10 Most Anticipated Nintendo Switch 2 Games Releasing in October 2026

The Nintendo Switch 2 has already had an incredibly busy 2026, but October is by far one of the more interesting months the console has seen so far, simply because the lineup is so diverse. There are several RPGs coming to the Switch 2 throughout the month, including a brand-new Final Fantasy and an expanded version of Dragon’s Dogma 2, but horror fans are also getting quite a bit to choose from with Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival and Hell Is Us. Then, right in the middle of all of that, Call of Duty is finally returning to Nintendo hardware after being gone for well over a decade.

There are also a few games here that probably won’t have the same name recognition as something like Kingdom Hearts or Call of Duty, but that doesn’t necessarily make them any less interesting. Echo Weaver is taking a very different approach to Metroidvania progression, while ANOMALITH looks like it could be one of the more distinctive Switch 2 games releasing in October. Add Nintendo’s own Nintendo Switch Sports Resort to the mix, and October 2026 really does seem to have a little bit of everything. So, without further ado, here are 10 of the most anticipated Switch 2 games releasing throughout October.

1

Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival

Release Date: October 8, 2026

It almost feels a little too appropriate that Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival is arriving at the beginning of October, because there probably aren’t many franchises better suited for the weeks leading up to Halloween. The first-person survival horror game follows Aidan Lynch as he searches for his girlfriend, Sunny, after she is taken into the Labyrinth, which naturally puts him in the path of Pinhead and the Cenobites. Clive Barker himself has also been involved with the project, so this isn’t simply a game borrowing the Hellraiser name and hoping the license does most of the work for it.

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What makes Hellraiser: Revival a little more interesting is that its monsters don’t seem to be enemies that players can simply unload a magazine into and call it good. Ammunition and other resources are limited, and while Aidan does have access to firearms, melee weapons, and supernatural abilities tied to the Genesis Configuration, survival still seems to be the main point here. There are plenty of horror games that eventually become action games once players have enough weapons, so it will be interesting to see whether Hellraiser: Revival can keep the Cenobites feeling threatening all the way through.

2

Echo Weaver

Release Date: October 8, 2026

At first glance, Echo Weaver might look like yet another Metroidvania arriving on a Nintendo platform that already has a vast sea filled with them, but its approach to progression is a little different from what the genre normally does. The game is built around a time loop, and instead of every obstacle being solved by finding some new ability that suddenly lets the player double-jump or break a specific wall, much of the progression comes from simply learning more about how the world works. A path that seems completely inaccessible during one loop might not actually require a new power at all once the player knows what to do.

Time itself also plays into that idea, because it isn’t just something that resets whenever a loop ends. Players can actually spend it to heal or open certain paths, which means every decision has the potential to affect how much time is left before everything starts over again. Echo Weaver certainly isn’t the first game to build itself around repeating the same stretch of time, but combining that idea with a Metroidvania could make exploration feel quite a bit different than simply walking back to every locked door once a new ability has been unlocked.

3

Kingdom Hearts Collection [I-III]

Release Date: October 8, 2026

The Kingdom Hearts Collection [I-III] is obviously made up of games that have already been around for years, but its Switch 2 release is still a pretty big deal considering how Kingdom Hearts was handled on the original Switch. Most of the series arrived there through cloud versions, meaning Nintendo players technically had access to games like Kingdom Hearts 3, but only as long as their internet connection was willing to cooperate. For a series people can easily spend dozens upon dozens of hours working through, that was never exactly an ideal solution.

Switch 2 is finally fixing that by bringing native versions of the mainline Kingdom Hearts games to Nintendo hardware. The collection includes Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 + 2.5 ReMIX, Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue, and Kingdom Hearts 3 + Re Mind, so there is a ridiculous amount of Kingdom Hearts packed into one release. The series’ story is still every bit as complicated as its reputation suggests, mind you, but at least Switch 2 players can now work through it without having to worry about whether their internet connection is going to hold up.

4

Dragon’s Dogma 2: Dark Arisen

Release Date: October 9, 2026

Dragon’s Dogma 2: Dark Arisen could have simply been Dragon’s Dogma 2 finally making its way to Switch 2, and that probably would have been enough to make its October 9 release worth it for fans of the game who have been waiting to play it on a handheld console. Instead, Capcom is bringing an expanded version of the open-world RPG to the system, with a brand-new snowy region called Norgan serving as one of the biggest additions. There is also a new storyline involving Eir and the Fallen Dragon, so returning players aren’t just getting the same adventure they already played on another platform.

Norgan also seems like it was designed to lean even further into the kind of exploration Dragon’s Dogma 2 was already built around. Players can head out on expeditions, recover relics, and then have those relics appraised for new weapons and skills, while additional challenge dungeons give the endgame more to work with as well. Dragon’s Dogma 2 already had a habit of rewarding players for wandering away from the beaten path just to see what was there, and Dark Arisen appears to be giving that philosophy an entirely new region to work with.

5

Tales of Eternia Remastered

Release Date: October 16, 2026

Tales of Eternia Remastered is bringing back an RPG that hasn’t exactly been easy to play on modern hardware, especially in North America. Originally released there as Tales of Destiny 2, despite not actually being the same game as the real Tales of Destiny 2, Eternia follows Reid Hershel and his companions as they travel between Inferia and Celestia in an attempt to stop the two worlds from colliding. It is very much a product of an older era of Tales, but that is also probably a large part of the appeal here.

Thankfully, Bandai Namco doesn’t appear to be changing the things that made Tales of Eternia what it was just to make it feel more modern. Its 2D combat is still intact, while features like adjustable encounter rates and destination markers are there to smooth out some of the friction that can make older RPGs more difficult to return to now. Players can even switch back to the original graphics and sound effects if they want something closer to the classic experience, so this looks less like an attempt to redesign Eternia and more like an effort to make it easier to actually play in 2026.

