Reminder: What's The Best Switch Game Of 2020? It's Time To Rate Your Favourites

I've given out four Switch games 10/10 this year, although some are ports/remakes. Little Busters! Converted Edition, Xenoblade Chronicles DE, Hades and Robotics;Notes Elite.

Every single mobile game that was ported to the Switch this year was better than the last. So my vote is for all mobile ports.

IDK why Nintendo even makes first party games anymore, seems like a waste of time and money.

I'm not gonna go through a list of thousands guys. Can't you just list the top 30 or something?

I voted 10/10 for Pretty Princess Party as my GOTY 2020 on Nintendo Switch !! 😆😆😆

Hades. Easiest pick ever.

I'mma just cut through the fat and say the GOTY on Switch was Hades.

@Dezzy Just use the search function?

I really thought it was going to be Animal Crossing first party-wise, but I think I have to go with Paper Mario: The Origami King. Huge, pleasant surprise from Nintendo.

Catherine: Full Body is my pick for best third party release. Stellar port and a really good value considering it retailed at $49.99 and came with all of the DLC included.

For me it's Animal Crossing and Doom Eternal. Can't say I really played much else that came out on Switch this year. I'd like to try Hades at some point though.

Oh and while they're not technically new releases, I'm Mega hyped for the Bit Trip games in a couple of weeks.

This list makes me sad how much shovelware was released on switch this year.

Animal Crossing was a hard game to score. I loved it but the fact I had to pay £250 for multiplayer (had to buy another console and copy for rhe wife) means I could only give it 4* when the gameplay deserves more.

A Frog Game is obviously GOTY, just look at the graphics

The Last of Us part 2. Seeing as it 'won' plenty of awards it didn't deserve,may as well give it the best Nintendo game too 😄. Joking aside 😏,I'd say Hades,as I'm not into Animal Crossing

I'm not paid to syphon through 1000 games for you, the least you can do is cut the fat so I don't have to ignore games like #Funtime and #Halloween, Super Fun Puzzle.

I will agree, NL, that y'all should include a shortlist of the top thirty releases or so this year.

If we're solely deciding based on what game we had the most fun with then Super Mario 3D All-Stars. Playing Mario 64 and Sunshine again after all this time (I only played them on N64/GameCube) was a delight! Now playing Mario Galaxy for the first time but not sure how I feel about it. Its very different to the previous two.

Hades or A Short Hike

SoR 4 is my pick. Viva beatemups.

Paper mario origami king

I appreciate the article, but blimey Nlife, this is overwhelming!

Holy moses what kinda request is that.

Xenoblade for me.

I'm supposed to get Xenoblade Chronicles today, but I know it's my #1 Switch game in 2020. I played it to death on Wii and still wanted the remaster.

My best on switch this year were Hades, Age of Calamity, and Kirby Fighters 2

Streets of Rage 4- 8/10
Animal Crossing- 8/10
Trials of Mana- 9/10
Paper Mario ToK- 9/10
Xenoblade Chronicles DE- 10/10
SM3D AS- 10/10

Honorable Mention goes to Devil May Cry 3 SE

Out of game releases this year that I've played? I'd say the best was Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition. My runner-up would be A Short Hike.

My top 10 for 2020 is as follows:

1. Fire Emblem Thracia 776
2. La-Mulana
3. Vestaria Saga
4. Metal Gear Rising Revengeance
5. Ys Origin
6. Trials of Mana (Remake)
7. Langrisser 1/2 (Remake)
8. La-Mulana 2
9. Paper Mario Origami King
10. Shadow Hearts

Of which La-Mulana, or more specifically, La-Mulana 1&2 Collection was released on the Switch this year, so I suppose that would be my Switch game of the year.

This list is stupid. Why would you put shovelware on here? 80% of these games are terrible.

Hades is Nintendo Goty this year. Which is sad really because as good as it is, it doesn't carry the Switch for 2020.

Mario 3D All-Stars, but that isn't saying much. Nintendo's 2020 was quite possibly their worst year in ages.

Hi everyone! For those suggesting we supply a shortlist, I can guarantee that whatever selection we drew up would be too short for somebody and we’d be inundated with “What about X?!” and “Y snubbed much?” and “I can’t believe NL hates Z!”. Granted, including everything is a little messy, but it’s the most democratic solution (our NL Staff Picks will be coming separately).

Also, you don’t have to scroll through 15 pages! They’re simply there so everything’s included — I’d personally recommend firing up your Switch for a reminder of what you’ve played and using the search bar to rate your top picks.

Or not! The order will be fluid even once it’s published, so the list itself can be your ‘shortlist’ if you like.

@JHDK a waste of money?

You know Animal Crossing sold 25 million copies this year and most likely pulled in a good few billion in profit for Nintendo.

How exactly is that a waste of time or money?

Now personally i think the game is rubbish and i honestly cannot see how it sold 5 million, let alone 25 million. But i have to give credit where credit is due, they really hit that one out of the park.

I believe Nintendo made more profit from their video games this year than any developer in the history of video game development has ever made in a single year.

