Nintendo has revealed four new games coming to Nintendo Switch Online’s Game Boy library today, May 23. They are Kirby Star Stacker, Survival Kids, Gradius: The Interstellar Assault, and The Sword of Hope.
Kirby Star Stacker is the highest-profile addition. Originally released by HAL Laboratory in 1997, it is a puzzle game with gameplay similar to Tetris Attack or Pokemon Puzzle League. Players have to match blocks that look like Rick, Coo, and Kine from Kirby’s Dream Land 2. The Super Famicom version of this game came to Nintendo Switch Online in 2023, but now the original release also has a place as part of Nintendo’s subscription service.
Survival Kids is another notable inclusion this month because it’s a Konami franchise about to be reimagined for Nintendo Switch 2. The original Survival Kids is a cult classic that tasks players with surviving on a deserted island. If you enjoy modern survival games, they owe a lot to games like Survival Kids that helped trailblaze some of the genre’s mechanics. While the Nintendo Switch 2 version of Survival Kids looks like a lighthearted, cooperative reinterpretation of the series’ formula, it’s nice to have the rare Game Boy original available through Switch Online now.
Game Boy enthusiasts will also enjoy the other two games coming to Nintendo Switch Online. Gradius: The Interstellar Assault is a solid Game Boy version of Konami’s classic arcade shoot ’em up. Meanwhile, The Sword of Hope is an ambitious but lesser-known RPG for Nintendo’s handheld console.
Kirby Star Stacker, Survival Kids, Gradius: The Interstellar Assault, and The Sword of Hope all now available to play through Nintendo Switch Online.