Need new Switch game recommendations.

January 22, 2022 5:27 AM

Pretty much what it says on the tin, with a light flurry of snowflakes…

I have been sick and have some stressful times coming up and have found weekend solace in my Nintendo Switch during times like these/throughout the pandemic. I am in need of new recommendations for Nintendo Switch games because I have overplayed all of my faves and am bored with them. I definitely skew more towards the less battle centric games that are slightly cutesy. I’m not the most technical player and have problems seeing black/white graphics so I struggle with very detailed graphic games that don’t have a lot of color contrast. What do you recommend?

I think I’m looking for something to get lost in for hours at a time with exploration and rando quests:

I love, love love BOTW and am chomping at the bit for BOTW 2 just like everyone else. I love the exploration and the side quests. I don’t mind battle, but prefer for it to not be the main focus of the game. Yup, I also played the DLC.

LOVVVED Road 96 - I love the procedural gameplay and again, exploration. I also liked Sludge Life for similar reasons. Also the music in Road 96 was worth the gameplay alone. Would love to find something similar.

Didn’t care for Zelda Links’s Awakening. I mean, it was ok, but I think I was ruined from playing BOTW first.

Mario Odyssey was super fun. I like epic quests.

What should I check out next? Animal Crossing? Some other indie game? I would prefer something longer that I won’t blow through in like a day (I’ve heard Stardew Valley is only ~2 hours of play!?). The game, Lake, looks like it fits the bill for me, but it’s not available on the Switch. I’m really tempted to check out Skyrim but based on my technical abilities and the black/white/contrast issue am hesitant about this - it also looks very battle centric (if this does seem like a good fit based on all this, please tell me more). Same for Hollow Knight/the black and white contrast issue.

Thanks MeFi!

posted by floweredfish to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (24 answers total)

Best answer: My suggestions listed from no battles to most battles:

* I'm playing The Last Campfire now. It's puzzle-based exploration.

* Maybe Super Mario World / Bowzer's Fury if you liked Mario Odyssey

* Ori and the Blind Forest & Ori and the Will of the Wisps are incredibly beautiful "metroidvanias". Def more battles here, but worth it IMO.

* Now my last suggestions is Hades. I will warn you, the main gameplay is basically all battles. But there is a ton of quests, and the game loop is very well designed. Basically you die over and over again w/out a heavy penalty, and often keeping some of the rewards. It's an incredibly captivating game. It's easy to pick up and put down, and you can play it for a long time, because the end-game is very well designed. It's really one of my favorites on the switch.
posted by pyro979 at 5:40 AM on January 22, 2022 [4 favorites]

I love Ori and would def recommend it!

Animal Crossing (and to my understanding Stardew Valley) are best as picked up for a half hour or so each day, rather than sitting down on a Saturday for several hours straight. If you “time travel” in Animal crossing you can do more marathon sessions, but other wise once you’re kind of set up, I’ve enjoyed it as a little each day
posted by raccoon409 at 5:59 AM on January 22, 2022

Stardew Valley is... well heck it can be a lifestyle if it gets its hooks into you.

Unlike Animal Crossing, it's detached from real time so you can sink as much time into it as you want. I've never gone whole hog, but I have *definitely* played a whole season (28 ~13 minute days) in an actual earth day. Heck I might start a new save file today...

I wanted to recommend Chicory, but it's about colouring a B&W world so that's out.

(Pause to thumb through Switch library)

Jeez I mostly like very combat-focused games. Sorry I couldn't be of more help!
posted by rhooke at 6:13 AM on January 22, 2022 [2 favorites]

Animal Crossing (and to my understanding Stardew Valley) are best as picked up for a half hour or so each day, rather than sitting down on a Saturday for several hours straight.

I will caution you that every single time I've sat down to play SV for 30 minutes, I've looked up to realize several hours have passed.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 6:13 AM on January 22, 2022 [9 favorites]

A Short Hike is sort of like a mid era Zelda but with no fighting and just calm, sweet exploration of an island. A little short, but also inexpensive.

Cat Tails is pretty much Stardew Valley, but you're a cat and do cat things. If that sounds appealing, it is.

Donut County is a fun little mess around game in the vein of Katamari. Very chill and silly, you swallow things by moving around a hole.
posted by SaltySalticid at 6:37 AM on January 22, 2022 [3 favorites]

Best answer: I also like binging games! You probably either want Stardew Valley or to get cozy with time travel in Animal Crossing.

On Stardew:

I have played Stardew for the PC for around eleven hundred hours, according to Steam, which is a huge undercount because Steam hasn't tracked hours played on at least one computer I have owned.

One save file, from Day 1 to the cutscene I usually get in year 4 or so after having unlocked absolutely everything, takes me around 150 hours or so, in part because I spend almost no time on trial-and-error anymore and know the valley itself really well. Again, the Stardew calendar is completely uncoupled from the real-life calendar, I have spent a lot of weekends playing through like an in-game week or two (or more).

