WORTH CONSIDERING - Rock of Ages 3: Make & Break brings with it a create-a-level mode as the centerpiece. For me, the Story Mode was still the heart of the game, but it’s borderline frustratingly difficult with a combination of too many obstacles, precise AI opponents that are just too good, and grueling courses. The classic storytelling and graphic animation styles were still present, but playing the game on the Nintendo Switch also brought some system quirks with it too. For fans of the series, there’s still something here to have fun with, but I felt like the original game ultimately brought me more joy.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Space Crew, the sequel to Bomber Crew, pits players against the perils of space, managing their crew and spaceship and defending the galaxy from the Phasmids. The game feels less like a sequel, and more like a complete reskin and a version 1.5 from the original. The controls are still a bit complicated, but gameplay is engaging with a lot of micro management to be had, albeit a tad more grinding than I would have hoped for. If you haven’t played Bomber Crew, or you want a new theme for that game, then take to the stars and enjoy some Space Crew.
Think of the Children is a fun and frantic party game that delivers on its promise of parenting mayhem. I enjoyed the simplistic gameplay and objectives, but really struggled with the visual style, particularly in handheld mode. I would have also loved to have some options to make difficulty adjustments, but the game as it stands shines the best when played with others, though solo mode is still achievable.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Golf Peaks blends logic-based puzzle gameplay with golfing aesthetics for the visual presentation. The game is neither a great golfing game, or really a challenging puzzle game as most of the levels are fairly easy and straightforward to solve, and the sport serves primarily as just window dressing. That doesn’t mean to say that the overall experience still isn’t polished and fun. Golf Peaks lands on the Nintendo Switch for a meager $4.99, and for that you’ll get a few hours of relaxed puzzle fun. It’s a decent alternative to hitting the real links on a given Sunday afternoon.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Koral brings us on a journey to better understand the destructive nature of certain fishing practices, climate change, and more. The journey is a gorgeous, but humbling one. Highly accessible controls let you control the current of the ocean to solve lightweight puzzles and revitalize the ocean. With 10 chapters to explore, there’s a reasonable amount of content, but it won’t have much in the way of replayability once you’re done, although it’s still a worthwhile journey to embark on.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Verlet Swing combines a unique art style with platform swinging mechanics in a progressively challenging game that’ll test your skills to the max. For someone thinking this may be similar to an artistic walking simulator like Abzu or Firewatch, you’ll be sorely amiss. Sticking with the game and overcoming its challenges will reward you with new unique environments to play through, but swinging around is anything but easy.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Solo: Islands of the Heart is an introspective journey to question how you love and understand different ways it can manifest. Filled with light puzzle elements and exploration, this game can be relaxing and is more of a walking simulator than anything else. The $20 asking price is a bit steep for the content included.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Megaquarium offers up a robust and well-researched fish and aquarium sim to players. You’ll have a blast expanding out the aquarium of your dreams. However, the complexity of the game is a bit high and it’s not always clear why certain behaviors are happening. It’s not the most visually appealing game, but there’s a whale-load of content to experience if you’re willing to give it a shot.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Music Racer is a quite reasonable addition to the rhythm game genre. It delivers a visually striking experience, with significantly non-challenging gameplay if desired. The music included is all typical EDM, but many of the songs are quite catchy and what should be expected in this genre. There’s a ton of visual unlocks, but otherwise the progression is pretty lackluster, so don’t expect to be playing this game for countless hours. That being said, for a $6.99 price point, it’s not going to break the bank to have a little fun.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Mini Motor Racing X is a fast-paced arcade racer with a ton of content to keep you occupied for quite a few hours. Type X mode introduces power-ups & weapons refreshing the title a fair bit from just the standard racing element. Despite the visuals looking a fair bit aged, there’s still fun to be had here, and in particular with friends or Multiplayer for a reasonable $20 price tag. If you like kart or arcade racing games, this one finds a reasonable home on the Nintendo Switch, however there’s quite a few competing games already on the platform, so your mileage may vary.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Wartile brings diorama-based table top gaming to the Nintendo Switch with a Vikings and Norse mythology fictional theme. While the game excels at making a highly creative and unique artistic presentation, many of the game's features felt somewhat incomplete, marred further by a lack of clear game progression and a missed opportunity for stronger miniature character leveling up. Still, gameplay is fairly fluid once you get used to it, and the thematic settings are great. If you’re craving a digital table top micro-experience, Wartile might be something you’ll want to check out despite its shortcomings.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Cultist Simulator brings a card-based roguelike to the table, with a great thematic setting and deep lore. The core game mechanics are simple to interact with, however the game struggles deeply to gain traction because of an intentional design decision to avoid any tutorials or context to what’s happening on screen, leaving me mostly stabbing at the dark to play the game. Some will enjoy the variable experimentation, but not all will drink the Kool-Aid.