6

Final Fantasy Resonance

Release Date: October 22, 2026

There has been a lot of debate over what Final Fantasy should look like in the modern era, especially now that the mainline series has spent so much time moving away from traditional turn-based combat. Final Fantasy Resonance seems to be answering that question by going in almost the complete opposite direction. It is a brand-new game rather than a remake, but just about everything shown so far is clearly pulling from the series’ past, right down to its HD-2D visuals and its renewed focus on things like crystals and espers.

The combat is turn-based as well, although Resonance isn’t simply pretending the last few decades of RPG design never happened. Exploiting weaknesses can stagger enemies and give the party additional turns, while the Vision system allows characters from throughout Final Fantasy history to assist in battle. There is obviously no replacing the older games for anyone who specifically wants that era of Final Fantasy back, but Resonance doesn’t really need to do that. It just needs to prove there is still plenty of room for a brand-new Final Fantasy built around the ideas the series once left behind.

7

Nintendo Switch Sports Resort

Release Date: October 22, 2026

Nintendo Switch Sports Resort is obviously trying to bring back some of what made Wii Sports Resort so special, and honestly, that probably isn’t a bad place for Nintendo to start. The original Nintendo Switch Sports already proved there was still an audience for this kind of game, but it never really had the same personality that Wii Sports Resort did, largely because Spocco Square felt more like a place the sports happened to take place in than somewhere worth getting attached to. Nintendo Switch Sports Resort seems to be addressing that by putting much more emphasis on the island itself, which could be just as important as whatever new sports Nintendo has added this time around.

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That’s especially true when things like Skateboarding, Power Cruising, and Prop Plane are taken into account, because those activities actually give players a reason to experience the island beyond whatever court or field they happen to be playing on. Wii Sports Resort made Wuhu Island memorable because players kept seeing different sides of it, to the point that the setting eventually became just as recognizable as some of the sports themselves. If Nintendo Switch Sports Resort can get anywhere close to that again, the island could do a lot of the work that Nintendo Switch Sports was missing. The sports obviously still matter, but making the place around them feel like somewhere players actually want to spend time might be what gives this sequel an identity of its own.

8

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4

Release Date: October 23, 2026

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 coming to Switch 2 is a pretty big deal before even getting into what the game itself is doing, simply because Call of Duty hasn’t had a presence on Nintendo hardware in well over a decade. Nintendo players have watched one Call of Duty after another come and go without a version of their own, so seeing Modern Warfare 4 launch on Switch 2 alongside the other platforms already makes this release feel different. More importantly, this isn’t some completely separate version of the game made just so Call of Duty can technically exist on Nintendo hardware again. Switch 2 is getting the full release, which is really where things start to get interesting.

After all, getting Call of Duty onto Switch 2 is one thing, but getting it onto Switch 2 without making the system feel like the obvious compromise is another matter entirely. Activision has said this version was developed natively for the hardware, so there isn’t a cloud version standing between the player and the game, and that alone gives it a much better foundation than some of the bigger third-party releases the original Switch received. Still, Modern Warfare 4 is exactly the kind of game that can show how far Nintendo’s hardware has actually come. If a series this technically demanding can feel at home on Switch 2 rather than merely functional there, its October 23 release could end up mattering well beyond Call of Duty itself.

9

Hell Is Us

Release Date: October 27, 2026

There is something immediately appealing about how little Hell Is Us seems interested in telling the player exactly what to do, especially when so many modern games seem terrified of the possibility that someone might be lost for more than a few seconds. The game takes place in a country already devastated by civil war, and the supernatural creatures that have begun appearing there only make an already hostile place feel even more difficult to understand. But rather than covering that world in objective markers to make navigating it easier, Hell Is Us expects players to actually pay attention to what is happening around them and work things out from there.

And really, that might be the thing that makes Hell Is Us more interesting than anything else it is doing. Getting lost in a game isn’t always fun, of course, and there is a pretty enormous difference between a world that encourages players to observe it and one that simply does a poor job of explaining where they need to go. Still, there is something refreshing about a game being willing to trust the player enough to not immediately provide the answer. Hell Is Us wants its world to be something that has to be understood rather than simply crossed, and if the environment itself is good enough to support that kind of exploration, not knowing exactly where to go might actually become part of what makes moving through it so satisfying.

10

ANOMALITH

Release Date: October 28, 2026

ANOMALITH is one of those games that almost seems to get weirder the more there is to learn about it, which is probably part of what makes it so interesting in the first place. It follows 17-year-old Diver Reona Minazuki as she heads into Anomaly Zones in search of a missing friend, and these places aren’t simply dangerous because of the creatures waiting inside them. Reality itself has started going wrong there, to the point that moving through an area can feel just as unfamiliar as whatever Reona is being asked to fight. That alone gives ANOMALITH a really strong identity, because the world isn’t just there to hold everything together. Rather, it actually feels like part of the problem.

The more ANOMALITH explores that idea, the more interesting it gets. Reona isn’t just walking into these zones to see what’s there and then heading home once the fighting is over, because whatever she finds only really matters if she can make it back out with it. Her Anomalization abilities also seem to grow naturally out of the same strange world she’s exploring, rather than feeling like some completely separate system layered on top of it. There is still quite a bit about ANOMALITH that hasn’t been fully shown yet, but honestly, that’s probably for the best with a game like this. Half of the appeal seems to be entering a place where nothing feels quite right and slowly figuring out what the game is even capable of throwing at you next.