A note of caution on visibility/contrast/accessibility: A few weeks into your first year, you will start having reasons to go into dark environments and the lighting available to you will be torches, which I find bad/annoying. By summer or fall of that year, though, you will probably be able to find or make one of the light ring items, so that your character and the area around them are always very visible/high-contrast. Even if you're unlucky and getting a light ring takes longer, only one area is very dark all day.

Other than the lighting issue, it's brightly-colored, cute, and reasonably forgiving.
posted by All Might Be Well at 6:44 AM on January 22, 2022 [5 favorites]

Best answer: A Short Hike was the most tranquil game I've ever played. It is a real sweet story too.
posted by mmascolino at 7:48 AM on January 22, 2022 [5 favorites]

Animal Crossing is amazing but a lot of stuff is time-gated, and when you start out you don't have many resources, so it can get boring fast. After you play for a few weeks and have plenty of resources/money/stuff, it's easy to lose many hours terraforming your island, or decorating holiday homes if you get the Happy Home Paradise expansion pack. If you do decide to get AC, I recommend getting a Nintendo Online subscription and checking out places like r/ACTrade and r/NoFeeAC, where people do a lot of giveaways. Without a subscription, the gameplay gets pretty repetitive (except for seasonal events).

I also really enjoy Kirby Star Allies; it's super cute but pretty fast-paced. Mario Kart 8 is also fun.
posted by neushoorn at 8:01 AM on January 22, 2022

Fenyx Rising. Very BOTW-ish. Not as good but good in different ways. The storyline is Greek mythology and the background commentary is funny. There are various quests and an open world. Puzzle vaults to solve, monsters to kill but you can avoid fighting them sometimes. I'm not really good at battles but I realized that you can hide in certain spots and chip away at certain monsters little by little so definitely a bit easier than BOTW (I never beat a Lynel).
posted by mokeydraws at 8:47 AM on January 22, 2022 [1 favorite]

Best answer: West of Loathing is an RPG that has battles in it, but is turn-based so it doesn’t rely on quick reflexes or button combos or anything like that - you can take your time to decide what your move will be. It’s also hilarious. Graphics-wise, it’s literally black stick figures on a white background, so high-contrast.

N-thin Stardew Valley, also.

Firewatch is entirely a story-driven exploration game where your only companion/human interaction in the game is on a walkie-talkie. No combat whatsoever and it’s gorgeous to look at. The graphics may be a bit challenging though contrast-wise, may be worth watching a trailer to see if it works for you.

Skyrim is absolutely wonderful but may be a bit combat-heavy for you - that said, if you enjoyed BOTW it may not be.
posted by gleiris at 10:37 AM on January 22, 2022

I was also coming in to say Immortals Fenyx Rising. It's very obviously a response to BOTW but I am finding it to be a fun world to explore. I also happen to be listening to Mythos, Stephen Fry's book of Greek myths and it's very good combo.

Yoku's Island Express is also just really great and a delightful world to spend time in, although not a big open world game.
posted by carolr at 10:47 AM on January 22, 2022 [1 favorite]

untitled goose game if you haven't played it's an absolute joy.
posted by wowenthusiast at 10:49 AM on January 22, 2022 [5 favorites]

I'm surprised nobody has said Spiritfarer yet! A building/resource management game with quests, a sweet and moving story, and beautiful (and very cute) graphics. I found it SUPER engrossing; the story isn't enormously long but you can go on doing quests and exploring after the story is finished for as long as you want.
posted by babelfish at 11:01 AM on January 22, 2022 [2 favorites]

As the other comment said about Animal Crossing, it's time gated, especially at the start. This can be frustrating as you literally have to wait days and days to be able to meet your villagers and explore etc. That said once you get going there's lots to do but fun is what you make of it in ACNH. It's not for everyone and can be a slow game ... even with Home Designer I find it less engaging than the old DS ACNL. I still play it on and off years later and I love it but it's a chill game I check out for a few mins each day now.

For games I find highly engaging on Switch: Pokemon Sword or Shield is a great intro to jRPGs of you haven't played them already and super engaging. If you enjoy that I also recommend the Dragon Quest trilogy, you get three great games.

Lastly I recommend LA Noire if you want something more adult.

I have other games on Switch that I actually haven't played yet (including BOTW) because these other games I mentioned take up so much time on Switch, so definitely you will get lots of gameplay hours.

As for StardewValley, I have it on PC and it's as many hours as you put in really, it's up to its you how involved you wanna get. SV is a bit of a copy of the old Harvest Moon series which was renamed to Story of Seasons on Switch... So if you enjoy SV and finish it and want more in that style maybe check out the Story of Seasons titles on Switch.

Have fun!
posted by Dimes at 11:03 AM on January 22, 2022

Re West of Loathing, it's a ton of fun and genuinely hilarious, but if (almost) all black & white presents some issues for you, there is an option unlocked after a few in-game days of "Nostalgia Mode", which makes it sepia toned. It's not a super long game, but you can replay with a different "class" and have a different experience playing.

