In a year of incredible releases, the Nintendo Switch certainly didn't miss out. Key Nintendo franchises saw brand new entries. Pikmin returned with a whole new perspective. Even F-Zero came out of retirement to show us all it still has some gas left in the tank. Not to mention an incredible lineup of third party and indie titles. So in this highly competitive year, here are our top five best new games of 2023.

5. Super Mario Bros. Wonder - Jordan Rudek

As the Switch’s first party output begins to sunset, we were bestowed an incredible parting gift in the form of an all-new 2D Mario platformer: Super Mario Bros. Wonder. In the same way that New Super Mario Bros. on DS would go on to see a handful of sequels in its particular style, I wouldn’t be surprised if Wonder goes on to do the very same thing. There’s little doubt that the long wait between New Super Mario Bros. U (and Luigi U) ended up yielding a remarkable and unique Mario experience.

One of the chief complaints lodged against Wonder is that it felt short, but its total number of stages is among the highest of all Mario platformers (granted that some of them are shorter badge challenges). Wonder’s greatest strength, though, is the variety of ways in which traditional platforming is turned on its head, sometimes quite literally. The Wonder Flower mechanic is a delightful, magical way of extending each stage and pushing that feeling of wanting to play just five more minutes to see what the next world offers. The sheer amount of color, enemy variety, and playstyle-altering badges make for an incredibly fresh return to form for one of the classic Nintendo-branded experiences.

While the boss fights (or lack thereof) at the end of every world didn’t live up to the highs of Super Mario Bros. 3 or Super Mario World, the journey itself was filled with secrets to discover that made it hard not to grin like an idiot while watching Mario and pals bounce across the screen. Super Mario Bros. Wonder indeed had flaws that kept it from being a true game of the year, but it was still a heck of a fun ride while it lasted. Here’s hoping we don’t need to wait until the end of Nintendo’s next console for the follow-up.

4. Cocoon - Neal Ronaghan

The latest game from some of the folks behind Limbo and Inside, Cocoon is a concentrated blast of brilliance where you control a little bug fella who has to carry around different balls that house worlds inside of them that you need to jump through in unique ways to figure out how to progress. Also all of the balls have distinct use cases that add further tweaks to the gameplay. And none of these elements overstay their welcome over the tightly wound four or five-hour experience.

As someone who loves a good puzzle-heavy adventure, I appreciate mind-bending twists that make you recontextualize how you even approach a challenge. The problem with some of those games is that you sometimes need to be thinking the exact way that the designer is thinking or else the puzzle might fall apart and you’ll get lost. Sometimes puzzles get too clever for their own good. That is not what Cocoon does. The game smartly limits your abilities and mobility in largely organic ways to make sure you are explicitly pointed to the tools you need to figure out a solution to the wordless puzzles. If I ever got stuck, the most I had to do was walk away and come back to analyze the landscape in a different manner.

At the time of writing, I have replayed Cocoon multiple times. Even after figuring out the puzzles, I enjoy the experience of being in this world, with its mood-setting music and contemplative visuals. The only thing that holds the game back on Switch is some light technical hiccups, but otherwise it’s sublime.

3. Sea of Stars - Alex Orona

Generation Remix, what’s old is new again! In a year that I've been listening to new retro sounding chicano soul and synth wave disco, I’m also playing what’s arguably one of the best throwback JRPGs of all time. Sea of Stars is what we all remember when playing such games as Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI as a child. It carries a lovable cast of characters you get attached to over the course of a few dozen hours, from small beginnings embarking on a journey that takes them to the ends of the earth and beyond. The pixel art is on full display in a dazzlingly rendered world of giants, dragons, and living gas beings.

When a lot of JRPGs hit a classic 100-hour gameplay pitfall, Sea of Stars keeps the entire game at a tight 25 hours, 30 if you want to 100% everything (which I did.) That means the immense story moves at a brisk pace, with very little downtime. Sure, there’s plenty of time to explore the world, but most often I was driven forward with an undeniable need to know more. Sea of Stars got its hooks in and wouldn’t let go until I had reached credits. All this is without even mentioning some of the most iconic JRPG music including tracks composed by the original composer of Chrono Trigger: Yasunori Mitsuda. There’s just so much to love about Sea of Stars. It’s a complete nostalgia package that improves on the memories you have while avoiding the mechanics that might’ve aged poorly. Sabotage Studios has trimmed the fat to give you only the best.

2. The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom - John Rairdin

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is in many ways less a sequel to Breath of the Wild, and more a culmination of a piece of genre re-defining game design spanning twelve years. For any minor faults, Tears of the Kingdom is still a game that manages to dwarf what many would consider one of the best games ever made. In that sense, the only criticism of Tears of the Kingdom I can really offer is that in a few areas it is still only as good as one of history's most celebrated games. And beyond those few things, is a game that invites the player to engage with it to a degree I’ve never seen before.

While Tears of the Kingdom can certainly feel derivative of its predecessor at times (the reason it fell just short of our top spot) it approaches its game design with a level of confidence that Breath of the Wild never had. This is a game that revels in you outsmarting it. Every new mechanic feels as if it is a challenge to the player, demanding that you try to break this incredible sandbox. And those mechanics don’t go away or become toned down when you enter a dungeon. Does that mean that clever use of abilities let you sequence break those dungeons? Of course, that’s arguably exactly what the game wants you to do. Add to this two new maps that more than double the size of the world and Tears of the Kingdom is a force even the Zelda team may struggle to contend with.

1. Pikmin 4 - J.P. Corbran

After ten years of waiting since the last mainline entry, Pikmin fans were treated to what is arguably the series’ best game yet. Featuring the franchise’s trademark blend of real-time strategy and action-adventure, searching for lost treasures and other travelers to rescue is great fun. With lots of areas to explore and more Pikmin types than ever, Pikmin 4 has the most depth and variety the franchise has ever seen.

Pikmin 4 takes a lot of its cues from Pikmin 2 on the GameCube, probably the least played in the series because of when it came out but my favorite of the first two. It features a more open-ended story focused on collecting treasure that lacks any real time limits with a heavy emphasis on underground caves, as Pikmin 2 did, but those ideas are much more fleshed out and polished this time around. Pikmin 4 strikes the right balance of an experience that’s gentle enough for newcomers but provides stiff challenges for experienced players who want to collect every piece of treasure and get high ranks on all the Dandori challenges that test your multitasking ability. Hopefully it’s not another decade before the series returns again, but whenever it does, Pikmin 4 is an incredibly high bar for its successor to try to top.

Honorable Mentions

• Fire Emblem: Engage
• Oxenfree 2
• F-Zero 99
• Disney Illusion Island
• Bomb Rush Cyberfunk