Survival Kids Demonstrates a Brilliant New Switch 2 Feature: GameShare
We only have one Switch 2. How can we play together? By "sharing" the game with my children's original Switches. It works brilliantly and the game is fantastic.
When Switch 2 was announced, I wondered whether to buy more than a single Switch 2. Once it became clear Mario Kart World, a game that we’ll largely play on a TV, was the primary launch game, I punted that conversation. Maybe there will be a reason for my oldest daughter to have her own Switch 2 eventually. Or maybe, as our first week with the Switch 2 has suggested, we might be able to get by just fine for a while longer.
Enter Survival Kids, a rare Switch 2 exclusive at launch. It’s based on an old Konami game for the Game Boy Color (!!) from 1999, but nostalgia is not a requirement for this.
Survival Kids is a simple but delightful game where you and up to three other players work together on an island to collect cosmetics, build structures like bridges, and goof around. There’s a neat stamina mechanic where cooking and eating food lets you climb longer, but this is not a high intensity game. It’s a casual and low-stakes experience that proved perfect for me and my eight-year-old when we booted it up.
(My five-year-old gave it a shot but didn’t like getting left behind and gave up.)
Where we booted up Survival Kids is important. How we booted it up is important, too.
“Where” was in the car. Last weekend, we had a family wedding in Chicago. Since we couldn’t leave until the kids were out of school, we buckled up for a slooooooow ride due to traffic. But it also proved a perfect test case for a new Switch 2 feature called “GameShare.” That’s the “how” part of the equation, because with GameShare, it’s possible for people with an original Switch to play Switch 2 games. Yes, an old Switch!
Here is the best part, too: it does not require a connection to the internet!
If you want to watch a step-by-step video, I’ve uploaded one on YouTube:
If you want to know how it works via screenshots, I’ve also got you covered:
Turn on both the Switch 2 and Switch 1. They have to be nearby one another, and I so far have not tested how far apart they can be. But you’ll be fine on the other side of the couch, or in another row in a minivan, where we played the game.
Set up a lobby via “GameShare.” You cannot customize how the other characters will look, which is likely to cause arguments in your family, as it did with mine.
On the Switch 1, load up the “GameShare” option on the menu screen. You cannot, as far as I can tell, send someone an “invite.” Please add this feature!
Next, the Switch 2 must start a lobby for people to join. It’s unclear why you can’t join during the character customization screen, but you can’t. Just start a game. Now, you’ll see a screen where you can monitor as people could join your lobby!
This is when the other Switch can now search for a lobby to join.
If there’s a lobby to be found, there will be a lobby to join…
Which will look obvious on the Switch 2 screen.
Once everyone is in, you can launch the game and, voila, you’re playing together!
Once that’s all done, you’re off to the races.
The connection got a little wobbly at times—but only a touch! For the most part, the connection between my Switch 2 and my daughter’s original Switch was rock solid. We played the game for nearly two hours and had a total blast. More than Mario Kart World, this became the reason my oldest was upset that I was leaving for Los Angeles.
The main problem we ran into was—one that I’m unsure is a GameShare or Survival Kids issue—was over player customization. You’re constantly running into secret items that add new options for your player to wear in Survival Kids, but the only person who can actually pick up the cosmetic items and the only person who can, importantly, use the cosmetic items is the person on the Switch 2! My oldest daughter immediately took issue with this, and the solution was, hilariously, to swap who was using the Switch 2. I handed her my Switch 2, which let her equip the new hats and shirts, while I ran around with a hand-me-down Switch that became hers years ago.
Like I said, it’s unclear whether this is a limitation of GameShare, a feature overlooked by Survival Kids, or both. I’ve contacted Konami but have yet to hear back.
GameShare is not supported by every game—it’s optional. Mario Kart World, for example, does not support GameShare. Maybe it’s not possible, or maybe Nintendo knows Mario Kart World is the kind of game that incentives people to upgrade to a Switch 2. Survival Kids, on the other hand, is a game that thrives with co-op and would struggle to find an audience while the world begins to populate with Switch 2s.
Instead, it immediately has access to hundreds of millions of already purchased Switch devices in people’s homes. Given how many families, including my own, are likely going the route of buying one Switch 2 for the house, this becomes a huge boon.
My daughter turned to me while playing Survival Kids and said “It’s like I actually have a Switch 2.” That’s powerful! She doesn’t know (or care) it’s a video feed. She cares about playing a Switch 2 game. Which, naturally, made it hard for me to explain why it doesn’t work with Mario Kart World. The Switch 2 edition of Super Mario Party Jamboree will also support GameShare, but that doesn’t mean it’s share the whole game.
“With one game, up to four people can play the Mega Wiggler's Tree Party board in Mario Party mode.”
It’s unclear if the limitations on GameShare are purely technical. Could Nintendo share the entirety of Super Mario Party Jamboree if they wanted? My uninformed speculation suggests “no,” but it also believes it could be more than a single board, too.
Long story short: Survival Kids is great and I hope more games support GameShare.
Have a story idea? Want to share a tip? Got a funny parenting story? Drop Patrick an email.
Also:
I’m still praying for a proper co-op “Free Roam” in Mario Kart World. Usually, Nintendo gives me a “no comment, but in this case, did not respond to me at all.
The desire to covet a Switch 2 has quieted in the house a bit, now that it’s just in the house and no longer something to dream about. The iPad remains the king.
My daughter is obsessed with this Camper Van game, which launched on PC this past week but is coming to Switch “soon.” Please be very soon. (I need to write about the camper videos that my daughters keep obsessively watching.)
We haven't jumped on the Switch 2 Bandwagon yet, but this feature definitely moves it up on the priority list.
I'm glad to hear that Nintendo continues to emphasize co-op and same-location multiplayer (blanking on a more official name for that, though I think there is one?) capabilities. That's been one of the things that's always sort of made me a Nintendo loyalist, and while online multiplayer and co-op games are great in many cases (we've put in ... a lot of hours on our college-friends-and-hangers-on-Valheim-server), there's somethings special about having friends or family over and firing up Super Smash Brothers or Overcooked and passing controllers around between levels.
I know someone that really loves the 'Survival Kids' franchise (you might also know it as 'Lost in Blue') that saw the trailer and felt some kinda ways about this game when it was revealed, as the tone of the co-op goofing felt a bit divorced from the rest of the series. I'm glad that the game itself is good and that GameShare works well. Something has been missing since the days of Download Play on the DS.