For me personally Fire Emblem Xenoblade Chronicles Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Rescue Team DX Ori and the Will of the Wisps and Hyrule Warriors Age of Calamity.

Doom I would put there but the game has just come out so too soon. Another game I want to mention is Trials of Mana but I have that on PC.

It's quite clearly Animal Crossing: New Horizons for me and the game isn't even a year old yet. Amazing! ^_^ I'll still be playing it this time next year.

My personal favorite was Pikmin 3 Deluxe. Haven't gotten around to Hades yet but I heard that it was really great.

Super Mario 3D All Stars wins by default, as that was the only new Switch game I played this year. And even that's not that great. Terrible year for the Switch. Understandable, but still terrible as it stands.

Am I the only one who rated the bioshock games really highly? Xenoblade I also gave a 10.

Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition for me. Best game I've ever played. It's followed up by Hyrule Warriors Age of Calamity and then Paper Mario The Origami King.

Super Mario 3D All-Stars for me. The kids are getting Paper Mario and Animal Crossing for Christmas, so I may revise my opinion. Any year where Mario Galaxy is considered a new release means everything else is playing for a silver medal in my opinion though. Any half-dozen of the levels from that game are a hundred times better than a lot of the games being voted for here.

Only just got a switch last month & only got munch's oddysee & the bioshock collection for it , hope to get more games for it though if there's a decent sale

@dartmonkey Thank the lord for search bars!

I dunno, maybe my favorite is pikmin this year

Uhhhh, what's the database dump you used for this? Pretty sure hollow knight silksong isn't out yet...

I don't mind combing through the pages and pages of titles. One man's poison, and all that.

I do mind NL not cleansing it's data before expecting readers to go through 44 pages of ratings. (The last 6 of which are empty). That's pretty unprofessional/lazy. Unreleased titles should not be on this list, or at least not major ones.

For me this is easy! Hades by a country mile!!!

The best games this year are definitely Hollow Knight Silksong, Little Nightmares 2, Baldo and Axiom Verge 2. XD What the hell...?

Now seriously, my favourite Switch game has been Ori and the Will of Wisps (a masterpiece) but Paper Mario comes close. Also Inmortals, Doom Eternal, Trials of Mana and the Bioshock/Borderlands games have been awesome. Really good stuff. Not the best year for sure, but there was still quite a lot of great games I've enjoyed.
Xenoblade and Pikmin are amazing games too, but I played them back in the day. Will probably get them again on a sale.

My 5 favorite Nintendo titles on Switch released this year:

• Pikmin 3 Deluxe
• Super Mario 3D All-Stars
• Paper Mario: The Origami King
• Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition
• Clubhouse Games

Otherwise it's been a year of catching up for me, mostly via the Switch. Some great games I've been playing for the first time in 2020:

• Resident Evil 4
• Okami
• Divinity Original Sin 2
• Undertale
• Final Fantasy VII
• Final Fantasy IX

NintendoLife - please PLEASE do at least two rounds of voting.

This format is so broken. We need to have less choices and all the bad games to be routed out. Then we vote for the best 30 or so at the end.

Any chance of a list without all the indie eShop titles on?

Pikmin 3 Deluxe is 10/10
Ori and the Will of the Wisps was excellent as well.

Why is 1001 Spikes on the list? It’s a game I’ve been aching to come to Switch! This is rubbing salt into the wounds 🤕😉

@Kienda The end list is dynamic, in that as people continue to vote even after it is published, it continues to change.

Personally it is Need for Speed because it ended the long "proper" arcade racer drought for me. (Since I did not enjoy Burnout that much because of the tracks)

I never played it but it's probably Animal Crossing.

90's Super GP huh? That wasn't even released xD

Mario 3D allstars Mario 64 for me all the way. Sor4 was excellent but I felt the game was too long and some enemies were annoying. Loved hades and will go back in one day. Last of us 2 and probably ghost of shoe shoe even tho didn’t finish it. Want to get ori 2 one day but haven’t played much of the first. Overall game last of us 2. The whole thing for me was an event, and a brave daring release. It’s divisive sure but I loved it. Despite some pacing issues xxx take care xx

Dear Lord, so much Shovleware.

Yeah, call me lazy but I much prefer a simple poll than these 'go and rate every game' articles. I guess these generate far more clicks to different pages and lots more ad revenue though...

It has to be Animal crossing new horizons, the sheer amount of time I have put into it just boggles my mind.

Only 2020 games I bought were Hades and a small puzzle game called inbento. (Got the info from Deku Deals.)
Hades: 10/10
inbento: 6/10
As others have suggested, there is no point in having all games released in a year, the least Nintendo Life could do was to include only the games they have reviewed.

That's a weird way to make the poll...

Hades and Ori 2 are perfection and the two best games of the year on the console by a mile.

I'd also give shout outs to Mario 3D All Stars, Xenoblade remastered, Age of Calamity, Immortals Fenyx Rising, Pikmin 3 Deluxe, Streets of Rage 4, Spiritfarer, A Short Hike, Animal Crossing, Doom Eternal, Burnout Paradise, Bioshock, Borderlands, Outer Worlds and Need for Speed Hot Pursuit.

