not take up thay much space.

Switch your NH save to the secondary Switch since they share the same NNID
-Not happening. I have two save files, my main and an alt. If I moved the data to the secondary, my alt won't be able to play as they alt has no NNID and I'm not creating a new email just for an alt account.

Since you want another game save, just create an alt and have them play the game
-I already do this. I have like 4 alts and like 10 save files. I can create multiple save files on one account. Refer to statement one, I'm running out of storage.
Also, there is a benefit to buying a new game on a different system. The DLC that I plan to re-download later (I'm pretty sure it'll 're-download' as the HHP does this with NH) breaks some quests in the game. If I wait on re-downloading the DLC, I can do those quests then download the DLC, and still get the rewards from the quests. "It just works."

Edited so it hopefully makes more sense/more cohesive

The "two physical copies = two different save files" is not the case anymore for any game on the Switch. Any save data is saved on the console, not the game itself.

You can upload and download save data for any game via cloud, but not New Horizon. Nintendo disabled that, but they made an island transfer tool to get the same island from one console to the other. But you can't play the same save data twice. If the island is moved to a new console, the old console has its data deleted. So you are forced to have two different save files on two consoles.

 

[Captain Jigglypuff]

The only game that you can technically own two copies of on the console at the same time is Uno. This is a really weird situation which I still don’t even understand how it happened. I bought the digital version of Uno back in 2018 or 19 and not more than a year after I had bought my Switch. Eventually I bought all the DLC available at the time. So I would occasionally boot up the game and play a few rounds in solo mode. Then in I think 2020 during the entire pandemic thing, Uno apparently had this new version with new themes and game styles and I was able to get it for free since I had previously bought the game and I thought it’d just be a standard update. Imagine my surprise to find out it was an entirely different game with the same icon as the old version but the old version couldn’t be played as it had been disabled. It took me two years to figure out which icon was the useless one and delete it as having two games both called Uno and with the same game icon in the menu was extremely confusing for me for two years.