Welcome back! Ready to finish off the list of games we'd love to see on Switch next year, pretty please, Nintendo? Keep reading to find out...

The Incredible Indies & Mid-Size Games

Wildermyth

Oh, lovely Wildermyth. You've heard of procedurally-generated games — think Skyrim's "endless" quests where NPCs would randomly select an item they wanted and a dungeon to get it from, or the levels in a roguelike — but have you ever seen a proc-gen narrative game?

That's what Wildermyth offers: A Dungeons-and-Dragons-style evolving story-slash-myth generator, with a cast of proc-gen characters called Splinch or Grunkus or Scary Willy that go on proc-gen missions and face proc-gen consequences, like having their eyes replaced with a powerful gem, or making friends with a wolf, and earning titles like "Scary Willy The Hole-Digger". It's so wonderful.

What are the chances?

This one's at the top of the list because it's already been confirmed for Switch, woo! In December 2021, the developers told Fanbyte that it would take them a year or so to port the game to Switch. Still, it's been a year, so surely 2023 means Wildermyth time, right?

Norco

Norco is one of the indie elite of 2022, sweeping many Game of the Year awards despite its relatively low profile. It's a point-and-click adventure game set in an alternate version of Louisiana, influenced by Southern Gothic storytelling, the culture of nearby New Orleans, and how the petrol industry shaped the town of Norco (which is a real place). Dealing with grief, terror, and the slow corrosion of life in the industrial swamplands, Norco is a very particular tone poem about a very particular place and time.

What are the chances?

The game is out on consoles and PC already, and with Raw Fury as the publisher, it seems prettyobvious to swing this beloved narrative game over to the Switch. Point-and-clicks are a little tricky to port to a controller interface, but since it's already out on Xbox and Playstation, at least there's precedent. We think we'll see this on Switch in 2023, if all goes well.

Potion Craft

There are, admittedly, a lot of games about potion-making — Potion Permit, Moonstone Island, Strange Horticulture, Wytchwood, Wylde Flowers the Atelier series, and more... but Potion Craft, which is currently PC only, focuses more on the actual craft than anything else. With some gorgeous medieval woodcut visuals and a particularly unique map-based crafting mechanic, it's hard not to fall in love with what Potion Craft has going on, as you create potions for your clients' specific needs.

What are the chances?

Medium, we'd say. The publisher tinyBuild has brought a fair few games to Switch, including Tinykin and Graveyard Keeper, so our hopes are high for Potion Craft to get a console release at least and a specific Switch release (with a physical edition, even!) in the best-case scenario.

Potionomics

Hey, you thought we were done with potion-crafting games? Not even slightly! Potionomics deserves a look, too. It's a seriously beautiful game with almost Pixar-quality animations that bring a lot of life and personality to its cast of characters, plus a fairly complex method of crafting potions that requires you to really understand alchemy.

What are the chances?

This game was published by Marvelous XSEED — AKA the Story of Seasons and Rune Factory folks — so we'd be really, REALLY surprised if they didn't use their Nintendo connections to zip this one onto the Nintendo Switch. There might be a lot of interface and text size tweaking that needs to be done, because this is a UI-heavy game, and those don't translate great onto the Switch's tiny screen, but we'd be surprised if this didn't pop up on the eShop at some point in the near-ish future.

The Case of the Golden Idol

If you're a fan of Lucas Pope's oeuvre and you've not played The Case of the Golden Idol yet, you absolutely need to. This murder-mystery is all to do with a family of psychos, a horrible curse, and a cult of more psychos, all of whom are trying to get their hands on... well, no spoilers, eh? It's like Monkey Island meets Return of the Obra Dinn, and it's BRILLIANT.

What are the chances?

Hard to say. We get the feeling that the success and popularity of this game was unexpected, which is no bad thing, but may mean that any console porting plans would have been made after the success happened. Golden Idol is a perfect PC game, as a lot of it is point-and-click and text-based, but we reckon it would play well enough on Switch given its similarities to Obra Dinn, which is also on Switch already.

Papers, Please

Hey, speaking of Lucas Pope, why isn't Papers, Please on Switch? Or any console, for that matter? The dystopian document thriller is one of the best indies of the last two decades, and it seems like a really glaring omission from the Switch's library. It's won a billion awards. It's really good. We want to play a little version of it when we are in the queue for border patrol at the airports so we can empathise with the agents at the desk.

What are the chances?

Well, Papers, Please made its way onto mobile in mid-2022, and as part of that announcement, Pope joked that it would also come to consoles next in "2031", referencing the fact that it took nine years to port it to iOS and Android. But the fact that he acknowledged that people were waiting for it has to mean something, right? We don't know if 2023 is the year for Papers, Please on Switch, but we can hope.

The Witness

Here's another obvious win for the Switch that seems like a glaring omission: This beautiful first-person environmental puzzler, helmed by the man who also made Braid. With some seriously brain-noodling conundrums to keep you busy on the bus, it’s an ideal platform for The Witness and we’re surprised that it hasn’t shown up yet.

What are the chances?

Unfortunately, lead developer Jonathan Blow has moved on, and when questioned about the possibility, seven years of development seem to have sapped his enthusiasm for more ports. Braid was also supposed to come out in 2021, but instead, we've had nothing but radio silence since its announcement in 2020. We really don't think The Witness is ever happening for Switch, but if it does get announced, be prepared to wait even longer for it to actually exist.

