Update thanks to thethatfox:
Physical game cards may also not actually contain the game:
Nintendo Switch 2 Game-Key Card Overview
Game-key cards are different from regular game cards, because they don’t contain the full game data. Instead, the game-key card is your “key” to downloading the full game to your system via the internet.
Update 2: There is probably a difference in Game-key cards and card that contain real game data. So we don’t know right now how often these game-key cards are used or if nintendo is using them.
That is a huge bummer for people that spends months working places with very slow or no internet. It is getting harder and harder to get physical media, and every single device needs to be constantly touching the internet to work properly. I just find it so ridiculous you can’t buy a brand new console, and throw a CD / cartridge in it, and expect it to actually play a video game.