Spring is here and so is the next edition of eShop Selects.
This time, we’re looking at the best hidden gems — as voted on by the Nintendo Life staff — with a separate Reader’s Choice poll for March’s eShop releases. You will see the winner of the latter at the bottom of the article.
We’ve been testing Readers’ Choice for several months now, and for April’s eShop Selects, we’ll be changing the way we post Readers’ Choice voting. Instead, we’ll be sharing the poll with the eShop Selects post instead of before.
Ahh, anyway, let’s go into action, shall we?
Honorable mentions
The reviews were pouring out of our ears this month despite it being “quieter”. What is quiet release month in 2024 huh? This time we included games that we scored 7/10 or higher in the staff poll; here’s what didn’t make the top three.
Nintendo Life Honorable Mentions
Speed to the opponent Sonic and corresponding transformations Mega man, Berserk Boy presents the retro 2D style platforming and shooting we’ve been pushing for all the time. Achieving that 16-bit aesthetic, Berserk Boy is delightfully fun and replayable, blending traditional SNES platforming with some throwback Metroidvania. It launched in early March, and we highly recommend checking it out if you haven’t already — we rated it 8/10 in our review.
The second game in the Digital Eclipse Gold Master series, Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story is an incredible compilation and a history lesson on one of the most unique figures in the industry today. We’re still in love with the idea of these interactive documentaries that let you play the games and learn about the people behind them. Your have play these games as you go through Minter’s life because it’s a pleasure to follow the development of these games in order. We gave Llamasoft a 9/10 in our review. A gold star, indeed.
Drill Dozer fans, wherever you are — you need to check out the Pepper Grinder. This kind of spiritual sequel is full of charm, color and personality, packed with fantastic level design and unique mechanics where you play as a pirate exploring the world with your drill. If this sounds even remotely fun to you, then you better head over to the eShop and check out the demo. We could also take twice as many levels, or a sequel, or something else from this unique platformer. The Pepper Grinder drills and strikes gold, and we’ve awarded it a 9/10 in our review. It’s a more than worthy winner in our eShop Selects staff poll this month.
eShop chooses a reader’s choice winner (March 2024)
WINNER: Death Trick: Double Blind
Lots and lots of games got your votes this month, but the clear winner of the Readers’ Choice poll is the game that was featured at last year’s Indie World Showcase — Death Trick: Double Blind. Winning with 17% of the vote, Death Trick sees you switch between two different perspectives to help solve a circus mystery.
Lots of other games are tied for second place — several bundled re-releases — but the two that stuck with us are two blockbusters that are both on Steam and have proven hits with readers.
Readers’ honorable mentions
< Nintendo eShop Selects - February 2024
How we decide that our eShop chooses the top three: As we come to the end of each month, the Nintendo Life staff votes on their favorite titles from a list of games selected by the editorial team. To qualify for this list, these games must have been released only as a digital Nintendo Switch eShop title in that particular month and must have been reviewed on Nintendo Life; we select qualifying games based on their ratings.
Staff are then asked to vote for the three games they think deserve to be at the very top of that list; the first choice gets 3 points, the second choice gets 2 points, and the third choice gets 1 point. Those votes are then tallied to create a top three list, with the overall winner claiming that month’s top prize.
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