The 26 finest Nintendo Swap video games in 2025

Multiplayer: Y | Yr launched: 2019

I used to be on the fence about Astral Chain from the day the primary trailer got here out till a very good few hours into my playthrough. All of it felt a bit of 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 return from PlatinumGames, the developer behind the Bayonetta sequence, lately.

In a future the place the world is underneath 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 can 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 cope with waves of mobs and bigger, tougher enemies. In addition to for fight, you may use your Legion(s) to unravel crimes and traverse environments.

Astral Chain sticks intently to a loop of detective work, platforming puzzles and fight — a bit of too intently, if I am being crucial — with the sport cut up into instances that function chapters. The story begins off properly sufficient however rapidly 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 hold you engaged via the 20-hour or so principal marketing campaign and into the pretty important end-game content material.

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