The 26 best Nintendo Switch games in 2025

Multiplayer: Y | 12 months launched: 2019

I used to be on the fence about Astral Chain from the day the primary trailer got here out till few hours into my playthrough. All of it felt somewhat too generic, virtually a paint-by-numbers rendition of an motion recreation. I needn’t have been so nervous, because it’s one of many extra unique titles to come back from PlatinumGames, the developer behind the Bayonetta collection, in recent times.

In a future the place the world is below fixed assault from creatures that exist on one other aircraft of existence, you play as an officer in a particular power that offers with this menace. The sport’s gimmick is you could tame these creatures to turn out to be Legions that you simply use in fight. Encounters play out with you controlling each your character and the Legion concurrently to take care of waves of mobs and bigger, more difficult enemies. In addition to for fight, you may use your Legion(s) to resolve crimes and traverse environments.

Astral Chain sticks intently to a loop of detective work, platforming puzzles and fight — somewhat too intently, if I am being important — with the sport break up into circumstances that function chapters. The story begins off properly sufficient however shortly devolves right into a mashup of assorted anime tropes, together with twists and arcs ripped straight from some very well-known exhibits and movies. Nonetheless, the minute-to-minute gameplay is sufficient to maintain you engaged by way of the 20-hour or so essential marketing campaign and into the pretty vital end-game content material.

Does Astral Chain attain the heights of Nier: Automata? No, under no circumstances, however its fight and environments can typically surpass that recreation, which all-told might be my favourite of this era. Usually out there for below $50 lately, it is properly price your time.