Let's Build The Ultimate Switch Collection - Worthwhile games that aren't first party Nintendo

[Judge Dredd]

What games are worthwhile on the Switch, preferably exclusives that are not first party Nintendo?


Powerlevel. I like handheld systems and own a bunch. The problem is they've become too valuable to take anywhere. I used to throw my 3DS in my pocket and take it everywhere but these days it can't really be replaced if it gets wet or damage. While I rarely want to play games out of the house these days, there are occasions like babysitting a dog where having a console to play on would be handy.

The usual solution I hear is "buy a Steam deck and put some emulators on it!" but Steam decks start at £350 (£460 for a decent one), and I can get a Switch OLED for that.

The real problem however is games. I've little interest in first party Nintendo games like Pokemon and Zelda, and the few I do care about like Bayonetta 3, Metroid Dread, and Mario + Rabbids have inflated prices. The big third party games like Doom 2016 and Skyrim are on PC and play better there. That leaves, what? Astral Chain? Starlink? I assume there's a bunch I'm missing.

There could also be games that do exist on PC but are well suited to the Switch's casual pick up and play nature. I don't know what those games are, but I'd like to know any suggestions you have. eg. I played a lot of Earth Defense Force on PSVita.

 

[jxxyy]

omori was fun ig I really don't use my switch for anything anymore. I'm starting to emulate the newer first party games on my computer and like you said, alot of third party games on switch just have better versions on computers. If I think of any good switch games I'll reply here again

 

[The Skeksis Emperor]

If you enjoy Atlus JRPGs, The Etrian Odyssey games and Shin Megami Tensei 3 and 5 are on the Switch, maybe start with SMT 5 if you wanted to check them out. The Rune Factory series is also fun, if you like that sort of stuff. Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town (2021) was also surprisingly good and not just recycled garbage for a change.

 

[Epoch]

buy a Steam deck and put some emulators on it!

It runs Switch emulators, you can pirate on it without a modchip or first gen switch, and you can just buy the cheapest one and put a new, larger SSD in it or an SD card for cheaper than it would be to buy the larger size deck.

I own a hacked Switch and a Deck, and since getting the Deck I haven't used my Switch.

 

[Buttigieg2020]

The usual solution I hear is "buy a Steam deck and put some emulators on it!" but Steam decks start at £350 (£460 for a decent one), and I can get a Switch OLED for that.

The real problem however is games. I've little interest in first party Nintendo games like Pokemon and Zelda, and the few I do care about like Bayonetta 3, Metroid Dread, and Mario + Rabbids have inflated prices. The big third party games like Doom 2016 and Skyrim are on PC and play better there. That leaves, what? Astral Chain? Starlink? I assume there's a bunch I'm missing.

If it’s a similar price (the base model steam deck is a very small downgrade from the top model) and you don’t want to play first party Nintendo games, I would just get a steam deck.
The main advantages for the switch are oled screen and battery life which are very nice. Emulation of switch games on steam deck is still a generally worse experience than playing on switch. It is free though.

Mario+Rabbids is on sale with the DLC for like 20 dollars every other week? Astral Chain is also first party.

Rune Factory 4 special, Dusk, Clubhouse Games 51, Bioshock collection, Metroid Prime Remastered, West of Loathing, Horizon Chase, are all very good cheaper games.

 

[Scarthew]

well indie games is the obvious answer, theres so many on the eshop.

 

[Pissmaster]

• Shiren the Wanderer: The Tower of Fortune and the Dice of Fate
  • roguelike; upgraded from the PSVita version; on par with the Steam version; physical version is rare because it was published by Limited Run
• Rogue Legacy
  • roguelike; on every platform, runs fine on Switch; physical version is also rare due to Limited Run
• La Mulana 1+2
  • very difficult 2D platformer; first game goes on sale for $3.74; physical version is only available as a 1+2 bundle in a box-o-crap edition
• Game Builder Garage
  • child-friendly game creation studio that's fun to poke around in; nintendo developed, switch exclusive
• Dragon Quest XI S
  • turn-based JRPG; on every platform, runs fine on Switch

That's the kind of list you're looking for, right? I dunno, Switch has an enormous library, and it's generally a good rule of thumb to look up if a game runs well before buying it, if it started on a different platform. Especially PC.

 

[Kerr Avon]

Considering your avatar , Rogue Trooper.

Any of the stuff by Rebellion runs well on it , Sniper Elite & Zombie Army Trilogy especially.

