Best Survival Games On Switch You Should Not Miss

Survival games on Switch deliver a beautiful world to explore, stories to unravel, and resources to craft. Nintendo Switch has brought Hardcore to lighthearted survival in portable consoles so that you can experience the best survival games on the go. Besides Switch, very few have brought the experience of playing all the awesome survival games anywhere and anytime. 

Living on the edge while gathering resources and crafting useful items makes sense of discovery in survival games an amazing experience. With Nintendo Switch, you can always spare some time during work or at the line to grind on resources and build items. 

Best Survival Games on Switch

While Minecraft is one of the best survival game players know and love, I decided to list some new survival games on Switch as the gaming industry is bursting with survival games bringing new content to the genre. Experience the best survival games with the inclusion of hardcore permadeath and captivating stories on Nintendo Switch. 

The Long Dark

The game is the absolute best regarding progressive storytelling and continuing basic survival instincts out in the frozen land of Canada. The Long Dark has some amazing visuals, although its art style is somewhat abstract and has simplified aesthetics. 

Your plane has crashed in the frozen tundra of a snowy mountain, and from there, your journey begins. The game heavily relies on survival, as you can die of cold in less than five minutes if you don’t light up the fire for warmth. You get hungry and have to hunt down rabbits and wolves to survive. Here, you are at the mercy of mother nature as you explore the sandbox of cold Canadian terrain. 

New contents are added on each update, and an amazing story mode progression will keep you inverted for hours. The Long Dark is an ultimate survival game for Nintendo Switch. 

Subnautica

First, it might seem like a horror game, and you might consider Subnautica as a horror game too because you are diving into unknown depths and discovering weird and creepy creatures. And who can forget the monstrous creature called leviathan?

After your spaceship crashes onto the planet covered in ocean, you are to survive on the unknown sea filled with alien fish and extraterrestrial life forms. Collect resources to build better equipment and vehicles to discover the mysteries of the alien planet.

Along with the survival aspect, you will also find strange alien technology that will help you flesh out the origins. 

The game is best experienced with headphones as you get to hear strange creatures’ ominous voices under muted water. Underwater survival games cannot get as immersive and horrifying as Subnautica. 

Don’t Starve

You are left in this randomly generated world; from there, you are completely on your own to survive.

 The open world is more like a sandbox where you can experiment with the environment to your advantage, but things might go out of control and kill you. Working with unpredictable nature as you gather resources is particularly interesting and can result in surprising outcomes.

The world of Don’t Starve is set in dark and mystical in a muted but comical art style that feels like the game inspired by H.P. Lovecraft novels. 

Unravel the mysteries of a strange demonic world where you encounter dangerous surprises along the way. Pave your own path by crafting weapons and hunting down monsters. 

This War of Mine Complete edition

This War of Mine tells the stories of civilians who are victimized by the spoils of war. The game is a perfect portrait of survival simulation with human emotion as the player has to decide the choice between greed and humanity. It’s not a simple task as you get drained with emotional attachments. 

The games mix the balance of survival and management aspects as the resources get scarce and people die due to hunger. The decision falls on you to sacrifice some civilians for the survival of others. This War of Mine presents the bitter side of war where civilians survive on limited resources. As the Stories season pass, you can experience some heart wrenching tale of people surviving in the besieged city of war. 

A personal journey of your survival characters and how you play to impact the whole survival aspect. One of the strong points in This War of Mine is the humane aspect where you will care about each of the characters you let in and the group’s needs.

Green Hell

Green Hell puts you in the Amazonian rainforest, where you are separated from your partner and go on a mission to find her. It’s an insanely difficult survival game as a small cut on your foot might kill you from infection if it is not treated in time.

Portraying the real-life simulation, collecting resources, and crafting items are made more focused on the real-world experience from the first person view. You can also use one resource for various purposes just by thinking logically. The game is frustratingly hardcore for veterans and newcomers alike.

You die several times by eating poisonous food or ignoring leech sucking the blood out of your body, or by hunger. Your current level of nutrition and hydration is displayed on the wrist watch making a more realistic approach. Failing to meet the necessary nutrition and water will also kill you. 

If you are really into a realistic survival game that challenges every formidable force of nature from a poisonous plant, wild animals, and hostile tribes. In that case, Green Hell will provide the experience of immersion you crave. 

Dying Light

Dying Light is a Survival Horror game where you play in a first-person mode, parkouring around the open world environment called Harran and old town. The horror aspect comes from the horrifying zombies scattered around the world.  

You play as undercover agent called Kyle Crane sent to the zombies-infested city to investigate the root of all causes. Zombies might be slow during day time but act very aggressive during the night. The game provides various ways to destroy a total of fifteen zombies with their own monstrous features.

From destructive melee weapons to abilities, Dying Light shines on creating engaging and innovative combat systems. Explore the environment, collect blueprints, and craft the weapons of your choice to kill hordes of zombies in this ultimate zombie survival game of Dying Light. 