Biggest disappointment for me at least was Paper Mario Origami King. I just didn't like it much at all. Bug Fables is a much better game if you are looking for something in that format.

@horizoniki

I apologize for the tangent, but since we were talking about Game Awards it just got going

Yeah, I think that I'm with you there man. One of the main reasons I'm even more glad I didn't watch the horse $#!t game awards is because I heard Hades was robbed. They had the chance to give an insanely deserving not your ordinary an extremely fun game a chance to show that we do appreciate something different. That we appreciate the visions & voices outside of the typical big studios & upper echelon. And that is not all about brand recognition or your favorites in the industry

Instead they gave it to a game that not even the people who consume the product voraciously weren't that thrilled about overall. Heck, I certainly got MY fill of the meh'ness that was tlou2 MUCH quicker than I did Hades. Which for the record and comparisons sake, had me sitting up all night like a Coke head chugging 40's of espresso saying one more run! One more run! One more...you get the picture I'm sure lol. Whereas tlou2 is a game that I don't even know if I'll ever go back to try and complete. As it honestly felt like more of a chore and a sense of duty to try and get into than something I was doing for fun. And while I can't personally speak for others, last I checked I personally play games to have fun.

IMO it just goes to show that it's really not about us the gamers. It's about their sponsors, the corporations and people who help line their pockets. Folks that give them free review copies, they are friends with & all that sort of crap. And while I've always tried to keep an open mind, remain objective & give nary a thought into the sort of thing, I may honestly be beginning to lean more towards being in line with some of the people who think that trash like the vga's are on the take from the get.

It's not about "my guy" or fav game not winning or any of that crap. As there's certainly been nominations that I didn't agree with, yet I could at least see why the pic was maybe made and had no real qualms. However, some of their actions, "coincidences" & highly suspect winners as of late don't exactly bolster my trust or faith. I've been saying eff them for a while & I think that I'll continue to do so.

With me these days it's quite a bit like the Super Bowl where you can't wait to see the commercials. In the VGA's case the reveals and such. Where they differ a lot to me though is that the actual Super Bowl show itself is a lot more legitimate, usually more entertaining and I can still always watch the commercial reveals as the bonus.

@JuiceMan_V

I'm going to cut to the bone and just say that I think the GOTY in general overall was Hades! Lil

I am not a fan of the way the game of the year polls work nowadays on this site. Why not the old system, just voting for your best game? Now I needed to rank one game higher then the other!

Looking at the games: I played some lovely e-shop games that weren't from this year, and Nintendo's output was very slim. Animal crossing isn't my thing, so I didn't buy it. Paper mario didn't really impress me much either (hence I have still not finished it, I gave it a 7). Age of calamity is awesome, I gave it a 8. But at the end it is a mindless hack and slash, so I gave Immortals a 9 (amazing game, just as addicting as botw. Oh, and hard puzzles too). Immortals is really my sleeper hit. Sadly everybody (except me) will vote animal crossing.

@ChaosBadger777 You paid an extra £250 for a game you only rate a 4?!?! I can’t even imagine the kind of money you spend for a 10!

My most played Switch title released this year was Trials of Mana. But I haven't purchased Hades yet. And I'm slowly working my way through Mario 3D All Stars. Got about 50 stars in Mario 64.

I also agree with the sentiment that this list is way too overwhelming. At a minimum, you should only include games that have been reviewed.

@Azuris

Yeah, every super popular console tends to get them. Unless you just started gaming a couple months ago, this should be nothing new to you.

Honestly, I thought 2020 was a great year for the Switch, but yes, if you limited yourself only to Nintendo first party games, you probably were disappointed in this year.

@DoomTurtle I had to buy another switch Lite and copy of the game so that we could both have our own game saves.

I don't think Animal Crossing has much of any competition first party-wise. The only two other games of any note from Nintendo this year were Hyrule Warriors and Paper Mario, and I doubt either of them would oust Animal Crossing.

Fire Emblem 3H: Cindered Shadows isn't on here

Well, I got to B and damn, this is a huge list!
Spreadsheet it?!

Origami King and Hades are both excellent. Hard for me to choose between the two. I had fun with other stuff, but nothing else is really in contention for me.

If I have to choose one, I’m going OK.

@gameboy1975

Yeah, but seeing it and also giving a Glance at the Titles in the Eshop let me think on those CDs back than with 100 Games and more.

Something like:
https://www.mobygames.com/images/covers/l/119215-10-000-games-windows-front-cover.jpg

But never would a Magazine came up with the Idea puting'em to a Vote for the Game of the Year.

Can't vote for my favorite, Lover kiss is not on this site. Another thing, do you have a minimum amount of votes a game needs to get on the list this year? If so, people should start upvoting ecchi games.

I'm already sad that Sakuna: of Rice and Ruin will probably be ranked lower than it deserves.

My picks for 2020 is Animal Crossing, Xenoblade Chronicles DE and Spiritfarer.

