Nintendo Switch games for multiple consoles, multiple players per Switch

October 15, 2020 11:29 AM

What Nintendo Switch games can you play with multiple people per console, multiple remote households, and with only a single left/right pair of Joy Cons per household?

Here's the situation:

1) We have four remote households. Each household has a Nintendo Switch.
2) Some households have one person, others have two. All households have one set of Joy Con controllers (one left, one right).
3) I want to play games where we can get as many people playing as possible.

Best-case scenario: there's a game where we can play online, with two people per console, and each player only needs a single left or right Joy Con.

What games should we get? Ideally Mario Party/Kart/SSB-type games. Is this feasible on a Switch at all?

posted by miltthetank to Technology (6 answers total)

Best answer: You can definitely do this with Mario Kart 8. It allows for up to 12 remote players! I will say that there are some cheap plastic “cases” that you can get for about $5 that you insert each individual joy con into which is far more comfortable but you can also just use the joy cons.
posted by raccoon409 at 11:33 AM on October 15, 2020

Mario Kart 8 can do this via online play, but all involved will need a subscription to Nintendo Online.
posted by little king trashmouth at 11:34 AM on October 15, 2020 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I'm pretty sure you can do this with Killer Queen Black, which supports up to 8 people in a 4v4 game, where the people can be from any mix of physical consoles. Steam players can also join in, but the switch players do need Nintendo Online (which will be true for all games like this). Killer Queen Black is a lot of fun, although may be difficult without voice chat going
posted by JZig at 12:04 PM on October 15, 2020

Oh and because this confused me with Killer Queen Black you probably need to do this as a Custom Game which has one person "host" and then there's a code everyone else can put in to join.
posted by JZig at 12:09 PM on October 15, 2020

One thing with Mario Kart (and possible other games) - be forewarned that if anyone has any sort of hand issues, they may want to invest in an inexpensive, off-brand, regular-style wireless controllers. I discovered the hard way during a play session the kids talked me into that I just plain cannot do the single joycon for more than a couple of rounds - it's just too tiny and makes my hands cramp up, and I have small hands and short fingers. I ordered one off Amazon, and now I can join them without having to beg off due to pain when everyone is all "but we're just getting started!"
posted by stormyteal at 12:31 PM on October 15, 2020 [1 favorite]

Best answer: If your households also have cell phones/tablets, the Jackbox games would work with one caveat: one house would actually play the game on the TV and stream it using a phone or laptop so the other households can see it. The other houses can use their phones or tablets as controllers and simply go to jackbox.tv to log into the game using the code on the main screen.

These games are great and come five to a pack. They are kind of like board games, but on the TV.
posted by tacodave at 5:49 PM on October 15, 2020