Immortal Redneck and Ziggurat are fun too.

 

[Peanut Butter in Peril]

Ori and the Blind Forest/Will of the Wisps could be good picks if you're into Metroidvanias.

I've been enjoying Octopath Traveler on my own Switch lately so it might be worth looking into.

 

[Focken Kiwi]

well indie games is the obvious answer, theres so many on the eshop.

I recently picked up an indie game called 9th Dawn III for the Switch. I was looking for something "grindy" to play and stumbled on it. I haven't seen anyone on the Farms mention any of the games from the series but it's pretty fun.

Spoiler: Trailer

 

[BananaSplit²]

There is a huge ton of third-party games on Switch regardless they're exclusives or not, and it's admittedly hard to keep track of them all.

RPG

• Octopath Traveler II
• Atelier series (either Rorona, Ayesha, Marie remake or Sophie 2 as a starting point as long as you avoid Ryza)
• Legend of Heroes (Crossbell duology in particular, funnily enough the first two Sen no Kiseki/Coldsteel are japanese-only)
• Shin Megami Tensei V
• Dragon Quest XI S
• LIVE A EVIL
• Fushigi no Dungeon Shiren 5 (a sequel was recently announced)
• The Witcher 3 Complete Edition (a pretty decent port)
• Dark Souls Remastered
• Dragon Dogma Dark Arisen
• Bug Fables

Simulation / Strategy

• Gundam G Generation Genesis for Nintendo Switch (English version is Asia-only)
• GrimGrimoire OnceMore
• Disgaea 1 Refine, 4 & 5 (D6 sucks balls)
• Valkyria Chronicles 1 & 4
• Banner of the Maid
• Triangle Strategy

Tower Defense

• Dungeon Warfare
• Xmorph Defense
• Futari de! Nyanko Daisensou (JP-only but it has English support, goes under the name of Battle Cats with none of the micro-transactions on Switch)
• Gensokyo Defenders
• 13 Sentinels Aegis Rim (part-visual novel & part-tower defense)
• Dragon Quest Heroes I + II (Japan-only, second game is more of an action RPG btw)

I was disappointed that Pixeljunk Monsters Ultimate and Defense Grid 1 didn't make the cut here, and we got the inferior sequels instead.

Action / Platformer

• Nier Automata
• Cuphead
• Ys Origin & Ys 8 (Felghana remaster is JP-only as well as the upcoming Ys 10 Nordics)
• Rabi-Ribi
• Akiba's Trip 2
• Rayman Legends
• Crash Bandicoot N'sane Trilogy
• Ender Lillies
• Hollow Knight
• Monster Hunter Rise (I mainly played with JP bros)
• Touhou Luna Nights
• No More Heroes 1 & 2 (NMH3 was a total mess and I'm not talking about the performance issues when road-roaming)
• Blaster Master Zero Trilogy (Japan-exclusive cartridge has voice-acting while remaining multi-language)
• Earth Defense Force 2 + 3 + 4.1 for Nintendo Switch (they're Japanese-only sadly unlike the old Vita ports)
• Katamari Damacy & We Love Katamari Reroll +

Arcade / Shmup

• Cotton Reboot
• Black Bird
• Radiant Silvergun
• Pix the Cat
• Densha de Go Hashirou Yamanote (JP-only train arcade sim)
• Rocky & Pocky Reshrined
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge

Roguelite

• The Binding of Isaac Afterbirth +
• Hades
• Risk of Rain 1 (there is the second game too but I recall the Switch port was left behind in terms of updates)
• Darkest Dungeon

Rhythm

• SuperBeat Xonic Ex
• Deemo
• Taiko Tatsujin for Nintendo Switch (the recent Taiko has subscription bullshit to get access to more songs)
• Muse Dash
• Mad Rat Dead (crossover between rhythm and platformer)
• Lumines Remastered
• Hatsune Miku Project Diva Mega39's / Megamix

Horror

• Yomawari trilogy
• Resident Evil 1 & 4 & 5 (Zero has longer loading times with a distracting circle on the lower-right and 6 suffers of performance issues just like the old PS3 version)
• Signalis
• Alien Isolation

Puzzle

• Catherine Fullbody
• Photon Cube
• Portal 1 + 2
• The Talos Principle (port has some framerate problems, alleviated when running in Performance mode from the settings, but overall not an issue considering the genre)
• Mighty Switch Force Collection

Also, as someone who owns both the Steam Deck and Switch, I still do largely prefer the Switch in everyday use because of the smaller size dimensions (easier to carry around) and the better stability all-around which means no sudden bugs or crashes (which mostly force the Deck to do a hard reboot).
Steam Deck is mainly for the couple of games I cannot get on Switch (like Armored Core 6, EDF5, Yakuza, etc.) and retro emulation.

