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Topic: Best Nintendo Switch Demos

Posts 1 to 20 of 20

BongoBongo

Hi there lovely peeps

Just wondering if anyone has any good suggestions for what might be the best free demos available on the Switch eshop? I always love downloading demos because there is zero pressure! Sometimes it may inspire me to get a game but they are often also useful to help me save money for something I wouldn’t have liked!

For me, the best demos have been Captain Toad and Yoshi Crafted. Recently downloaded the Cadence of Hyrule and Super Mega Baseball 2 demos but yet to try. Also really enjoyed the Mario Tennis Aces trial but guess that was a bit different.

Cheers,

Bongo x2

BongoBongo

BongoBongo

Almost forgot one gang: Puyo Puyo Tetris demo - it’s like a full on game but for free!

BongoBongo

Magician

Hmm, there are over 200 games with demos. Dragon Quest Builders 2, God Eater 3, R-Type Dimensions, Katamari Damacy, and Yoku's Island Express would be my top five.

Switch Physical Collection - 1,241 games (as of March 23rd, 2024)
Favorite Quote: "Childhood is not from birth to a certain age and at a certain age the child is grown, and puts away childish things. Childhood is the kingdom where nobody dies." -Edna St. Vincent Millay

Illusion

Vostok Inc, Pixel Junk Monsters 2, Big Sister, Badababs Mausoleum, Valkyria Chronicles IV, Pinball FX3, Arms, Mighty Gunvolt Burst, Uno, Risk, Bad North, Dungeon Village, and Kirby Star Allies all have great demos that convinced me to buy their full games.

Illusion

BongoBongo

Thanks gang - just downloading Bad North and Risk demos to take a look.

Would also agree that Katamari and Yoku demos are well worth playing!

BongoBongo

Maboo

One of the best demos I played was Octopath Traveler's. Not only it convinced me to pre-order the game, but as soon as the game arrived it allowed me to continue from the exact point I stopped at seamlessly.

Maboo

My Nintendo: Maboo

Monmoya

I'm really enjoying the Mugsters demo at the moment. I would probably never buy the game but it is just a really different gameplay experience to what I usually play.

Monmoya

komodo182

Octopath Traveller and Dunegon Village both had great demos.

Switch Friend Code: SW-6361-0099-3716

KamenRiderGENM

VOEZ. It's such a relaxing rhythm game, and the three songs you can do are really good and are on spotify. I keep meaning to buy the full game but I don't think its ever been on sale and £20 is a bit much for a rhythm game that isn't Theatrhythm or Guitar Hero/ Rock Band. Other than that its a great demo that I usually keep downloaded or at least archived instead of straight up deleted like I usually do with demos.

KamenRiderGENM

BongoBongo

Reporting back on the Super Mega Baseball 2 demo - it’s only a 3 innings game you can play but I played through it quite a few times. Enough there to convince me this was the baseball game I had been looking for.

I’ll check out Voez thanks!

BongoBongo

BongoBongo

Also highly recommend the Ori demo. Persuaded me to buy the game.

One of the few demos that transfers over to the main game if you get it - which should become an essential part of demos really!

BongoBongo

SKTTR

Taking away this right from the start: Everyone obviously has games they don't need a demo for.
I wouldn't need a Dragon Quest, Yoshi, Captain Toad, or Wonder Boy/Monster Boy demo. I know they're all great and I pick them up in a heartbeat. And only a couple of demos conviced me to get the real thing as soon as possible: Disgaea 5 Complete and Vostok Inc. Both had the humour and charm and relaxing gameplay I was looking for.

And some other demos almost convinced me. Lots of polish and love to detail and style shine through them: Stikbold Dodgeball Adventure, Ape Out, Just Shapes & Beats, Automachef, everything by DYA Games, and Bad North to name a few. I recommend them to everyone, so maybe you like them enough.

Honorable mentions:
Art of Balance, Toki Tori 2+
They're kinda old now as they appeared on WiiWare and Wii U, but if you never played them, you should at least give the demos a try.