Wow that's a lot of games I won't be playing
Hurtle warriors
And fairy tales
Are great games

Animal Crossing

This is why I get confused when folks say there is a drought.

@Razer I think the game list is more or less a general list of 2020 releases, and that's why there's shovelware-looking titles.

Not the easiest year to judge. Hoping for Sakuna, Hyrule Warriors, and Gods and Monsters for Xmas, and my year has been playing remakes (3D Mario, NMH and Xenoblade) and older games in my backlog.

But of truly new Switch games, Paper Mario and Indivisible are the ones that stand out.

Animal Crossing New Horizon was the best game of the year for Nintendo Switch.

@BenAV

I don't remember everything I've played! I used the search function and remembered like 3 games.

@Dezzy But you remember the best ones, right? That's all that's really relevant here. If you want to add all your games then just look through your library while you do it.

Going through this giant list is a bit much , gave up pretty quickly there. I’m sure AC will win the award and it’s a great game deserving of such an accolade but my personal favorite this year is Streets of Rage 4 - just love this game. Really hoping for more new entries to classic series with this level of quality.

Probably not going to vote as I've played precious few Switch games released this year. From the comments, though, I've learned (a) people dislike having choices, and (b) I really need to play Hades, apparently.

I would say Mario 3D All-Stars, but it feels like a cop out to put it as game of the year, as its a re-release of several games.

And as much as i like Paper Mario Origami game, i didn’t like it, that, much.

I gave my two 10's to ACNH and Need for speed hot pursuit

Axiom Verge 2?

I stop looking on page 3 😬

For me it’s two point hospital, hugely addictive and challenging!

Did we have to include shovelware?

There is nothing in Hades that is less than excellent. Pumping action, wonderful music, great script, heartfelt characterizations, and a story about love, forgiveness, reconciliation, and reunion. Orpheus’ Lament is the best video game song of the year for me, tied with Jenova from FF7R.

I also really enjoyed (in no order) Crosscode, Please the Gods, Robothorium in the indie gems JRPG bundle, Xcom 2, Huntdown, Streets of Rage 4, Operencia, Faeria, Darksiders Genesis, and Nowhere Prophet.

I’m playing Monster Sanctuary right now and looking forward to playing Ring of Pain and Trials of Mana.

The whole 2K games’ package, but if I’d have to choose, I’d say Borderlands 2 and BioShock Infinite were the best games coming to Switch this year. Great graphics, huge content and some of the best titles ever, at very affordable prices.

@dartmonkey yeah but come on man, so you genuinely believe someone is going to ask where Accidental Queens Collection is?

You definitely could have thinned this list out a lot.

I voted for 2 games because i couldn't be bothered to troll through the list to find what i was looking for.

Im sure im not the only one.

@Wilforce Youre not suppose too, just vote for your favorite games or believe are good that you have played or owned. They also included a search bar so you also don't have to go through the list one at a time, lol =XD

Going through this list is like going through the E-shop sale list.

@Razer yes, youre not the only one that has missed the search bar just above the list of games to make your life easier. =

@ChaosBadger777 Yeah, my girlfriend was really happy when I get her a switch and a second copy of animal crossing. We both been having a blast, Animal crossing for sure is going to win game of the year, game has been pure perfection =

@JHDK Your joking right, never heard anyone say this, in fact quite the opposite. But sure, Nintendo should drop their multi-billion, console selling, franchises for run of the mill app games with no longevity. Lol =XD

Ori and the Will of the Wisps all day long. Big shout for Age of Calamity as well.

Xenoblade gets an easy 10/10, GOTY. I'd give praise to the SNES games they added to NSO, but those aren't counted. (Also, a glaring lack of DKC3.)

Story of Seasons Mineral Town for me, followed by X-COM 2. I feel bad that neither of them is original to 2020; I haven't bought many games this year, because work has been insane.

@Razer There’s no need to scroll to find something, though — if you type the first few letters of whatever you’re looking for into the search bar, it’ll pop up immediately.

I picked hades 3d all stars and ac.

anybody's eyes hurt after scrolling through that giant list? Mine do, lol.

can only be one imo

Ori and the will of the wisps

Animal Crossing will obviously win since it's popular and 30 million people bought it.

I choose None

probably xenoblade in all seriousness (though I though it looked visually inferior to 2 in the screenshots)

4x4 Dirt Track for me...

Too lazy to rank them, but Xenoblade, Ys Origin, Hades, Streets of Rage 4, Huntdown, Tokyo Mirage Sessions were my standouts.

@Dezzy You know you can search, right?

> Animal Crossing New Horizons
> Hades
> Paper Mario The Origami King
> Ori and the Will of the Wisps

So much dross. It's the Wii library all over again. It's the downside of successful consoles. Great games swimming in shovelware.

@Inc Except the Switch library is far superior to the Wii library. Every popular console has loads of shovelware. PlayStation does as well.