 

[SSj_Ness (Yiffed)]

The upcoming Another Code Recollection is a Switch exclusive.

There's not a lot of notable 3rd party exclusives that come to mind, I'd have to think. There's certainly some greats like Dragon Quest 11, but it is not exclusive (though speaking of DQ, the new Dragon Quest Monsters entry is exclusive).

 

[Calandrino]

I hardly ever use Switch for worst-party games. I mostly got one because Ninja Warriors Once Again wasn't coming to Steam (and I wasn't about to get a GAYstation), although recently, it finally did. Nevertheless I believe these are still Switch exclusives:

Puzzle Bobble Every Bubble
Sega Ages series but especially Space Harrier
Pac-Man 99 (has an offline non battle royale mode)

Could include more not-on-PC console-exclusives.

Steam deck is worthless to me because it doesn't support handheld vertical mode, as the Switch does with a Flip Grip. I'm not playing Pac-Man or Mushihimesama in a tiny little window, like some retarded zoomer's youtube video they filmed in portrait. If somebody gave me a free Steam deck, I would probably back up over it with my car.

 

[Epoch]

Steam deck is worthless to me because it doesn't support handheld vertical mode, as the Switch does with a Flip Grip.

I'm sure you could use some abomination of clamp on bluetooth controller to get it to work

 

[Two Dollars]

The usual solution I hear is "buy a Steam deck and put some emulators on it!" but Steam decks start at £350 (£460 for a decent one), and I can get a Switch OLED for that.

You may want to look into emulation handhelds; cheap Linux/Android devices that are strictly meant to emulate old games, with maybe a tiny handful of newer games getting ported. Reposting from the Sony thread:

Spoiler

[…] the current most popular lowish-end options are from Retroid (the Pocket 2S, Pocket 3+, or Pocket Flip depending on your preferred form factor; they're all about equal in what they can emulate). The Miyoo Mini Plus is also a good option, and Anbernic has a wide variety of systems that are hit or miss. If you don't like ordering from chink-shit sites that take weeks to ship, you can also sometimes order from Amazon and get free Prime shipping, but expect a markup in price.

You mainly want to think about form factor, power, screen resolution (you don't want "the biggest resolution", you want whatever is closest to a multiple of the resolution of whatever you're trying to emulate, though it doesn't matter as much for 3D games), and operating system (Android and Linux both have their pros and cons, and Linux will often have two or three similar choices of distro). Retro Game Corps is a well-liked reviewer that I recommend, and he has a website full of tutorials.

Pac-Man 99 (has an offline non battle royale mode)

Not anymore, they took it down. The only way to get it now is to sail the seven seas.

 

[Kerr Avon]

9th Dawn III

Yeah this one is perfect for playing on the shitter, had it on phones for years

 

[Judge Dredd]

The Rune Factory series is also fun, if you like that sort of stuff. Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town (2021) was also surprisingly good and not just recycled garbage for a change.

I'll look into those. I'm really enjoying Stardew Valley on PC so I'd be up for more of the in a casual setting. I vaguely remember some controversy over the rune factory games, though I don't remember which side was reeeing about it. @BananaSplit² know anything about it?

Also, as someone who owns both the Steam Deck and Switch, I still do largely prefer the Switch in everyday use because of the smaller size dimensions (easier to carry around) and the better stability all-around which means no sudden bugs or crashes (which mostly force the Deck to do a hard reboot).
Steam Deck is mainly for the couple of games I cannot get on Switch (like Armored Core 6, EDF5, Yakuza, etc.) and retro emulation.

I own a hacked Switch and a Deck, and since getting the Deck I haven't used my Switch.

It's an interesting problem because I can see the benefits of getting a Steam Deck. It's always the go-to recommendation for a reason.

@Two Dollars made a great point about buying a cheapo handheld for emulation of older games. That would fit my goal of a "disposable" handheld I can carry around without fear of it breaking. The Steam Deck and even higher end Switch fails that goal.

