Nintendo Switch Online Is Down At The Worst Possible Time

Nintendo Switch Online is used by many Switch games -- including Mario Kart 8 Deluxe -- for multiplayer functionality. Those same servers also underpin the Nintendo eShop, which allows you to purchase games digitally. As of this writing at 9:46am EST, Nintendo online services are still down, as witnessed by the screenshot and error message presented below when trying to access the Nintendo eShop.

Nintendo's woes aren't isolated either; Microsoft's Xbox Live service went offline for a few hours yesterday to the ire of stay-at-home gamers. Even the Microsoft Teams service, which needed even more in times like this when companies are trying to conduct operations remotely, has experienced outages this week.

Gamers of all ages have flocked to games like Fortnite and Call of Duty to burn off some frustrations after being forced to stay at home (either mandatorily or voluntarily). Italian internet service provider Telecom Italia SpA saw its network usage spike by two-thirds following a nationwide shutdown.

And gaming service Steam saw its highest number of concurrent players ever -- 19,728,027 total -- earlier this week, no doubt due to the coronavirus.