Despite being from a different timeline, I think Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity is worthy of being Nintendo's GOTY, followed by Xenoblede Chronicles Definitive Edition. I would have put Super Mario 3D All Stars in second place, but many others have played 2 of the 3 games of the collection and Sunshine still needs QoL/lower down the difficulty of various levels, so I put it in 3rd place.

From what I have heard and seen, I think Ori and Will of Wisps should be 4th place. I have mostly purchased Megaman games (on discount) these last months and the original FF7 early this year.

@kingbk Pretty much what I said I'd agree with you on the Switch having more good games too.

My personal pick for GOTY is Animal Crossing: New Horizons. It has a plethora of problems that need fixing, but they’re overshadowed by an amazing twist on the classic AC gameplay and lots of improvements over its predecessors.

My favourite games that released this year

Hades
Huntdown
Streets of Rage 4
Doom 64
Duke Nukem 3D

2 old games in there but it doesn't matter, they're brilliant games and come to Switch in 2020.

@dartmonkey Little Nightmares II and Hollow Knight Silksong haven't released yet but are on this list, maybe you could remove them.

Has to be Descenders for me. I left a snarky comment on the review after I first played it... 50 hours later I'm addicted as **** and can't stop going back for one more run.

Trials of Mana!

For half a second I was like "oh, this will be a fun article to spend 30 seconds on" and then after a minute of scrolling I was still only at "Ad" in the list, I promptly gave up.

You can't possibly expect most people to want to load through dozens of pages for something like this...

Definitely Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Paper Mario TOK and 3D All Stars

Am I the only one voting for Phoenotopia: Awakening?

Xenoblade Chronicles and Animal Crossing! Two very different games but I had a great time with both of them.

37 pages and like 20 games worth actually voting on. And Digimon Survive, a game not released in 2020, for some reason.

1. Animal Crossing: New Horizons
2. Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity
3. Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition
4. Super Mario 3D All Stars

1. Ninjala
2. Ninjala
3. Ninjala

Yikes, was it really necessary to include every single title? This is exhausting...

You guys really have to find a better way of collecting votes. I’m surprised I had energy to find my top 3

While I concede that it’s certainly not the 'best' Nintendo Switch game this year, my personal favourite was Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity. I enjoyed every single hour I‘ve poured into it so far and I haven’t finished with the game by a long shot!

kinda sad to see no one talking about clubhouse games

A title should show how many ratings it gets too. A short hike may have a perfect 10 from 20 users, while animal crossing may have a 9 from 5k users. Would.that mean a short hike would be higher on theist w/o context? I didn't play the latter & don't think the former is a perfect game, so these are just examples, FWIW.

@dartmonkey the simple way to fix this is to do two rounds of voting.

This massive format is broken. I’ve voted for a few things and stopped because I ran out of time. Others will do the same or forget their favourites or miss games or whatever.

People do NOT have time. As someone who works in marketing, you can’t rely on people to do homework or spend more than a few moments on this.

We always get random skewed results from these NL polls and it’s because there is too much choice.

I love you guys, but these crazy long lists simply don’t work. You have to think of a better way because you’re the only site who does it and the end result always has random games added that make no sense.

@dartmonkey to clarify, the two round voting system.

The first vote has all games listed. But it helps to narrow down the list to the top 100 or 50 and cuts out the junk.

The second vote helps to order that vote and give the final result.

I promise you will have much better results doing this than just throwing all games in one list and hoping for the best. It just doesn’t work like that.

Xenoblade chronicles definitive for me . Absolutely loved the game before this edition and they just nailed it . Definitely will play again .. really want to play Hades as it gets alit of mentions here

A Short Hike is the game that keeps coming to mind as the most pleasant game experience this year for me.

Age of Calamity is a solid 9/10. Not perfect, but I love the story.

Pretty sure pillars of eternity 2, super meat boy forever and yo-kai watch 4 didn't come out this year. I desperately want to play all three on switch so stop taunting me!

@dartmonkey okay thats cool. I'm just going to leave it there...

Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition 10/10. Probably the best JRPG ever released.

I have literally never heard of over 95% of these games. I have played only a tiny fraction of 1% of these games! 37 freaking pages of games NintendoLife? Really? This is the worst game ranking format I've ever seen on any website!I was scrollin through for like half an hour, and every couple of minutes I'd be like "oh, I heard of that one", and then go back to scrolling though pages upon pages of garbage! Never do this again! If even 10% of the games on this list even receive a single ranking from someone, I will be shocked.
Ori and the Will of the Wisps is my Switch GOTY btw.

Based on playtime it's Animal Crossing.
Based on good-feels it's Mario 3D All Stars.
Smaller title packing a punch it's Hades.

I wouldn't personally give any of these a GOTY but I appreciate it's all relative. 2020, for obvious reasons, has been utterly, utterly dreadful.

2021 will be miles better... but I'm still expecting a mixed bag overall. The key difference between 2020 and 2021 will be the big AAA title. Animal Crossing has been fun, made lockdown 1 a lot more bearable, but ultimately leaves me feeling a bit "meh". Next year there will be something bigger to leave that good feeling.

There are some duplicates in here, such as Ciel Fledge and Keen.

