Top 100 / Best Indie Puzzle Games on Nintendo Switch

Grindstone

There’s nothing I like more than a surprise game that shows up, slaps you around a bit, and leaves you thirsting for mor...

GRIS

As the game starts you’ll witness the main character, Gris, losing her voice. This seems to be both literal and symbolic...

The Gardens Between

When we first saw footage of this title in one of the Nindie Directs it was already clear that the game was brilliant v...

Battle Chef Brigade Deluxe

Brigade is a game that immediately sounded appealing when I heard the premise and then delivered something truly uniq...

Untitled Goose Game

Bless indie developers and their ability to come up with weird concepts for gameplay that you probably never considered ...

PICROSS S9

While no new enhancements have been made to this flagship puzzle series, it remains as the king of its subgenre hill

Teslagrad Remastered

Taking the masterfully-made original to spruce it up a little and add some additional challenges makes a great game better

FEZ

This far into the Switch lifespan the list of outstanding top-notch indie titles that haven’t yet made it to the platfor...

There Is No Game: Wrong Dimension

OK, so typically when you see games coming over in some form from the mobile space I tend to put on my skeptic hat and p...

Shady Part of Me

There’s something pretty delightful when you encounter games that you’ve never previously heard of that, once you begin ...

Carto

Having played so many of them, unfortunately the first thing I assume I’ll see when approaching any sort of puzzle game ...

Trine 4: The Nightmare Prince

A quick admission, while I’ve always appreciated the beauty of the Trine series overall I was just never much of a fan o...

Puzzle Quest: The Legend Returns

While fans of the old school original game likely won’t even need to read this review, it’s worth noting that though som...

Slayaway Camp: Butcher's Cut

To start out in the game you’ll initially be playing the part of Skullface, a homicidal maniac determined to slaughter t...

Bridge Constructor Portal

While there have been a few different bridge construction games on the Switch I'd say this one, by far, stands out from ...

Tents and Trees

Taking the base Picross formula and adding in some extra rules and complications works out quite well here, indeed

Rob Riches

A satisfying budget puzzler that’s visually polished and constantly changes things up, while crucially properly introducing new mechanics

Railbound

Carefully plotting your rails to ensure your train will leave the station has never been so addicting

Youropa

While this gravity-defying and somewhat mind-bending 3D puzzler can be aggravating it’s also quite unique

A Monster's Expedition

One thing I’ve learned over the years as someone both on the programming end of software and on the consumer en...

Jenny LeClue - Detectivu

One of the more overall neglected flavors on the Switch has been single-player experiences I would consider to be bot...

Kine

With its challenging 3D-style puzzling and great jazz soundtrack, Kine simply has its own vibe

Death Squared

If you've felt like puzzle games have become a bit stale and predictable over the years, with many of them using ...

Piczle Lines 2: Into the Puzzleverse

While the fundamentals of the Lines experience haven’t evolved much, the addition of theming and loads of puzzles of various sizes has appeal

Timelie

While time manipulation puzzling has been done before in the indie space, there’s an element of visual polish and flair ...

Where Cards Fall

Considering the abundance of puzzle games on the casual-friendly Switch, including many from the mobile/tablet space it’...

Unbound: Worlds Apart

While they weren’t initially very well-represented on the Switch, in the past 2 years the Metroidvania genre has been th...

Bonkies

While my family and I have become quite jaded with multiplayer titles, since so many of them fall into pretty predictabl...

Dodo Peak

There’s nothing I enjoy more with indies than games that defy expectation. At first glance Dodo Peak looks like a pretty...

Biped

I first encountered Biped at PAX East, repeatedly walking by the booth on the way to other appointments and seeing small...

Wunderling

Who ever said that puzzle games had to be for casual gamers? Oh sure, Wunderling could likely be enjoyed by just about a...

Travel Mosaics: A Paris Tour

Even as consistently as indie titles have managed to surprise me, there are times when I’m almost taken aback by a title...

Tangle Tower

When there are so many point-and-click style adventures available on the Switch it pays to try to stand out. Smart puzzl...

Etherborn

The definite stand-out title of the week is Etherborn, a gorgeous, challenging, and somewhat mind-bending 3D environment...

