Considering how saturated the Nintendo eShop is with various console ports, indie titles, and new releases, it should be no surprise that great games can fly under the radar for most gamers. While the likes of Cyberpunk 2077 get the spotlight for all the wrong reasons and amazing titles like Breath of the Wild for all the right ones, others slip through the cracks while they try to compete with higher marketing budgets and hype.
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Nintendo may be most well known for their first-party titles like Mario and Zelda, but in recent years, particularly with the Switch, they have been more willing to allow third-party games onto their consoles which, unfortunately, can slip through the cracks when up against their more famous work.
10 Kunai
Due to the Switch being saturated with Metroidvania titles, some with a lower quality than others, the good ones that aren't as well known can easily be missed by fans of the genre. One such game is Kunai, a game where players take the role of a non-descript tablet called Tabby who wields the powers and weapons of a ninja, as well as several firearms of escalating power. The main draw of this game, however, is the kunai themselves, which allow Tabby to swing around the world like Tarzan with a rocket launcher and makes combat that much more exhilarating, particularly in the boss fights where the player's ability to use said kunai are put to the test.
9 The Banner Saga
Tactical RPGs, like Metroidvanias, are a dime a dozen on the Switch. While the likes of Fire Emblem and Into The Breach get a lot of love from their fans, this also means that several great tactical games fall under the radar, such as The Banner Saga trilogy. While the combat sometimes takes a backseat to the survival and narrative elements of the game, it has some of the best tactical gameplay players can find on the Switch and has a unique take on standard turn-based combat that incorporates something of a risk-reward system when dealing with enemies.
8 Furi
Since games like Ghost of Tsushima and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice aren't on the Switch, gamers will have to look elsewhere if they want to take part in some great sword-based action. One of those places that gamers can look is the indie title Furi, which takes elements of sword-based combat and adds a touch of bullet hell to the mix for some seriously unique battles.
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Furi is a little different from most games in that all combat takes place during boss battles, being akin to something like Shadow of the Colossus and Malicious Fallen, though with some differences, including a three-life system that can be replenished by successfully clearing one of the boss's health bars, allowing players to fail repeatedly while not having to restart the battle.
7 Steamworld Quest: Hand of the Gilgamech
The combat in Steamworld Quest may not be too unique, borrowing heavily from the likes of Slay The Spire, it is one of the more fun card-based RPGs on the Switch. Taking place in an indeterminate time in the Steamworld universe long before Steamworld Dig, Quest changes up the formula from a Metroidvania into a turn-based RPG using punch cards as the main attacks and abilities. Alongside this punch card system, players also have a choice between several characters for their team of three, with each character playing much differently from the next and opening up the game to a lot of replayability options.
6 Super Daryl Deluxe
If there was any Metroidvania on the Switch that deserves far more love than it gets, it's Super Daryl Deluxe. A somewhat bizarre mash-up of Symphony of the Night and Napoleon Dynamite, this game takes place in a high school where players control Daryl, a new student with a very vivid imagination, as he uncovers the mystery and conspiracies going on around him. Unlike other Metroidvania games, each face button is assigned to a different special attack, each with its own cool-down time, that forces players to use a mix of fast, low damage attacks alongside large and heavy attacks in order to keep the pressure up in battle.
5 Fire Emblem Warriors
For the most part, Hyrule Warriors and the recent Age of Calamity get a lot more love among their fanbase than Fire Emblem Warriors, but this doesn't mean fans of the Warriors series should overlook the game. While it does have the issue of many characters essentially being skin changes of one another, the combat itself implements elements of Fire Emblem that other Warriors titles could take a lesson from, such as better unit management and the ability to pair up characters for more powerful attacks.
4 Hob
Something of an older title that has since lost all of its traction, Hob plays out like a 3D Zelda game in terms of combat, story, and world design, but has a completely silent storytelling narrative reminiscent of Journey and does a just as good a job at showing the player its world and story as Journey did.
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The combat in Hob is very much reminiscent of other action platformers, though has a bit of a higher difficulty curve and necessity for the player to learn the dodging and blocking aspects fairly quickly. That being said, if gamers are looking for a Zelda alternative and have already played Okami to death, they should look no further than this game.
3 Lichtspeer
There are many bizarre games on the Switch, the majority of them either being adored by fans or completely ignored by the community due to their poor quality. One game that seems to fall into neither of these categories is Lichtspeer, a strange game that is part Angry Birds and part tower defense where the player takes control of a champion of the Lichtgod and must defend themselves against hordes of enemies that want to tear them apart. While this game can be incredibly hard at times, it is also one of the funnier games on the Switch and has a two-player option that adds to the hilarity.
2 Aegis Defenders
Aegis Defenders is something of a hard game to define, as it falls into both the 2D sidescrolling platformer genre while also borrowing heavily from tower defense games and adding in a splash of light RPG mechanics. Players control one of three characters as they traverse the world, using character-specific powers to solve puzzles and defeat enemies while also trying to reach the final part of the level, where the game shifts into a tower defense game that uses similar variations of those same powers in battle over multiple rounds and waves of enemy encounters.
1 Arms
For some reason, this fighting game doesn't get nearly as much love as it deserves despite its unique take on the genre. In Arms, players take control of one of a variety of dangly-armed fighters to duke it out in the ring, having full control over their character in a 3D space while also being able to control the trajectory of their punches in battle. The characters themselves may have shown up again in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, but it seems as though this title for the Switch has been entirely forgotten by the player base since its release in mid 2017.
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