On Friday, May 28th, the Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity’s Expansion Pass provided a purchase bonus to fans ready to save Hyrule. While new, the purchase bonus was a simple armor and weapon set for Link (Prototype Ancient Gear and Prototype Ancient Short Sword). With just a quick little update, anyone who had purchased the two-wave DLC would find the new gear in-game. That is, in theory, as the European Nintendo eShop listed the purchase bonus in a separate listing as a free download for anyone.
Thus, for a short time, anyone with a European Nintendo Switch account could download the purchase bonus without buying the DLC. Tack on speculation that this would unlock the entire Expansion Pass (priced at $19.99), Nintendo had a free-for-all downloading spree on their hands. Now, almost two weeks later, Nintendo of Europe has made a statement about this error and sent the following e-mail to any Nintendo account holders that “purchased” the gear set:
Dear [Nintendo account holder],
On Friday May 28th 2021, the Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity Expansion Pass was made available for purchase on Nintendo eShop. Buying the Expansion Pass entitles users to a special Purchase Bonus of equippable items that can be used in-game immediately.
Unfortunately, an error on Nintendo eShop led to the Purchase Bonus being briefly made available to all users. Furthermore, downloading the Purchase Bonus without buying the Expansion Pass gave the impression that the Expansion Pass was then purchased, when this is not the case. As you are one of the users affected, we’d like to apologise for this error.
Currently, users who downloaded the Purchase Bonus without buying the Expansion Pass are able to equip the related items in-game. However, once Expansion Pass Wave 1 – Pulse of the Ancients becomes available, these items will no longer be usable unless the Expansion Pass is purchased. This will not affect your save file or ability to play the game.
Users affected by this issue are currently unable to purchase the Expansion Pass via Nintendo eShop. This will be resolved once Expansion Pass Wave 1 – Pulse of the Ancients is released, at which point the purchase button will be accessible again.
Once again, we apologise for this error and any inconvenience caused.
Nintendo
While Wave 1 of the Expansion Pass is scheduled for a “June release”, chances are it will be shadow dropped or given an official release date during the Nintendo Direct E3 2021 taking place on Tuesday, June 15th. Enjoy the Ancient gear set while you can, as it’ll only be available in Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity’s “paid for the DLC” timeline then!
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Written by Jennifer Burch
Illustrator, designer, writer and big Nintendo geek, you can find Jennifer with an N3DS within reach 24/7. As the oldest of three, she has survived many Mario Party, Super Smash Bros. and Mario Kart sessions intact in addition to getting her brothers hooked on some really weird games. (Cubivore anyone?)
