> The NES games inside Animal Crossing blew my mind as a kid

Sounds similar to Donkey Kong 64 (1999) that had an arcade machine inside a level that let you play the original Donkey Kong (1981): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwPRHdhhVK8

> Nintendo doesn't simply have its entire catalogue available via virtual console

Not entirely the same, but Nintendo does offer a lot of their classic games through the Nintendo Switch Online membership: https://www.nintendo.com/us/online/nintendo-switch-online/cl...

> Sounds similar to Donkey Kong 64 (1999) that had an arcade machine inside a level that let you play the original Donkey Kong (1981)

Interesting tidbit about that is that it was carefully recreated from scratch by Rare, rather than being emulated, because Nintendo doesn't have/own the rights to the original source code. They originally had Ikegami Tsushinki do the programming for the arcade version, who later claimed ownership of the source code and eventually won the lawsuit.

https://www.gamedeveloper.com/business/the-secret-history-of...

The distinction is, if I stop paying for the Switch Online membership at any point (or forget to renew), all those titles go away. By contrast, my Animal Crossing Gamecube disk still works. :)

People have even come up with generic gift codes that can unlock some of the NES games Nintendo never "officially" released for AC, like Legend of Zelda, Punch-Out, and a few others.

My entire basement house in the original Animal Crossing is filled with nothing but gyroids and NES games.

What I think they're pointing out is that the Wii, Wii u, and 3ds did have the virtual console and basically the full back catalogue available on it. It took the lifetime of the switch for the new service to get a comparable line up.