Gonna be a hugely unpopular opinion I'd imagine, but Trials of Mana is only game I've played new this year that I played again right after finishing. In fact I played it 3x back to back.

You know, if you shortened the list, there will be that one person, why is "obscure game #925" not on there?

I have probably most enjoyed playing through The Outerworlds this year, despite the switch not being the ideal way to play. Paper Mario was also thoroughly enjoyable but you really can’t deny that 2020 was the year of Animal Crossing. It was one of the most zeitgeist dominating games since Pokemon Go.

Easily Clubhouse Games. That's one of those games where I'll always want to play a few matches online here and there every few days or a few times a day for the life of the system. Those games are classics because they don't get old, and having online competition it's infinite replayability with a ton of choices, like I could spend the next few years playing 7's and President and Ludo and Last Card and Bowling and Tanks and Yacht and Speed and Takoyaki and still only have played a small percent of the games available.

CBA to find them in your list but Duke Nukem 3D and Doom 64.

Been a strange year. I thought this year was dreadful for the switch - understandable with the pandemic. I had to purchase an additional 2 switches though due to animal crossing - which means there are now 4 switches in my house.

So garbage year yet 2 additional consoles bought- as I said it’s been very strange

i agree, these rate every game polls are INSANELY nuts and need to be replaced with a small curated selection simple poll thats actually a poll.

paper mario or baldo

That was a horrible year for me as a switch owner, Nintendo gave me absolutely nothing this year.

Taiko No Tatsujin Rhytmic Adventure was a VERY welcoming surprise. A rhytmic game mixed with RPG? SOLD!

@Azuris

Haha yeah I remember them. I think NL have just put up everything that was released this year rather than any curated nominations. It’s usually what they do with all their Votes.

Animal Crossing is definitely my Game Of 2020, but aside from that Hades is my GOTY

@Tyranexx I have the excact sme opinion:)

There were good Switch games released in 2020?! Coulda fooled me...

Edit: Scratch that. We got Fight Crab and A Short Hike this year!

Super Mario Odyssey. But of the ones that came out this year, I say Panzer Paladin.

My top:

• Hades
• Sam & Max Save the World (though it's a remake)
• The Bard's Tale (another remake)
• Thronebreaker (not really from 2020)
• Mega Man Zero/Zx Collection (same as above)
• Metro 2033/Redux (same)

So the best one really from 2020 is Hades in my opinion.

Im still playing botw 3 years later. It deserves game of the century

@JHDK You are joking right?

@Arsene I too have been playing botw for 3 years. But I've only put about 30 hours into it so far. I tend to get going for a bit, then a shiny new game distracts me and I don't come back to it for several months.

I guess I’ll be the lone vote for Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin.

Really don’t think re-releases and expansions should be included, even though Mega Man Zero/ZX Legacy would be on my list otherwise.

And as someone mentioned, there are a number of titles that haven’t been released yet Gestalt: Steam and Cinder, and Hollow Knight: Silksong don’t even have an announced date.

That said, here are my picks:
-Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin
-Hades
-Ori and the Will of the Wisps
-Star Renegades
-Carrion
-Ghostrunner
-Panzer Paladin
-Alwa’s Legacy
-Shantae and the Seven Sirens
-Void Bastards

I don't buy games often so Age of Calamity was the only one for me to rate. Loved the game. It was my first hyrule game and is very fun to play.

As others have said, so many games to trawl through. Most of them shovel ware. I must admit I gave up halfway through. A top 100 or something would be great. I’m hoping for less first party ports/remakes next year and more new games. I suppose not every year can be to everyone’s taste. Here’s to 2021 👍

@Auggie_Plays_Games It seems like several here do!

...You guys out hollow knight silk song in here....🤦

My favourites of 2020, as by playtime x fun:

1. Animal Crossing: New Horizons
2. Xenoblade Chronicles - Definitive Edition
3. Super Mario 3D All-Stars
4. Paper Mario: The Origami King
5. La-Mulana 1 & 2 - Hidden Treasures Edition

I really need to get Axiom Verge 2 and try Hades.

I also completed Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity in co-op. I'd put it in 6th, but I don't own it.

@dartmonkey
I can’t believe NL hates Z!

Hoping Immortals Fenyx Rising gets some deserved love ❤️🥳🏟

@electrolite77

Well, at the Vote for the SNES Games where many Games missing
Maybe they just thought: "Well, here! Take Everything!" .

Thats a lot of games! How bout a few more?

The only true 2020 game I played was Moving Out, but since this list goes by Switch release date (and includes freeware I spent an hour or less on before deleting it from my console), this opens up my options.

Superliminal (9/10)
A Short Hike (9/10)
Manifold Garden (8/10)
Moving Out (8/10)
Super Mario Bros. 35 (6/10)
Ninjala (5/10)
Jump Rope Challenge (5/10)
EQQO (4/10)

Also, I had no issue using the search bar. I'm glad ever weird game I played was represented.