Some demos that convinced me to not buy:

Metropolis: Lux Obscura could have been a neat match-3-game with a mature theme and noir art style, but when even the demo is buggy as hell you should not bother. Free-2-Play Gems of War released around the same time and dominated instantly.

Deep Ones had a nice ZX Spectrum look to boot. And Awesome Pea had a nice Game Boy look to boot.
Unfortunately they just look like cool old games on the surface until you realise they're just bad with a paint of nostalgia splashed onto them. They don't get the feeling right.
And even though they're so primitive looking, the gameplay is clunky and the design is rubbish.
Deep Ones is a lot more rubbish than Awesome Pea though.
Get Rock Boshers DX, Minit, Gato Roboto, or Downwell for your ZX fix. In that order!
And Save Me Mr. Tako for your Game Boy fix! Maybe Gunpowder to the Teeth as well? I dunno yet.
Another idea: Buy Super Life of Pixel to have all bases covered (even Atari 2600, C64, Amiga, and SNES)!

Instant Tennis is probably the worst Tennis game I played in some time. I'm weirded out by it. Almost the worst demo I played so far.

Some demos like Lightwood Games POWGI puzzle series, Kairosoft's flood of very similar sim games, and the resurgence of visual novels apparently have their fans, and I can't see anything particular wrong with these games as they seem to make certain players happy.

The worst demo however, is either

1. Assault on Metaltron for looking like a trippy mess that nerd voice SOME1 SH!7 OUT OF HIS XXX AND STREAMED THAT RIGHT INTO THE SCREEN! Yeah, sorry, the artists must be colorblind or something. These guys clearly don't have a designer on their team. It's rare that graphics can be that offputting.

or 2. Any of the extremely basic, uninspired, school programming projects and browsergame-lookalikes from Sprakelsoft which are almost as bad as Wii U's casualtrash developer RCMADIAX. Sprakelsoft has 6 demos on the Switch eShop and they all have one thing in common: I give them all a 1/10.

Edited on by SKTTR

Switch fc: 6705-1518-0990

Heavyarms55

@BongoBongo Octopath Traveller and Dragon Quest 11 both had really solid Demos that let you carry over your progress to the main game. Same with Valkariya Chronicles 4.

Nintendo Switch FC: 4867-2891-2493
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Dezzy

The Dragon Quest XI demo is the most generous I've ever seen. About 10 hours long if you explore, which includes the biggest town in the game (apparently, I haven't played the whole game yet).

It's dangerous to go alone! Stay at home.

Monkeido

This thread reminds me of when magazines would come with a CD full of the latest demos and as a kid you could entertain yourself for ages with just those. Good times.

I was going to recommend Bad North, but I see you've already downloaded that one. Great demo, would've bought the game right away, but LRG already confirmed a physical release for it in Q3, so I'm waiting for that. Now that I think about it, Q3 is already over..

Sorry I don't actually have anything to recommend! ^^'

Monkeido

SwitchForce

I'll check MistOver and Witcher III and for Witcher that pushes the Switch and gives a good insight into porting can benefit Switch. Also here I would say look at DQ XI S demo even though it is now release the Demo was standout in my gaming expectation.

SwitchForce

Manah

KamenRiderGENM wrote:

I keep meaning to buy the full game but I don't think its ever been on sale and £20 is a bit much for a rhythm game that isn't Theatrhythm or Guitar Hero/ Rock Band.

It actually was on sale two months ago, and sometime last year too. That said, it's definitely worth full price.

toiletduck

@RedderRugfish you're right. It definitely pushes me away. I always figured I'd give it another shot later, but that never happened... now there's enough other games to play.

toiletduck

Switch Friend Code: SW-2231-9448-5129

toiletduck

@RedderRugfish yeah you're totally right. Problem is that I really was on the fence beforehand, so I needed a good demo to convince. It was not like I was planning on buying it without the demo.

toiletduck

Switch Friend Code: SW-2231-9448-5129

rallydefault

Really can't go wrong with the Dragon Quest XI demo. If you're any kind of RPG fan at all, it's almost like a mini game in itself. You can easily get 10+ hours of traditional battling, crafting, etc. without having to pay a penny.

rallydefault

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