Ravenswatch brings its twisted fairy tales to Switch 2, free for players who already own it

Ravenswatch begins from a deliciously cruel premise: the heroes of the stories we were told at bedtime have been poisoned by the very dreams that made them. Little Red Riding Hood carries a curse of lycanthropy, Sun Wukong is a fallen monkey king, the Snow Queen turns her coldness into a weapon, and all of them are drafted by a secret order to hold back a Nightmare that is swallowing the realm of Reverie. Passtech Games, the studio near Lyon behind Curse of the Dead Gods, built its second roguelike on that inversion. Now it is bringing the whole thing to the handheld that can finally run it the way it was drawn.

Publisher Nacon has confirmed that Ravenswatch is coming to Nintendo Switch 2, and the pitch is less a port than a correction. By the studio’s own comparison, the original Switch version was the compromise; the new one promises sharper textures, a Full HD image and a stable sixty frames per second. That last figure is the one that matters in a game where reading a boss’s tell a fraction too late ends the run.

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It also arrives complete. The Switch 2 edition gathers every content update released since launch and all nine DLCs, among them three extra heroes, Romeo, Juliet and Merlin, who extend the game’s habit of lifting characters out of Shakespeare and Arthurian legend and asking what darkness they were hiding. Players who already own Ravenswatch on the first Switch get the upgrade for free, a welcome decision at a time when several Switch 2 Editions, Nintendo’s own among them, come with a fee. The physical release carries the full package on the cartridge.

The move makes sense on a design level, too. Each run is compressed into three in-game days and three nights: you level up, choose talents, chase side activities across a randomly generated map, then face the chapter boss when you feel ready, or when the clock decides for you. That shape, tense and self-contained, suits a machine you pick up for half an hour on a train. The roster now stands at 13 heroes, with more than 250 talents and 50 magical items to combine, four difficulty levels and custom modes. Online co-op supports up to four players with cross-play, so a Switch 2 squad can join friends on PC or other consoles.

Passtech made its name with Curse of the Dead Gods, a solitary descent through cursed temples. Ravenswatch kept that density of combat but opened it to friends and wrapped it in comic-book dark fantasy, with maps drawn from enchanted forests and marshes, One Thousand and One Nights and the Arthurian cycle.

Ravenswatch arrives on Nintendo Switch 2 on December 10 outside North America and on December 18 in North America. It is already available on PC, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One and the original Switch, in its full release since 2024.

The Nightmare, it seems, travels well. Now it fits in a bag.

Tags: Nintendo Switch 2, roguelike games, Curse of the Dead Gods, Nacon, Passtech Games, Ravenswatch

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