Monkey Island (any of them... or all of them)

Let's keep this one simple: If Return to Monkey Island so good, why not all Monkey Island on Switch?

What are the chances?

Well, there are Special Edition console versions of the Monkey Island games already, albeit ones that haven't come out on anything since the PS3/Xbox 360 era. We can only speculate on why they aren't reusing them on Switch, but maybe Disney needs to iron out some licensing first, or some other boring legal reason. it shouldn't be too complicated to port 'em over, we think, especially with the updated console controls!

Weird West

This action-RPG is what it sounds like: The Wild West meets the supernatural. With ex-Arkane designers on board, Weird West plays like a mashup of early Fallout games, a frontiers-style Dishonored, and a twin-stick shooter, with Borderlands-like cel shaded visuals and a ton of different ways to complete missions, including stealth, explosions, and straight up shoot-outs. It looks awesome.

What are the chances?

Pretty good, we think — Borderlands is on the Switch, and this looks a lot like Borderlands, ergo this game could be on Switch. Right? More seriously, it's on PS4 and Xbox One already, and with Devolver publishing, we think the chances are high.

Vampire Survivors

One of the out-of-nowhere 2022 success stories, poncle's Vampire Survivors is a roguelike action bullet-hell in which you don't actually control the fighting. All you can do is pilot your little character around the screen, trying to avoid skeletons and milk ghosts as knives and explosions cascade around the screen. It's glorious chaos, and it belongs on Switch.

What are the chances?

Honestly, it's just a matter of time. We played this a bunch on Steam Deck, and it's the perfect format for something as easy to pick up and put down as Vampy Survivey. Also, we think the music sounds like Ace Attorney, which we think is a very convincing reason to bring it to Switch.

Stray

It really felt like everyone in 2022 got to enjoy the kitty game except us, even though it was only on PC and PlayStation. And listen, if any console is the cute animals game, it's Switch, right? We wanna play the kitty game.

What are the chances?

Unreal Engine games are all over Switch, although Stray is heavier than many others, so who knows? If it does come to Switch, expect visual downgrades.

Valheim

This Viking-flavoured co-operative survival sandbox is still technically not out yet, but with over 10 million sales in its first year of early access, does it really matter? Iron Gate Studio have a huge hit on their hands with Valheim, and we'd love to have it in our hands, too.

What are the chances?

Well, there's still no solid release date, although it's been confirmed for Xbox One and Series S|X in Q2 2023, including cross-platform play... which sounds pretty "console launch exclusive" to us. So, Switch is pretty unlikely for 2023, although if there's an indie with a ton of surprise money to spend, it's Iron Gate. Whether they'll spend it trying to force this hellishly fun online multiplayer game onto a console that doesn't love online multiplayers is... uncertain.

Her Story

Listen, we can understand why Sam Barlow's indie debut title isn't on Switch. Unlike Telling Lies, which lets you navigate via on-screen text, Her Story involves typing — and the Switch is not great for typing, is it? It would break immersion quite badly. Still, in our wildest dreams, we imagine Half Mermaid figuring out a way to get this beautiful narrative mystery working on the Switch. Sigh.

What are the chances?

Looooowwwww. Sam Barlow is busy scooping up GOTYs for Immortality, and also, Her Story just wouldn't work on the Switch anyway. BUT STILL.

Immortality

Let's get all the Sam Barlow games on Switch! Immortality — which is sweeping 2022 GOTY lists at the time of writing — makes a great candidate for a Switch game, if you ask us. It's all about scrubbing through footage, and works well with a controller. Also, it's awesome.

What are the chances?

Well, it's potentially a bit risqué for Switch — it's got FMV nudity, after all — but we've seen saucier stuff on the eShop, albeit in anime format. Still, if there's any game developer that can sway Nintendo, surely it's the multi-award winning Half Mermaid Productions?

Pentiment

Obsidian did a hard pivot from games like Fallout, Pillars of Eternity, and The Outer Worlds to create this strange little thing: A murder mystery set in 16th-century Bavaria, in which the protagonist is a journeyman artist working on illuminated manuscripts at a local monastery. The art is all based on woodcuts, early printing press typesetting, and medieval manuscripts, with all the hilarious "that is not what cats look like" outcomes you'd hope for. It's sumptuously illustrated and written, and we want to play it on Switch, like, yesterday.

What are the chances?

Once again, with Xbox as publisher and owner of Obsidian, it's not likely, but it's not unlikely, too. If Xbox Game Studios can port the Ori games onto Switch, this could follow suit.

FTL: Faster Than Light

FTL plays like a dream on iPad, and if they ported this right, it could play like a dream on Switch, too. This real-time strategy roguelike space adventure is one of those games you either haven't heard of, or you love — no in-betweens, really, much like developer Subset's follow-up game Into the Breach. Plus, there honestly aren't enough Star Trek-style games on Switch, if you ask us.

What are the chances?

This game came out in 2012 and hasn't come to consoles since. We'd put the likelihood of a Switch port at about as likely as a certain billionaire moving to Mars.

Which games would you love to see ported to Switch in 2023? Tell us in the comments!