This will be a popularity contest more than a quality one, but my two Switch GOTYs are:

Crimzon Clover World EXplosion
Darius Cozmic Collection Arcade

Hello everybody! We've updated the shortlist above to include only games we've reviewed on the site rather than every 2020 release in our database. More details at the top of the page.

Hopefully, this should make scrolling through pages of titles a little more bearable, although we still absolutely recommend using the search bar to quickly find the games you've played and want to rate.

@xxx128
I can't tell if you're being serious or not, but if you are then that's awesome, because I completely agree with you.

@Nicolai
If you don't mind me asking, what made you give Ninjala a 5/10 and SMB 35 a 6/10?

Hey, @dartmonkey can you ask your fellow peers @NintendoLife if they received my Ninjala news tip or not?
EDIT: I'm asking because I made a comment on the Ninjala Forum (like I usually do when something Ninjala related hasn't been turned into an article yet) on Friday, but I didn't get a response back, nor was an article written about it. I also sent you guys a "News Tips" through the Contact page yesterday, but I haven't heard a response from any of you guys, and you guys are (usually) very good at responding to the users on here.

@SM3DASislit The news team will weigh it up against other stories in the pipeline and make a decision on whether to report it. If you sent it via the contact page it will have gotten through, but other things might have taken priority for any number of reasons.

It may yet turn up, though. Either way, thanks for the tip.

@dartmonkey
Okay, thanks for letting me know and thank you so much for responding to me. 👍
I just wanted to ask since I hadn't heard anything about it. 🤔
One time I sent a Ninjala news tip via the Ninjala Forum and it was reported on 45 minutes later. I wasn't expecting the same result, but was hoping it would be reported on sooner rather than later.
I will keep that in mind for the future. I hope I'm not bugging you guys too much with the news tip.

You could have made this list a lot shorter by having XCDE as the only option

Shovel Knight: Shovel of Hope is listed as a 2020 game but that's been out on Switch since launch, dear people of NL.

https://www.nintendolife.com/games/switch-eshop/shovel_knight_shovel_of_hope

Unless that's been re-released as a standalone game? (without the rest of Treasure Trove?)

Has to be Xenoblade. Nothing else on Switch this year comes close to the masterpiece that is that game.

Some of my all time favourites were ported this year: No more heroes, Wonderful 101, Super Mario 64 and Xenoblade Chronicles. Already played them, but they are still as good as always (better in most cases).

Animal Crossing- nothing else even comes close

ACNH, NFS HP, Kingdom Hearts Melody of Harmony, and 3D all stars are best.

Doom eternal is included as well

@JHDK
have you played any of them?

edit: the first party games I mean

@SM3DASislit

Don't worry, the reasons are entirely personal. They're both games that I put down after playing for only an hour or so.

Ninjala's yet another multiplayer title that I couldn't grasp due to mechanics that weren't well communicated, and the gameplay didn't entice me enough to put the research into studying those mechanics. Perhaps the tutorial should have been more helpful, or the games theming could have been more intuitive (e.g. a Mario block made of brick probably breaks, one of ice can probably melt, etc). Unfortunately, that means that there may be a good game in there if I do the legwork, but other games like Rocket League or Splatoon either have simple intuitive mechanics (like the former), or communciate them well (the latter). My friends didn't really keep playing either, and I probably shifted my attention to something else. To be honest, if I was a gaming journalist, I wouldn't have given it a review at all with how little of a chance I gave it. But as a mere consumer I don't have any incentive to play through it to get the whole picture, so I'm just going to go just by how good it was on my first few tries.

Super Mario 35 I find fault in the way that you can't really interact with the other teammates, at least not in a way that you can influence, coupled by the fact that the game won't end until everyone dies. So its really just survival mode. The first couple times I played, it really just felt like playing an endless loop of the same levels for 20-30 minutes at a time until eventually enemies overwhelm you beyond reason. I've got nothing against survival games, but its pretty disappointing after having played that one fan game that did the same thing but better imo.

If you consider 5 being an average game, I gave them both pretty average scores, which is appropriate for games I felt indifferent or bored by, but don't have any glaring flaws. Makes room for the praise I gave the other games that I really liked.

@Nicolai
Thanks for replying and letting me know.
Yikes, sorry to hear that you couldn't get into Ninjala or SMB 35.
People have said that the tutorial for Ninjala was confusing, but I seemed to able to understand it. So I'm kind of confused as to how they find the Ninjala tutorial confusing. I found it kinda hard (at first) to get into Rocket League, but I feel like I was starting to get good at it when I started it more consistently a few months ago.
Well, for SMB 35 it's supposed to be a "free for all" (to put it one way), so I'm confused as to why you would need to communicate with the other players. I'm not into survival games, but I'm having a lot of fun with SMB 35. I didn't play the fan game, but I have heard about it.
Personally, I believe a 6 is an average score, but I mean everyone has their own rating system.

@SM3DASislit
Yeah, I had a similar issue with ARMS, a game I know is good, but something about it escapes me, where I'll get my butt kicked, and I'm not sure why the punches I'm throwing aren't landing but my opponent's are. I'm sure I could figure it out if I put in the time. Sometimes multiplayer games just don't click with me.