The World Next Door

As the final credits rolled The World Next Door felt like a satisfying experience on the whole but I was also left with ...

Golf Peaks

Starting out things are pretty simple as the game walks you through the basic mechanics. For each puzzle you’ll have a n...

Baba Is You

Why settle for going the normal route and following the game’s rules to win when you can simply look for ways to change ...

Pic-a-Pix Pieces

Central to the experience are two elements. First, rather than being stuck with only filling in black pixels on a white ...

The Room

Brought over from the mobile and tablet space, which is normally a red flag for potentially mediocre titles, The Room is...

True Fear: Forsaken Souls - Part 1

Who knew that having played a number of horror-esque games on the Switch that the one that would be the most consistent ...

The Spectrum Retreat

You begin by waking in a somewhat modern-looking hotel room and are pretty quickly greeted by one of the staff, an almos...

Piczle Lines DX 500 More Puzzles!

For anyone who’d choose to try to throw shade for this being a release that does nothing more than drop more puzzles int...

Semblance

This is a title I got to check out at PAX East that definitely left me wanting more and the final product was no disappo...

FRAMED Collection

While its comic book-style presentation is clean and outstanding it’s the unusual gameplay in both Framed and its sequel...

Piczle Colors

If you’re unfamiliar this style of puzzle game centers on filling in a pixel grid with a variety of colors to create a l...

Azkend 2: The World Beneath

The greatest strength the game has is the diversity of variations it throws at you, with new wrinkles and variations in ...

Teslagrad 2

Pretty well hitting a running start continuing from the innovation of the original, Teslagrad 2 is a solid follow-up but can be finicky

Arise: A Simple Story - Definitive Edition

While my fondest memories of great Switch titles tend to focus on games that are more on the more gameplay-focused si...

Lumote: The Mastermote Chronicles

Puzzle platformers on the Switch have taken on all sorts of appearances on the Switch, but nothing has been quite lik...

Kombinera

There’s nothing like a relaxing puzzle game to take a break from the stresses of more action-based and intense ...

LEGO® Builder's Journey

The first thought people tend to have with a LEGO title is an action-oriented romp you can casually enjoy on your own...

Perchang

While Perchang isn’t terribly long I’d say it manages to deliver a unique experience that puzzle fans sho...

Tin Hearts

A charming mix of story beats and generally smart puzzles help to make this easy to appreciate… once you get going

Q.U.B.E. 10th Anniversary

Even after 10 years, the original Q.U.B.E. remains a compelling and well-built first-person puzzler

ElecHead

It’s always cool to see a new and inventive take on a puzzle platformer, and ElecHead certainly accomplishes th...

The Talos Principle: Deluxe Edition

Among the indie titles that I’ve played and loved on the PC there aren’t too many that still haven’...

Overloop

A puzzle game where it helps to have some creativity mixed with a bit of a sociopathic tendency that enjoys killing your clones

Unheard - Voices of Crime Edition

This unique take on crime solving has you moving forward and back through the scene of the crime, relying on only audio as your guide

Brightstone Mysteries: The Others

Mixing point-and-click adventure with a variety of puzzle styles, this casual title thankfully hits more than it misses

A Little to the Left

A game that will first trigger, and then satisfy, your inner OCD freak

Toodee and Topdee

What I love about indie games is their ability to make sometimes relatively small tweaks on or hybrids of well-known ...

Aspire: Ina's Tale

From an “elevator pitch” angle there’s something great about being able to cite popular and success...

Tumblestone

All said Tumblestone is a very strong contender in the action puzzler space and sets itself apart by not trying to im...

Piczle Lines DX

Piczle Lines DX is one of those games where, with the nature of its puzzle challenge, you’re either already int...

IRONCAST

Somewhat picking up the mantle from the popular Puzzle Quest series, Ironcast constructed a very compelling, though u...

Storyteller

A really cool and pretty high-concept idea that can lead to some fun and creative stories, but sometimes you can really get stuck

Backbeat

Fun, funky, and more challenging than it can look, this fresh take on a puzzle game simply does its own thing

Dorfromantik

While its name is undoubtedly odd, this very chill-but-smart puzzler delivers a unique challenge

Time Loader

When it comes to puzzle platformers the Switch has them in pretty well every shape, size, and form. That said, I can’t s...

