I was nervous about how it would hold up on Switch, especially given how troublesome its PC port was at launch, and I am incredibly happy to have been wrong to worry. This might be the best third-party Switch port I've ever played, which makes it incredibly easy to recommend this game to anyone who has never played it before. There are simply no two ways about it: NieR Automata was a triumph of design in 2017, and it is a triumph of porting big games to Switch in 2022.
Despite a few struggles with the franchise's constant challenge of toeing the line between its story and gameplay, Great Ace Attorney feels like a series highlight. Ace Attorney as a whole feels like it's in limbo now since we're now four years past a brand new game being released in any territory, but hopefully this long-awaited localization is a sign of things to come. The Great Ace Attorney may not technically be a new game, but it's still just as good as I would expect a brand new Ace Attorney to be after half a decade's wait.
undefined.Ace Attorney remains one of my favorite franchises of all time, and I have loved the opportunity to play through the trilogy again on Switch. Though it lags a little in the middle with some less-than-stellar cases in the second game, the Ace Attorney Trilogy is still an incredible story with wonderful characters, memorable plots, and satisfying mysteries to solve. With little more than a new coat of paint, the Trilogy collection manages to be the perfect way to experience the story of Phoenix Wright whether you're a rookie lawyer or a great ace attorney.
Duck Game has been of favorite indie party game for years on PC, and I'm so excited to finally be able to bring it with me wherever I go to convince more friends and coworkers to play it with me at any time. Even though it was made as a PC exclusive five years ago, it still feels like Duck Game was made for the easy pick-up-and-play-anywhere multiplayer that the Switch was first advertised with. Few games draw out as many laughs, screams, and curses among my friends as Duck Game does, and now that it's available on Switch it's going to be a cornerstone of my millennial rooftop parties for years to come.
Puyo Puyo 2 is an excellent arcade puzzle game, and the Sega Ages port makes it more accessible than ever
Its ruined yet beautiful world carries a tone of wonder and amazement throughout the entire game, and HAL Laboratory undoubtedly stuck the landing while transitioning the series' gameplay into 3D. Though I am disappointed in the small number of copy abilities, the game's issues are mere bumps in the road compared to its many triumphs. It is the only game I can think of to make me cry from the sheer joy of how cute and heartwarming it can be, and it is in my opinion the best game Kirby's name has ever been on.
Bayonetta 3 is the kind of game that makes you wonder where a series could possibly go from here, because I can't imagine a sequel being bigger or better than this.
I have never played a game quite so ravenously, sinking over ninety hours into my first playthrough in just two weeks (though don't get too intimidated by that number, it counts all of my resets from playing on Hard difficulty, and I also played all fifteen optional chapters). At the end of it all I didn't feel exhausted or burnt out, but rather like I somehow wished that I could play for even longer. Fire Emblem Engage may not check every box that fans were hoping for, but it is easily the strongest showing for the series in the last decade.
If that seems like a minor thing to make my biggest complaint, you'd be right; the faults in Resident Evil 4 don't add up to very much. It's astonishing just how well RE4 has held up after nearly fifteen years, but it still managed to draw me in and keep me playing no matter what intermittent problems I ran into. There's a reason this game has been so celebrated over the years, and if you're like me and have been ignoring it for over a decade, then there's no better time to see what the big deal is than right now.
Despite a few hiccups, HoPiKo is still an incredible game. It's a pure test of mechanical skill set to a breathtaking chiptune soundtrack, and while that may not be for everyone it is absolutely for me. Playing each level over and over until I had mastered the quickest path through it was insanely fun, and I can see myself coming back to this one to beat my best times again and again.
Just like Human Resource Machine before it, 7 Billion Humans is one of the finest puzzle games I've ever played. A game based around programming logic runs the risk of being too complicated for its own good, but Tomorrow Corporation has fine-tuned the difficulty curve perfectly. Scrolling through a program and finding the exact command that needs to changed to carry out the exact right action is as fun as it can possibly be and with over 60 unique puzzles I doubt I'll be putting it down anytime soon.
This remains one of Arc System Works' best releases, and with flawless performance in handheld mode it's never been easier to take the fight with you to a friend's house. Though you may have already picked up Cross Tag Battle last year, you'd still do well by checking out this fully-featured mainline entry. Central Fiction is the best BlazBlue has ever been, and this may be the right time to join the battle if you haven't already.
There will never be a Yu-Gi-Oh game that is quite the same as simply playing with real cards, but Legacy of the Duelist is the closest that we have ever gotten to the real thing.
After a decade of seeing the series recommended everywhere, Trine 4 is my first time playing the series, and it’s made me realize just what I’ve been missing all these years.
It's oozing with style, it's shockingly accessible, and the back-and-forth exchanges prompted by the Grind Grid system make for non-stop excitement in every match. There's even a fifteen hour visual novel experience in the Chronicles mode that helps flesh out the world and characters of Under Night In-Birth, though personally I think I'm more afraid of understanding all the insane proper nouns in the plot summary than I am excited. This was a worthy addition to both the EVO lineup and the Switch lineup, and there's nothing I want more now than to see the game finally reach the mainstream success it deserves.
A Vita version was originally planned before the game was delayed so much that the idea of releasing a new game on Sony's dying handheld was laughable. Because of that, this version feels like 13 Sentinels is finally where it was meant to be all along. This game is wild and weird in all the best ways, and there has never been a better time to play it than right now.
I can't remember the last time I played a puzzle game with so many unique elements to keep track of, and it's definitely rare that I've played a game with so many puzzles that are so consistently well-designed. Out of the 80+ puzzles, I wouldn't say a single one was bad, and none of them were so obtuse that I needed to give up and find a solution online—although some definitely stumped me for a while. If a patch or two comes out to fix the performance problems in the late game, then picking this up will be a no-brainer.
Although I would’ve liked more challenge in the campaign, I still had fun with Unravel Two right up until the very end. Yarny is an adorable character that stole my heart right from the beginning, and the unique puzzles that come from both characters being literally strung together made for a fresh spin on co-op puzzle solving.
J.'s story while solving puzzles and crossing obstacles in ways I've rarely had to think about before. It's a game that touched me on a personal level and one I'll be thinking of for a long time to come.
Despite that, it's still a personal favorite of mine. The structure of the game, with its changes to matchmaking and further exploitation of loot boxes, feels worse nowadays than it did three years ago, but the core, fast-paced experience of actually playing the game remains as fun as it's ever been. Overwatch is an absolute must-play for fans of multiplayer shooters, and while the Switch version makes a number of compromises, it does not compromise how incredible Overwatch is.