I became obsessed with Vigor for a few months but the game is far from perfect.
I’d like to see Hades win GOTY here.
I really love that game.

Xenoblade and Cross Code were my favorites this year. Hades was good, maybe even great, but still overrated by gaming press.

Voted for my top three this year. Tokyo Mirage Sessions, Animal Crossing, and Burnout Paradise. I tend to vote for games I actually play, so those are getting my picks.

@Dezzy There's a search bar. You don't have to search through the whole list. You should know what you played this year. Type it into the search bar.

I didn't buy a lot of games that released in 2020 but most of what what I did buy are excellent. The highlights being,

Streets of Rage 4
Hades
Huntdown
A Short Hike
Horace
Doom 64
Duke Nukem 3D

Nexomon Extinction a great Pokemon like game with it's own unique element's, I love the artwork, soundtrack and story!

I still have Hades and Horace still to try... it’s crazy reading this list and being reminded of my unplayed list!

Ori, by far. It’s a gorgeous game and they did such a great job porting it, I’m amazed.
I think it deserves it

Definitely either Animal Crossing (pretty much a given as to why) but I also enjoyed Nexomon Extinction as well. In fact, if I had to choose, I'd choose Nexomon, not only because it's a fantastic game with great dialogue, but because I know a lot of people are going to vote for AC more.

I didn't make any new big game purchases this year as, I'm not into Animal Crossing, and I'm still on the fence for Doom Eternal - gory shooters aren't my thing, but I might make an exception for Doom Eternal.

HotShot Racing was impressive, fun for a bit. Had fun with Mini Motor Racing X (the F1 style car maxed out seems to be the best car)

I'm looking forward to the Staff Picks, too, good idea NL.

Going through this list I realized that I haven't played very many new Switch games this year. Animal Crossing New Horizons and Super Mario 3D All Stars is it, I rated a few other games based on versions I've played on PC or Wii U, but I guess Animal Crossing is my personal Game of the Year on Switch

@BenAV
What about animal crossing

@EngineerMario Animal Crossing is close but I ended up giving it a 9/10.

Great games:

CrossCode

Hardcore Mecha

Kunai

Mega Man Zero/ZX Legacy Collection

Outbuddies DX

Streets of Rage 4

Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late[cl-r]

Willy Jetman: Astromonkey's Revenge

Hades, Xenoblade Chronicles and Trials of Mana for me.

Honourable mention Ys Origin and Age of Calamity.

2020 another year where I bought more games than played.

My favourite Switch game this year is one I don’t even see listed. Shaolin vs Wutang. Goddamn I love that game

The Takeover as well. That is one badass Beat-em-Up. Liked it better than Streets of Rage 4

@dartmonkey NintendoLife HATES Shaolin vs Wutang

Uh... there is games missing from this list. One of my favourites, Pocket Mini Golf, isn’t here ):

EDIT: Just realized I misread the update, sorry.

Ministry of Broadcast is my game of the year.

@Travisemo007 did Baldo get released? I really liked the look of that, but it all went quiet.

Spiritfarer is the most beautiful game I’ve ever played and sad to see barely any mentions. Think it got missed within all the TLOU2 hype.
That said, Hades is my GOTY with Huntdown as my 2nd place. Spiritfarer at 3rd

Clearly, we all know Fight Crab is going to sweep in and take the W for best game on the Switch. Ocean. Check. Crowbar. Check. Mutant crabs. Check. Easy game of the year contender with better storytelling that Last of Us Part II AND Ghosts of Tsushima combined. Haven't played it, but downloaded it yesterday & immediately felt it was 10/10 material based on the thumbnail

@Neckcrane Huntdowns high on my list as well, but as far as switch goes animal crossing takes the crown. It’s a little stale now but it was a good time.

@Neckcrane Yes! I was scrolling down the comments, ready to shout out ACNH, and Spiritfarer.

You are right, it is an absolutely stunning game, visually, audio and storytelling.

@TYRANACLES Huntdown was such a surprise hit, had some immense fun with it and now trying to complete it on the hardest difficulty. @dugan I don’t cry much but that game did something to me, it’s a game everyone needs to experience.

Animal Crossing, Hades, and A Short Hike. I Am Dead I just purchased, and am looking forward to getting into that. I'll catch up on Paper Mario and Xenoblade eventually. A solid year all around!

Worst year for the switch imo. Only game i bought was the Mario 3D collection.

I dont hold it against nintendo due to the lockdown messing them up, i just hope next year will be better since its starting pretty solid with Bravely Default 2 and Mario 3D World.

1. Streets of Rage 4
2. Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition
3. The Takeover
4. Paper Mario The Origami King
5. Shantae and the Seven Sirens

@Nicolai
People seem to have a hard time with getting into ARMS, and I can see why. It's a good game, but I sometimes struggle with it as well. I didn't seem to have issues with getting into Ninjala (aside from the usual learning curve). 🤔
The interesting thing is that I feel that Ninjala is easier to get into than ARMS. (IMO, at least). 🤔