FILMECHANISM

It’s always great to see smart puzzle games that deliver play that hasn’t been run into the ground and that provide the ...

Ghosts and Apples

Just because a puzzle game is pretty simple in its design doesn’t mean it can’t be challenging and even m...

Happy Game

Like a moth to a flame I tend to be easily drawn to the oddball titles on Switch, and there’s no doubt that Happy Game q...

Regency Solitaire

You’ve got to respect a development team that takes on a well-known casual card game and decides to swing for the fences...

A Little Golf Journey

Part golf game, part puzzler, A Little Golf Journey is hard to put in a pre-defined box. Rather than being dominated wit...

The Lightbringer

Certainly there are plenty of 3D action platformers on the Switch, and they take a variety of forms from intense to more...

Unavowed

When you think of the classic point-and-click adventure title visions of classics from LucasArts with their signature se...

Willy Morgan and the Curse of Bone Town

The point-and-click adventure has been around since roughly forever and the sort of renaissance the genre has enjoyed ov...

Smelter

Appropriately named, as it combines elements of multiple styles of gaming, Smelter is a game that defies a simple explan...

TOHU

Right out of the gate I was honestly a bit nervous with the look and feel of TOHU, concerned that it would go firmly dow...

Nine Witches: Family Disruption

Walking into the Nine Witches experience I hadn’t seen enough about the game to know what I was in for. It turned out th...

Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty

While the Switch has had some entries from the Oddworld series that have dabbled in a variety of styles of play, most of...

Projection: First Light

I’ll admit that simply seeing this game for the first time I pretty well fell in love, completely digging the unusual ae...

Radical Rabbit Stew

If you’re looking to make a splash on the Switch eShop who can resist some cute killer bunnies mixed with very accessibl...

Ministry of Broadcast

Harkening back to earlier days with a gameplay style reminiscent of the likes of classics like Prince of Persia, Ministr...

Hidden Through Time

If you’ve ever had kids or were a kid at some point you may recall the Where’s Waldo books. Given a dense...

Depixtion

While for many years the Picross series has sat safely at the top of its own puzzle kingdom, seeing threats from other c...

Agent A: A puzzle in disguise

Puzzle fans have both a blessing and a curse when it comes to the Switch. Let’s just say that there’s an abundance of ri...

Milkmaid of the Milky Way

When it comes to adventure games, the Switch is very well (and possibly too well) represented. The good news tied to tha...

FAR: Lone Sails

This is one of those titles where I walked into the experience not really knowing much about it, being surprised by it b...

The Vanishing of Ethan Carter

When a game starts up showing a warning that establishes it isn’t meant to hold your hand I’ll admit my “Ruh Roh Raggy” ...

Hue

With an abundance of puzzlers available on the Switch it is taking more and more effort to come up with ways to stand ou...

Death Coming

If you’ve got a bit of a sick streak this game absolutely delivers great moments that will make you break out your most ...

Q.U.B.E. 2

Obviously having drawn inspiration from the likes of Portal, blending a very clean aesthetic style with smart puzzles an...

Glass Masquerade

The first thing that makes these puzzles a bit more challenging is that you don’t go in with any idea what they look lik...

My Memory of Us

Overall, this is yet another great visually-impressive puzzle adventure to add to the Switch library. The art and the na...

When Ski Lifts Go Wrong

While the system has a number of bridge building physics games, this one takes that general premise and does some new th...

Koloro

You’ll play the game as Kora, a young girl who is trying to find and save her sister. Once the action begins she’ll just...

ABZU

Moving a bit further into the abstract you have Abzu, a game that relates the framework of a story with no words and tha...

Bendy and the Ink Machine

Since there haven’t been a ton of games in this vein on the Switch to date if you’re a fan of some scares and a sense of...

Tricky Towers

Offering up a mix of iconic tetronimoes with a tower-building mechanic and some real concerns with gravity and your crea...

Nindie Spotlight