I’m willing to bet that absolutely no one expected a sequel to the 1999 Game Boy Colour game, Survival Kids to be a Nintendo Switch 2 launch title, but here we are. Survival Kids is a semi-time trial puzzle game that pushes you to get your base from one end of a course to the other and escape, all while solving puzzles along the way to be able to progress. It’s like Portal, just without the access to a portal gun… or a really good friend in Companion Cube. Luckily, I was able to refresh myself on the games twenty-six year old original as it’s on Nintendo Switch Online, and oh boy did this need the update into the modern generation.

Cooking some Clam Bam Chowder.

I would say to no one’s surprise, but based on some of the unoriginal hate for the Switch 2 maybe some people will be surprised, Survival Kids looks infinitely better than its Game Boy counterpart. The jump to 3D gives a much bigger playground to create and experience puzzles, and just simply, obviously, looks more appealing. This also makes playing with friends much easier as it’s obvious who’s who. Additionally, having the ability to adjust your character’s appearance helps distinguish yourself along the way.

Getting all six stars is not the easiest.

While the puzzles generally aren’t too difficult, the real treat is finding and understanding how to collect the various collectibles through each level. These are not mandatory in any way, but do add a lot to the experience of playing and replaying levels, on top of obviously trying to get a gold time on each level of course. These can be hidden on various islands making you understand how to collect them when you can’t jump with them, or just simply hidden in areas that may seem inaccessible.

The main part of Survival Kids is scavenging and building. Need to get up a wall? Some vines and wood will build you a net that you can climb. Is the wall too high, are you running out of stamina? Food solves that problem, just cook some berries at your base. When going for a fast time, it becomes a risk vs reward on how much food you choose to cook. You will have more stamina to carry things at full speed or run longer, but it will take longer to cook. The stamina boost also isn’t permanent through the level, it will slowly deplete back to its original state as time passes. This creates an interesting balance and problem solving along the way, especially when playing with others.

Mine rocks, get rocks, build with rocks.

The music is cute and fitting to Survival Kids  having quite a tropical feel to it, and the Lighthouse Keeper has a great voice actor, who’s information I am unfortunately unable to find anywhere to give proper credit to. Your actual character’s voice I find very grating though, all sounding like someone is making noises in a baby voice, and there’s not a lot of variation to the different “voice lines,” for lack of a better phrase.

Fastest way to build a bridge? Throw stuff.

Overall there’s quite a lot of fun to be had with Survival Kids whether it’s solo or with friends. It’s a lot less frustrating than something like Overcooked to play with your significant other, but it’s a bit more of a “game” so it might take them longer to comprehend exactly what to do and how to play, but still a better option for these kinds of relationships than something like Split Fiction. 

Survival Kids is available now on Nintendo Switch 2

Reviewed on Nintendo Switch 2

A copy of Survival Kids was provided by the publisher.