I also second Spiritfarer, but will note that it is a cozy management game about death, so heads up if you're not in a place to deal with that. The game is lovely and you'll be bopping along doing quests, and then bam! Emotional suckerpunch! It definitely made me cry at multiple points.
posted by yasaman at 11:14 AM on January 22, 2022 [1 favorite]

I’m not a huge gamer but once in a blue moon I’ll get really into something my husband got, and right now I’m obsessed with Loop Hero!
posted by cakelite at 11:22 AM on January 22, 2022

Best answer: Be aware that Firewatch isn't really exploration and rando quests. I think I was expecting another sandbox, so playing it after BotW I was disappointed. As gleiris said, there's a story, and you play through the story.

I've been playing Subnautica after seeing it recommended here. It has exploration, random quests, no battles (that last probably changes, but so far I've just swum away from anything scary). There are occasional encounters with aquatic creatures, which range from surprising ("ooh! what was that?") to fascinating ("ooh! pretty") to genuine scares ("aaaaahhh! get out get out get out"). For a game where you're basically alone on a water planet there's been a lot of me talking and yelling, is what I'm saying. Part of the point of the game is to build up your home base, though, which is something I don't really enjoy in games and why I've avoided Animal Crossing (I always think, "why am I doing this instead of organising my actual house?") Stardew has that element too but you can easily ignore it in favour of quests.

West of Loathing is a lot of fun, and so is Yoku's Island Express. I enjoyed the Ori games. Stardew is great and I've spent... *cough* ... many, many more than ~2 hours on it.
posted by happyfrog at 2:08 PM on January 22, 2022

Oh and just a warning about Ori, because you mentioned technical abilities - I found coordinating the controls in the middle of the Blind Forest quite difficult. The early part of the game is fine, but then you get the ability to "jump stick" to walls, which requires a LOT of pressing the jump button while coordinating with other buttons needed for tasks. I had to stop myself from playing as long as I wanted because it was straining my hands and wrists. In the last part of the game you get new powers that solve this problem.

They've ditched the "jump stick" in Will of the Wisps and I haven't had any difficulty with the controls.
posted by happyfrog at 2:26 PM on January 22, 2022 [1 favorite]

Strongly recommend Steamworld Dig 1 & 2 if you'd like a 2D style metroidvania.
posted by juv3nal at 6:41 PM on January 22, 2022

I, too, quite enjoy exploring and collecting in games! Ones you might like:
Dragon Quest Builders - kinda like Minecraft with a plot

Pokémon? - weird suggestion but it has a lot of exploring and collecting

Another slightly wacky suggestion, but the Lego games have a lot of exploration built in, tons to collect, and it’s fun to see a favorite franchise be redone in Lego form. They typically go on super sale often, too!

I found Bastion to be a fun little game, although the combat may be too much of a focus for you.

Also, Pokemon Arceus is out next week and is being hyped as Pokemon meets breath of the wild so I’m hype
posted by itsamermaid at 9:17 PM on January 22, 2022 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Thank you so much everyone!

Mario World 3D, Firewatch and A Short Hike totally fit the bill and Stardew is a runner up. I’m so excited that y’all gave me a bunch of games and not just one.

Happy gaming everyone!
posted by floweredfish at 5:57 AM on January 23, 2022

I would give Toem a try!
posted by moons in june at 1:53 PM on January 23, 2022

It hasn't come out for the Switch yet, it was supposed to come out for the holiday but got delayed, but definitely keep Outer Wilds on your radar. It's an open world space exploration game with no combat where you try to solve various mysteries. I'm about 12 hours played and not close to finishing. Based on what I think is left, I'd estimate another 10-20 hours to beat it. There aren't any detailed graphics and any text only happens when you're reading a log so I don't think you'll have any issues. Most of the planets are very colorful.

https://kotaku.com/outer-wilds-is-one-of-the-best-games-ive-ever-played-1835801654
posted by cali59 at 8:33 PM on January 23, 2022 [1 favorite]

Spelunky and Spelunky 2 are sold as a bundle on the switch. It's one of the more influential indie series and arguably played a huge role in the explosion of rogelites and -likes.

It's a 2d platformer, with an emphasis on vertical travel as opposed to horizontal, though there's plenty of that as well. Levels are randomized each time you start a new run, but that randomization is constrained. There's several worlds in each game, and within those worlds there is consistency in enemy and block type and such. There's layers of complexity in both games, with secret items and levels and alternate endings. There is a very large amount of game play in the games, assuming you like the core mechanics.

If it can be said that Mario games - with their frequent jumping on and fireballing and hat-flinging of enemies - have combat throughout them, then that is also true for this one as the base mechanics are very similar.
posted by cCranium at 10:11 AM on January 24, 2022