Can you believe we're already two months into the year?! Well, thankfully, no matter how quickly time passes by, the Switch eShop seems to offer up dose after dose of great digital content to enjoy and February was no different.
These awards aim to celebrate the best of Nintendo's digital store, giving some love and attention to the games that could so easily be missed in the Switch's ever-growing library.
So, let's get started. Here are the best Switch eShop games of February 2021!
Honourable Mentions:
While these titles didn't quite make our top three this month, they're still certainly worth checking out.
- Curse of the Dead Gods | Review: 8/10
- Thomas Was Alone | Review: 8/10
- SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium | Review: 8/10
- Blue Fire | Review: 8/10
- Rogue Heroes: Ruins of Tasos | Review: 8/10
- Hero-U: Rogue to Redemption | Review: 8/10
- Glyph | Review: 8/10
- Haven | Review: 7/10
- Cathedral | Review: 7/10
3. UnderMine (Switch eShop)
Taking third spot this month is UnderMine, a delicious roguelite that's an easy one to recommend. In our review, we said the game "demonstrates clear mastery in its overall design, controls, upgrade systems and presentation, which all come together to make for a thoroughly engrossing experience," awarding it a mighty 9/10.
It won't change the mind of anyone who's grown tired of the roguelite genre, of course, but if you're ready for another adventure, this is absolutely worth your time.
2. Ghosts 'n Goblins Resurrection (Switch eShop)
In second place is Ghosts 'n Goblins Resurrection, a game which stays true to its old-school roots while implementing a fresh approach that's definitely worth a look. While several members of our team have been loving their time exploring its beautiful environments and brutal gameplay, reminiscing over kinder times in the NES days, our recommendation does come with a word of warning: sometimes, this is particularly brutal, to the point where anyone not looking for a serious challenge may be put off.
We'd urge you to give our full review a read if you're interested in checking out this Ghost 'n Goblins love letter; if the sound of the difficulty doesn't bother you, go ahead and get this downloaded ASAP.
1. Capcom Arcade Stadium (Switch eShop)
Taking the gold this month, though, is Capcom Arcade Stadium. We kind of feel like we're cheating a little bit here, as this release technically contains 30 games in one, but that just makes it all the more tempting, right?
Capcom Arcade Stadium can be downloaded for free (at first), giving you access to retro shooter, 1943. After that, you can pick up the additional 30 games, with the full set costing £29.99 / $39.99 in total. What you decide to buy is naturally up to you, but we were pleasantly surprised with the range of games on offer – particularly the shooters – and came away feeling like the package was excellent value for money.
If you have an interest in retro gaming or the history of Capcom, you can't really go wrong downloading Arcade Stadium and browsing through its selection of games. Go on, treat yourself.
< Nintendo Life eShop Selects - January 2021
How we decide our eShop Selects top three: As we reach the end of every month, the Nintendo Life staff vote on their favourite titles from a list of games selected by the editorial team. To qualify for this list, these games must have been released as a digital-only Nintendo Switch eShop title in that particular month, and must have been reviewed on Nintendo Life; we select the qualifying games based on their review scores.
Staff are then asked to vote for three games that they think deserve to sit right at the very top of that list; first choice gets 3 points, second choice gets 2 points, and third choice gets 1 point. These votes are then tallied to create a top three list, with the overall winner taking that month's top prize.
Comments 20
I didn't buy a lot of new eShop games in February. UnderMine was fun though as is Littlewood which I'm playing now. I also bought Thomas Was Alone but haven't played it yet. Corpse Party is probably my favourite if we count Japanese releases.
CYBER SHADOW
NINJA APPROVED
Does anyone know if Capcom plan to add more games to the arcade collection in the future? I'll buy it if they ever add Super Puzzle Fighter 2 Turbo or Marvel VS Capcom 2. 😃
@Clyde_Radcliffe I'd buy it if they included the Alien vs Predator arcade beat'em'up
Rogue Heroes - Tacos Tacos Tacos!!!
If you enjoy co-op dungeon crawlers, definitely give this one a look. It plays great with friends, ONLINE too!
Glyph is such an awesome game. It wasn't until after I'd played it quite a bit that I read on it's eshop page where they say it runs at 50+ fps. What a charmingly detailed bullet point! It seems to almost always run at 60fps to me, but maybe later level get heavier and drop more frames. It feels like a Chozo world made up of nothing but sentient morph balls that transform into roboinsects, and they talk to you like the elder dragons in Spyro, which is charming. The controls, floatiness, ability to double jump as well as hover-fly, all of it makes for quite a fun 3D platformer. Kind of like what I always thought Floating Runner should've been, or an evolved, next-generation Jumping Flash! (Jumping Flash 1 and 2 are so great, I'm still in disbelief that Sony doesn't provide any way to play one of their Jumping Flash games on either PS4 or PS5)(it should especially be on PS VR!).