Going Steam Deck and putting a bunch of money into it for upgrades, then using it as a pirate machine has an appeal as well. I already have a gaming PC, and playing those kind of long form, deep games "on the go" doesn't sound like a good fit. If I'm just using it to emulate Switch, then I'm not really saving much money because I can always emulate on the gaming PC.

Mario+Rabbids is on sale with the DLC for like 20 dollars every other week?

I didn't know that. I decided to check the prices and you can get the "gold" edition for £35. This surprised me because every other first party game I've checked is either out of print, or asking £50+ on ebay for a second hand copy. I also had no idea there was a sequel until I did that search.

Astral Chain is also first party.

I didn't know that. I'll still count it for the purposes of this list when I edit the OP.

I guess I should include first party games to be recommended.

The reason I excluded first party games is that 99% of Switch discussion (with 1% margin of error) is the same games over and over. Mario, Mario Kart, Zelda, Pokemon, Splatoon. Most of which I have little interest in, and everyone knows those games already. I had no idea Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope existed until now and that sounds up my street. I never heard any mention of it in any conversations related to the Switch.

 

[SSj_Ness (Yiffed)]

I vaguely remember some controversy over the rune factory games, though I don't remember which side was reeeing about it

Later games added some LGBT shit, I believe. I know the first one is good and free of any faggotry.

I decided to check the prices and you can get the "gold" edition for £35. This surprised me because every other first party game I've checked is either out of print, or asking £50+ on ebay for a second hand copy.

That might have something to do with it being developed by Ubisoft despite being a 1st party IP.

 

[Buttigieg2020]

@Judge Dredd It’s not letting me reply directly to you, but the first Mario + Rabbids is published by Ubisoft, which is why they do deep discounts. The sequel is a different type of game and in my experience it’s worse.

Rune Factory 3 and 4 Special are remasters of 10 year old games, so there is no “current year” shit in them at all, both very good if you can stomach 3ds era graphics. 5 is a clusterfuck where the localization team added gay dating but didn’t bother to fix the performance, so it’s a mess.

Astral Chain and Bayonetta Origins are both Platinum games published by Nintendo where you control 2 characters at once, I thought they were both great, but you should probably find them on sale somewhere.

If you wanted something really cheap, portable, and disposable, the switch lite might be better than the oled. You can get refurbished models for half the price of the oled. No TV functionality though.

 

[BananaSplit²]

@BananaSplit² know anything about it?

I may recall mentioning in the Localization thread that Rune Factory 5 was the sequel with plenty of gameplay downgrades, a various amount of bugs, and the localization team poorly implemented the gay dating/marriage for brownie points.

It's an interesting problem because I can see the benefits of getting a Steam Deck. It's always the go-to recommendation for a reason.

Going Steam Deck and putting a bunch of money into it for upgrades, then using it as a pirate machine has an appeal as well. I already have a gaming PC, and playing those kind of long form, deep games "on the go" doesn't sound like a good fit. If I'm just using it to emulate Switch, then I'm not really saving much money because I can always emulate on the gaming PC.

Switch and Steam Deck are fundamentally two different devices even if their respective game libraries often do overlap between each other. At their cores, the former is a console, the latter is a PC.

Crashes and bugs will happen once in awhile on the Steam Deck, but more frequently than I ever personally experienced on Switch. My Deck is 4 months old now, and most of the problems were the hardware having issues to properly wake up when pausing in-game with the start button, or that one time I had to mess around the BIOS to "repair" the dock. Trying to alternate docked and portable mid-game, like you can on Switch, is not recommended on the Deck imo.
Compatibility issues with Proton may also happen. They can generally be fixed by switching to Proton Experimental in the launch settings, but there are certain cases (such as Beyond Good & Evil) where you'll have to edit files & folders like on a real computer. There is the rare case of a game ultimately not working properly too, such as Granblue Fantasy Versus where trying to look up the attack combo list will softlock the game no matter what.

The Steam Deck itself is still a neat device, but it's not entirely hassle-free and it's primarily built around using Steam as a storefront/game launcher plus the emulators you download off Dolphin (the software manager of Proton). Trying to run anything outside of that perimeter may involve some level of nightmare, depending of how computer-savy you are.

I own an OLED Switch and I do enjoy its kickstand to play games in tablet mode, in addition to docked and portable, making more versatile in terms of use.
I also have irl friends and family relatives with a Switch, so there is the social factor too, between playing together or renting vidya.