2020 is a great year to own a Switch, isn’t it? With PS4 and Xbox One owners staring longingly at their soon-to-be-obsolete consoles when not nervously googling price predictions for the next-gen consoles, Switch gamers are reveling in what seems to be a console in its prime. Some of the best exclusives to any platform, wildly innovative development and a library of incredible games at affordable prices make it smooth sailing for at least a few years more on the Switch.
But with so, so many games to choose from, we thought we’d help Switch gamers find the most bang for their buck with a roundup of some of the best Switch games for under 30 bucks that you can play right now!
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Spiritfarer
- Released: 18 August 2020
- Developer: Thunder Lotus Games
- Price: $29.99
Spiritfarer feels like a game stitched together out of childhood dreams and the moment Mufasa died (spoiler alert). In Spiritfarer, players take up the mantle of ferry master of the deceased, piloting their spirit friends across open seas and wildlands to the gate of the afterlife and one bittersweet goodbye.
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The game bears a striking resemblance to Terraria but with more artistically bold graphics and plays like an easy-going resource-management and survivalcraft game. Be warned: Spiritfarer will pluck your heartstrings like a twelve-fingered musician, so get ready to feel.
Download Spiritfarer on the Nintendo Store
Minecraft
- Released: 20 June 2018
- Developer: Mojang
- Price: $29.99
Minecraft is a game that needs no real introduction. It is the undisputed heavyweight champ of survivalcraft games that puts an extra emphasis on imaginative creation. Players are dropped into an angular, voxel-based world that, at first, seems almost idyllic. In a boxy sort of way, of course. That is, until the sun goes down and the spiders come out. The spiders and the zombies and everything else that would very much like to discover how your insides taste.
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Minecraft has been going from strength to strength for over a decade, supported by one of the largest and most engaged gaming communities in the world and an extensive universe of mods and player-generated content, and shows no sign of slowing down anytime soon.
Download Minecraft on the Nintendo Store
Terraria
- Released: 27 June 2019
- Developer: Pipeworks Studio
- Price: $29.99
Terraria is most certainly up there with Minecraft on the Mount Rushmore of survivalcraft games — a spot it earned with over a decade of steady and attentive development that recently concluded with the massive Journey’s End update. Players emerge into a stylish, sidescrolling world where the only goal is exploration, discovery, and surviving the terrible night.
Terraria puts a greater focus on combat than its voxel-based counterpart, with huge boss battles and an extensive array of diverse weaponry to craft, as well as an increased onus on the player to develop movement mechanics to aid in exploring. Highly recommended for fans of Minecraft who want something with a little more bite.
Download Terraria on the Nintendo Store
Overcooked 2
- Released: 27 August 2018
- Developer: Team 17
- Price: $24.99
Overcooked 2 is the followup to the original hyper-hectic kitchen simulator that doubles down on the heat and frantic, relationship-fraying co-op that made the first game a smash hit. The premise of the game is simple, with players working as chefs doing their best to cope with the demands of a voracious customer-base, but everything else is anything but simple.
Players will find themselves in a wide array of absurd kitchens, preparing verifiably insane dishes, and struggling to keep up with a workload that would make an overseer at a slave-driven salt mine grimace. And have a whole lot of white-knuckling fun.
Download Overcooked 2 on the Nintendo Store
Final Fantasy IX
- Released: 13 Feb 2019
- Developer: GUILD STUDIO
- Price: $20.99
Final Fantasy IX is considered by many to be one of the best — if not the best — Final Fantasy games ever made, and a strong contender for the greatest game, in general, ever made. IX follows the exploits of Princess Garnet of Alexandria, her personal guard Steiner and the bandit Zidane as they venture across the richly developed world of Gaia, inevitably embroiling themselves in the politics of warring kingdoms and coming to head with cataclysmic powers of darkness.
Anybody who joined the Final Fantasy party a decade or two late has good reason to check out IX just to see what is considered the pinnacle of OG Final Fantasy games
Download Final Fantasy IX on the Nintendo Store
Crysis Remastered
- Released: 23 July 2020
- Developer: Crytek
- Price: $29.99
Something like Far Cry (but with power armor!) Crysis pushed the limits of hardware back in 2008 and the remastered version further enhances the landmark game while making it viable on the Switch. When an alien structure is discovered off the coast of the Philippines, super American-ly named special forces soldier and literal one-man army, Jake Dunn, drops in with his special Nanosuit to oblivionate North Korean soldiers and ancient aliens alike.
Players can switch between the different modes of Dunn’s Nanosuit to prioritize different attributes like speed, power, defense, or stealth alongside varied abilities to find their own unique way to complete each mission — tactical finesse or brute force, it’s entirely up to you.
Download Crysis Remastered on the Nintendo Store
Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LELiGQcHqk
- Released: 14 August 2019
- Developer: 6 Eyes Studio
- Price: $29.99
Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark is a smooth tactics game that draws inspiration from genre classics like Final Fantasy Tactics and Fire Emblem while shucking out underperforming mechanics and shucking suboptimal design choices. Set in a medieval fantasy world, the game is centered around the order of Arbiters, law-enforcement agents beholden to immensely powerful beings known as Immortals.
Players uncover a deep story while progressing through the game’s 40 battle scenarios, tasked with coordinating multiple units across the tiled board, while steadily upgrading the power of their heroes and units.
Download Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark on the Nintendo Store
Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles
- Released: 27 August 2020
- Developer: Square Enix
- Price: $29.99
After a meteor strike obliterates the Great Crystal that supplies the world with the power of life and deposits a parasitic force known as the Miasma, the four sentient races of the planet are forced to brave the dangerous wilds in search of a rare resource needed to replenish the Crystal Fragments that shield the last remnants of civilization.
The game deviates from the signature turn-based cozy of the main series, opting for a hack-and-slash ARPG combat system that allows players to chain together combos and make use of a complex elemental system that involves spell fusion and other effects. Anybody who played the original version from back in the day or enjoys vintage dungeon crawlers will love the Switch port of Crystal Chronicles.
Download Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles on the Nintendo Store
Bayonetta
- Released: 16 Feb 2018
- Developer: PlatinumGames
- Price: $29.99
Something like Memento meets Devil May Cry meets Trinity from the Matrix, Bayonetta is an intense action game that sports some of the most fluid combat of any game out there. Players step into the high heels and unapologetically skin-tight leather jumpsuit of the titular Bayonetta as she awakens from a 500-year slumber with no memories of who or what she is.
So, naturally, she starts fly-kicking people and doing a lot of demon-summoning. The game progresses in stages, with players receiving a performance rating at the end ala Devil May Cry. Bayonetta is great for people who just want to fight.
Download Bayonetta on the Nintendo Store
Katamari Damacy REROLL
- Released: 07 December 2018
- Developer: Monkeycraft
- Price: $29.99
Katamari Z Damacy REROLL is the recreated and enhanced remake of the original “roll-em up” classic that begins in the wake of a seriously consequent bender by the King of All Cosmos that has reduced the universe and all the stars in the sky to nothingness. Players step into the minuscule shoes of the King’s 5 cm tall son, tasked with using a special material called Katamari that is used to adhere to anything and everything it comes into contact with into a giant ball.
Players roll about the world, progressively snowballing into a titanic sphere until they’ve gathered enough matter to condense into a star. It’s simple. It’s wacky. It’s super fun, and everybody who plays it inevitably falls in love with Katamari Damacy.
Download Katamari Damacy on the Nintendo Store
Isn’t it great to be a Switch gamer right now? What’s your favorite Switch game? How do PS4 and Xbox One gamers sleep at night? Let us know what you think!
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