I also love Capcom Arcade Stadium. I've only purchased set 3 fro Progear, Gigawing, 19xx etc because I'm hoping for a physical release. Capcom please release your stuff physically simultaneously with the digital release! I want to play Ghosts and Goblins Resurrected so badly, but am trying to wait for the damn physical release that has to be coming.
Oh, and I've been addicted tl Descenders on Switch, which is surprising because it runs so badly. It would be dreamy at 60fps or higher, but struggles to hit a consistent 30fps on Switch. And oh my god the favelas environment is a freaking slide show! Also, it seems like replays only work if I'm online. I try to play Descenders offline because it runs better without extra mountain bike models and their transparency producing dirt cloud trails. The game won't let me select offline in the options so I have to go handheld and put the Switch in airplane mode. Sometimes I wish Unity didn't exist (Bad North looks great at 60fps on Switch, but I can't think of any other smooth Unity game on Switch).
@Clyde_Radcliffe MvC may be a problem due to the licensing rights (was it ever included in ANY CAPCOM compilations?) but I'm all for Super Puzzle Fighter or hopefully something seen on compilations less ofteb like Rival Schools or Street Fighter EX.
I have downloaded 4 on that list with another 4 on my wishlist pending wider review opinions, upcoming compilations featuring same game, gaming budget "allowances" etc...
This month, I agree with NL assessment, having bought Arcade Stadium and Ghosts 'n Goblins and put Undermine and Rogue Heroes on the wish list.
Blizzard Arcade Collection needs to be on here and in the top 3 at that. I'm surprised NL hasn't reviewed it yet, or even mentioned that Rock n Roll Racing has actually been totally remastered. Which I'd have thought would be pretty big news for Nintendo gamers of a certain age.
It makes the $20 for just 3 games, seem more than reasonable. This is a collection that has clearly had an enormous amount of love put into it,you can tell that just from the main menu screen but I fear many will be put off by what seems like a steep asking price, especially compared to the 32 games offered by Capcom for just $10 more.
As for Ghosts n Goblins difficulty, lower the difficulty to Squire and you have a difficulty level comparable to Donkey Kong: Tropical Freeze. At this level, I'm sure most can have some fun with it. It offers a proper GnG experience as there are still a lot of enemies but never to the point you're overwhelmed and it feels unfair, which allows you to concentrate on some of the tricky platforming segments. Too much has been made about the evil challenge the game provides but not much about how the various difficulty levels make the game accessible to every one.
somewhat related but im happy the NUTS game is back online after being taken down while the studio waited for nintendo to approve an update, ive been hoping to download it all month. seems to be on a sale now too
Really wish they’d put Aliens vs Predator in that Capcom collection, but probably out of the question.
@Noelemahc it was released on the Capcom Home Arcade, it's one of the built-in games.
Really enjoying Littlewood, would love to see a NL review of the game
@GalacticBreakdown I looked at the NintendoLife review of it and it makes no mention of MvC. It does have AvP, which is another licensing dark horse, but not MvC?
Capcom Arcade Stadium needs premium license pack of games. I would clearly pay double for these games alone.
Alien Vs Predator
The Punisher
Cadillacs And Dinosaurs
Marvel Vs Capcom
I agree @Fraba
I wouldnt say you can pick and choose those Capcom Arcade Stadium games by the way. You have to buy them by the bundles and it’s irritating when you own Capcom’s previous Street Fighter Anniversary Collection release.
It's a shame that Littlewood didn't make the cut. It's such a nice little step forward for the life sim/farming/town building genre. It's so streamlined and easy to do what you want without being overly-simplified. It's a treat.
@Wavey84 For what Cyber Shadow is, the fact that it was developed by one dude (except the music) is incredible. His design philosophies are extremely sound. Obviously, I've played Ninja Gaiden extensively so I agree with you about how good the jump mechanic feels in that when compared to Cyber Shadow. It's got some "weight" for lack of a better explanation. Still, I find Cyber Shadow to fit perfectly with how I play games, so I didn't notice any excessive floatiness in the jumping, feels great to me.
NINJA APPROVED
@Noelemahc oh my bad, yeah I was speaking of AVP. Got my abbreviations mixed up. Oddly enough though now, the publishing rights for Aliens & Predator is now with Marvel, they're doing the current comics not Dark Horse. I'm not sure how the licensing works but that would be nifty if Capcom could now make a deal with Marvel to publish both games again. Yeah the only MvC release I've seen are on the 1up Arcade cabinet releases.
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