9 “Mature” Games We’d Like To See On The New N64 Nintendo Switch Online App

Image: Nintendo Life

The arrival of Rareware’s classic Perfect Dark and Acclaim’s Turok: Dinosaur Hunter via the Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack was a very welcome announcement at the June 2024 Nintendo Direct. Both titles are the first entries in a new standalone Nintendo N64 app labeled ‘MATURE 17+’.

Following on from the Japanese version that launched when GoldenEye hit the service in 2023, the app will be an “adults only” repository for all M-rated games with blood, language, or other naughtiness deemed inappropriate for younger audiences by the ESRB. players. In the case of Perfect Dark and Turoka, it’s the blood and violence that sets them apart from the other family-friendly N64 games on NSO.

Of course, this opens the door for more adult-only N64 games, so we’ve compiled a selection we’d like to see on Nintendo Switch Online. As you will see, not all of them are cool classics, but we argue that NSO is perhaps the best and most convenient place for games that you wouldn’t spend money on, but are still interesting in some way and worth exploring. Very few people would buy a stand-alone version of, say, Winback, but as part of a service you’re already paying for, it might charm you.

It should also be noted that several games below have already have been ported to the Switch. However, as evidenced by Turok’s arrival, that doesn’t stop them from being added to the expansion pack, and we’d still appreciate having “free” access to them. We left out Quakes and Doom 64, but couldn’t resist adding more.

Let’s start with the most obvious and famous “mature” game in the N64 library…

Look, we’re not suggesting this is going to trouble any list of the best N64 games, but Ion Storm’s FPS is a curiosity worth exploring, and not just for its infamous “John Romero is going to make you . . .” marketing. The title blade was apparently inspired by Zelda’s master sword, and the main character, Hiro Miyamoto, was of course a tribute to Nintendo’s most famous design guru, Eiji Aonuma.

What!? I just checked you were awake.

The thing is, despite the game’s reputation as an actual steamship, there is a purpose, history, and legacy to Daikatana that make it scientifically interesting for video game lovers. It is perfect a candidate for NSO release in our opinion. We’d also like to see a Game Boy Color version.

Duke Nukem 3D came to the N64 as the imaginatively renamed Duke Nukem 64, but 1999’s Zero Hour was a Nintendo console exclusive and a game we’d like to see more available, mainly because we never got around to playing it ourselves.

Again, by all accounts, we’re not looking at the classics here, but Eurocom’s third-person spin on the Duke’s M-rated escapades has always been on our If-we-see-it-cheap list of old ones. We never did, so please put it on NSO.

Resident Evil 2 is, in a sense, where the modern series as we know it began. The first game was terrifying, but the original version’s production values—with its cheesy FMV sequences and questionable dialogue—placed it in the realm of the direct-to-video horror genre. This would tie in with REmake again, but Resident Evil 2 upped the ante considerably in every way, creating the look and feel that the series has adopted ever since.

The Nintendo 64 version of the PlayStation classic is a technically incredible port in its own right, with the GameCube version being sharper but arguably less interesting. Due to absence original Resident Evils on Switch feels like the perfect opportunity for NSO to showcase this.

Another curio that scratches a similar itch to Doom 64, Hexen also arrived on a Nintendo console in 1997 with a sensible port that had the usual cartridge-based caveats (no FMV or CD-style audio). It offers a decent take on a Doom-esque shooter with a fantasy theme, although with GoldenEye arriving just a few months later and completely disrupting the FPS scene on consoles, Hexen was destined to be overlooked, even with a library as minuscule as N64. .

All these years later we jumped at the chance to give it another go.

The N64 wasn’t blessed with many fighting games – and very few good or great ones – so we’d love to pick up a Mortal Kombat or two. Trilogy was a decent summation of all the MKs up to that point (1996), albeit with a few caveats such as missing characters and worse sound quality on the N64. Mortal Kombat 4 offered a more modern and satisfyingly terrifying chase ride two years later.

Mythology: Sub-Zero? To supplement, sure. But it’s not the one we’d pick first. Or the other one.

This 1998 FPS has been remastered courtesy of Nightdive Studios (who else?), but has yet to make its way to the Switch. You pilot a hoverbike with full 360-degree movement, so while the Forsaken is technical first-person shooter, that label might give modern gamers the wrong idea if you’re expecting a guy running around with a gun. Set in a dystopian future, you fly around underground tunnels and shoot scavengers to the accompaniment of drum and bass. It’s not forever, but there’s plenty to like.

Remaster Switch by Nightdive (is something that studio doesn’t have remastered?) is a great way to play, but for a game as undeniably old as this, the asking price of ‘Has an NSO Expansion Pack sub’ is perhaps the best way to get new players to try this dark and obtuse gem. Michael LeRoi (the titular Man o’ Shadow) comes from the same team that developed the 64-bit Forsaken – and is based on the Valiant Comics series – and has a vast and disturbing world to explore, and the lily-livered among us would be grateful. to have rescued states that we can rely on to do so.

Did we miss anything you’d like to see on Switch? Let us know your favorite adult-only N64 games from the list above in this poll, and comment below if you like something else.

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