Sons of the Forest

Welcome to the Sons of the Forest, where enemies are as intelligent as they are creepy. You are sent to find a missing billionaire on a hellish island filled with cannibal tribes and strange humanoid creatures. 

The game is a survival simulator with a whole lot of terrifying aspects, as cabalistic tribes are smart enough to ambush and gank you in a matter of time if you are not careful enough. You can either play alone or with friends who will help you survive in this open forest inhabitant by horrifying mutant creatures.

Defend your base by the fort and crafting various weapons. But be aware because your enemies are smarter and retrieve on the sight of hostility and will approach according to your behavior. 

Explore the dark caves and discover various items to advance further into the game. The inevitable hunger might also turn into cannibalism when you have to eat the flesh of mutant creatures. The game has many dark turns set in the luscious green forest, so build a base and defend yourself against cannibalistic creatures.  

The Survivalists

The Survivalists is a top-down pixel art survival game that feels more like a cross between Stardew valley and Terreria but make no mistake because this game has a lot more to offer to survival players, from collecting and crafting to dungeon crawling features. 

The world is brimmed with dangerous animals, hidden secrets, monkeys to train, and, of course, resources to collect. The nice little feature added in the Survivalist is the monkeys that you can train to gather resources.

 It’s really helpful as training monkeys to do specific tasks will reduce the amount of time invested in grinding. Along with exploring the beautiful island, dwelling deep into the dungeon makes the game so adventurous. And for the best, you can also discover legendary weapons to easily kill some of the wild beasts. 

Your ultimate goal is to find the deserted ship and repair it to sail back home but before that, enjoy the vast island filled with hidden treasures. 

Crashlands

Your space is crashed into a mysterious planet filled with hostile creatures. Your goal is to repair your ship and fly back to your home planet but not before you build yourself a safe base against hostile creatures.

The dialogue between you and the juice box results in some funny moments that keep the pace of the storyline light to its core. The story progresses with exploration where you find wise aliens who will help you way back home and also encounter bosses. 

Although it’s a 2D top-down game focused on exploration and survival, the world is also the home of many alien creatures that you can tame and evolve. You can pet such animals and harvest them for your own purpose. Go out on an adventure collecting eggs and making your ultimate pet to bring them into battle against deadly bosses. 

Frostpunk

Frostpunk mixes the survival genre with city building and resource management, where you have to build infrastructures to meet the demand of citizens. Set in the post-apocalyptic world where only hope remains in the steampunk society frozen in the depth of snow. Your task is to keep the hopes of citizens by keeping humanity alive in the stressful society. 

Frostpunk delivers a great deal of satisfaction after overcoming the challenging resource management aspect of the game. It is by no mean an easy game as people are constantly demanding basic needs to survive.

The game keeps you on your toes by providing hard decisions that can question your morality. What you choose will ultimately result in gameplay progression. 

Subnautica: Below Zero

If you have completed Subnautica and crave more, Below Zero will provide you with whole new areas to explore, vehicles to build, and a story to unravel. 

Although the game is not as terrifying as its previous predecessor, Below Zero has some new content, including a huge snowy biome with many hidden secrets outside the surface of the water. The game also does a remarkable job by giving varieties under water.

You can find some serious abandoned technology that tells the story through audio logs like its prequel. The game has everything Subnautica fans wanted along with the quality of life changes, such as larger storage in small vehicles like seamoths.   

Alien: Isolation

An atmospheric horror game where you have to survive against the alien called Xenomorph. It’s an exhilarating experience where you have to navigate through claustrophobic spacecraft, hiding from the inevitable aliens that will kill you on sight. 

You basically rely on stealth by sneaking into the vents or hiding inside the cabin when an alien approaches. The intense feeling of Xenomorph lurking around the corner makes the survival horror game paranoid.

Later during progression, you will obtain weapons such as a revolver, shotgun, flamethrower, and stun baton, but nothing can kill the indestructible Xenomorph; your only way to survive is to distract it and hide from it. 

Relive the intense and fearful movie moments by concealing yourself against the terrifying aliens in this true survival horror game of Alien: Isolation. 

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Breath of the wild is truly a spectacular game that comprises the survival aspect of open-world sandbox adventure. The feeling of survival comes from the moment you are introduced to the open land of the Great Plateau. From there, you are given nothing but the sense of basic instinct to survive. 

The game consists of a nonlinear story that can be approached in any way you like. The main emphasis is given to world-building, where you can craft various potions, cook delicious dishes and collect a bunch of powerful weapons and gears to aid you on your journey.

Just like any other survival game, BOTW consists of weather that affects your health. Eating the right food and wearing proper clothing will mitigate the weather effects.  The world of BOTW is filled with wonders, and the game is also more forgiving than other survival games.