WORTH CONSIDERING - Monster Jam Steel Titans 2 improves on its predecessor and delivers an engaging arcade monster truck experience for all ages. With a solid progression system, loads of trucks (fan favorites and more to unlock), and fictional environments to toy around in, there’s plenty of truck hopping fun to be had. You’ll have to navigate some minor to moderate grievances that may potentially effect hardcore players more so than younger kids, but we’re still talking about an enjoyable Monster Jam experience here.
MEDIOCRE - Empire of Sin wants you to be the Mob Boss in all of Chicago. From managing relationships, to hostile takeovers, running an underground economy, and with an X-Com inspired combat system layered on top for action moments, this game has all the right makings for a top-notch prohibition management game. However, the menus are cluttered, heavy, and an unnecessary time sink, and the combat is just too light with clunky opponents, making the whole experience a bit awkward for me to really love.
A Gummy’s Life fails to bring the gummy fiction to life on almost all counts apart from the characters. With no combat feedback and UI, punches and kicks felt non-impacting and lifeless in the physics brawling. While the game is fun for a few minutes at times, a lack of progression or goals keeps this title on a very short lifeline. The MSRP of $14.99 just feels too steep for this game’s offerings.
MEDIOCRE - Bombfest is a physics-based brawler that, while visually cute, falls short of bringing much in the way of strategic gameplay, coming off far more random in outcomes than desired. There’s a lot of content that can be unlocked which is wonderful, but when it comes to new bombs, they just don’t stand out as meaningful, resulting in more of a bland execution than desired.
MEDIOCRE - Ultrawings ports over a VR flight game to the Nintendo Switch. Unfortunately the developers didn’t tweak the controls to fit the platform, so there are some odd gameplay elements. A lack of a map means you’ll really have to enjoy your time flying over large swaths of water to reach possible destinations. Only a few event types means a redundant experience pretty early on. Flying felt good and respective of the different aircraft, but with only 4 total planes to use and lengthy unlock requirements to get them, there’s just not the right balance to make this games soar.
MEDIOCRE - A farming sim adventure on a deserted archipelago certainly has a great ring to it, and the setting is ripe for a lot of exploration, discovery, and some clever mechanics. Stranded Sails however falls a bit short in nearly every department. A heavy over-use of a convoluted cooking mechanic and other issues prevented the game from reaching that addictive quality that is required for games like these.
MEDIOCRE - Star Horizon is a pretty standard on-rails shooter set in space. Basic gameplay and an extremely lenient auto-targeting system make for a fairly dull experience. Visuals, voice overs, and graphics are pretty decent here, but overall there’s much to be desired.
MEDIOCRE - Street Power Soccer attempts to bring an arcade-centric focused urban soccer game onto the Nintendo Switch platform. While the game does great at creating a visual and audio thematic setting for this genre, gameplay is clunky more times than not, and many of the game’s modes feel awkward and too mini-game focused. I also encountered a complete lack of polished animations that make for the standard soccer matches looking broken, and even in the home menu, my character would break from his idle animations to a standing T-Pose randomly. For a $49.99 game, there’s just a lack of polish and depth to this game.