Top Nintendo Switch Games 2023

Remnant: From the Ashes delivers a beautifully deranged vision of the apocalypse overflowing with twisted creatures hellbent on making you suffer. The thrill of finally beating a boss that’s had your number for hours is right up there with the Souls games that so clearly inspired it, though the underwhelming gear system sometimes brings down the high of overcoming the frequent difficulty spikes. Overall it’s a solid game that offers one of the best and most rewarding co-op experiences in quite some time, as long as you have a hint of desire to challenge and punish yourself over and over.

My time at Portia is, first and foremost, a game about building, and I've had a great time doing it. From mining to taming wild llamas to dating, there’s a lot to do here, and I’m still discovering and unlocking new and usually interesting things. While each of its parts is lacking in some way or have annoying audio bugs, when you put them all together they bolster each other to add up to something fun. I look forward to seeing how My Time at Portia continues to evolve in the future.

New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe is a broadly approachable and feature-rich platforming game. Toadette is a welcome addition to the roster for those after a more forgiving way to tackle some of the more challenging levels, and the inclusion of the New Super Luigi U mode extends its lifespan substantially. While there are a number of other Nintendo Switch games within the genre that outdo New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe in various different ways, it nonetheless remains a highly enjoyable platforming package as a whole.

Pokemon: Let's Go, Pikachu and Let's Go, Eevee finally bring full, main-series Pokemon titles to Nintendo Switch in the form of modernized and fairly simple remakes of Pokemon Yellow.

Part fighting game, part future sport, Lethal League Blaze is frantic and enjoyable – but single-player modes feel like an afterthought.

Mario Tennis Aces is the best sports game for Nintendo Switch, offering enough in-depth action to keep you swinging.

Pokemon: Let's Go, Pikachu and Let's Go, Eevee finally bring full, main-series Pokemon titles to Nintendo Switch in the form of modernized and fairly simple remakes of Pokemon Yellow.

Kirby Star Allies for the Nintendo Switch doesn't add much new to the series, but it's still an excellent, engaging, and accessible platformer.

The malleable quality of Fire Emblem’s weapons-triangle and pairing systems make them a natural fit for the hack n’ slash genre. Even when I could barely tell what was going on on the crowded battlefield and my troops were a little too codependent, I enjoyed directing the action and jumping in to be part of the carnage. And while Fire Emblem Warriors makes poor use of the Fire Emblem universe’s story and history, we still get traces of the relationships between the characters that make it memorable.

This fighting game is unlike anything else on the market, in a good way.