It’s a clear and solid A.

Personally, 2020 has two of my top 5 most played games on the Switch with Animal Crossing (#1) and Xenoblade Chronicles (#5, but #4 for Nintendo only games). Animal Crossing and Xenoblade are also my 2nd and 3rd favourite Switch games.

Objectively, Animal Crossing is the biggest game release in the history of Nintendo, it will go on to sell somewhere between 25 and 50 million units during its first year. Has any other retail level game achieved that on a single platform?

Thinking about it 3 different ways:

1) Raw software sales - Animal Crossing is going to be the best selling game on the Switch.  3D Mario All Stars is going to sell more than 10m and Age of Calamity might do it too.  Of course, there are a lot more first party games that will sell in the 1-5m range.  The only other year that was better for titles turning into raw software sales was 2017.  In this category I give 2020 a B.

2) My personal enjoyment - I haven't played Age of Calamity yet, so this is somewhat of a guess.  However my two favorite Zelda games of this century are BotW and Hyrule Warriors.  I'm definitely buying Age of Calamity.  I've been enjoying Super Mario 35 a lot.  I am definitely going to buy the physical version of Cadence of Hyrule.  There is also a decent chance I'll get Mario Kart Live and Clubhouse Games at some point.  For personal enjoyment I'd have to say this year is tied with 2017.  Nothing is as good as BotW from this year, but there are more first party games that I'm interested in.  For this category A-.

3) Variety and originality - This year relied a lot on first party ports which is the worst thing I can say about it.  (Although 2017 and 2018 also had a lot on first party ports.)  However, I think Mario Kart Live has been the Switch's best original game so far.  It easily beats LABO and 1-2 Switch.  The only real contender for me is Mario+Rabbids, but I find the AR Mario Kart idea more interesting.  Age of Calamity also gets some originality points from a storyline perspective.  Nintendo is taking a cue from Marvel on this one.  They are giving us an entire story trilogy on one system, and they can do it because they are partnering with another studio on Age of Calamity.  So the Zelda trilogy is also a plus.  However, the quanity of actually original titles this year brings this category down to a B.

Overall score: B+.

I'd give it a C. There were definitely a couple of very high quality new releases, Animal Crossing is great, and Origami King could honestly be considered a hidden gem. I understand the general disappointment behind it and I don't think it's necessarily as deep mechanically as the classic games, but it's incredibly rare to play a game with that much love and care put into every single tiny detail, and it also has amazing dialogue and comedy, some of the most enjoyable boss battles in any game I've ever played, and an AMAZING soundtrack. So that alone puts Nintendo's 2020 up a fair bit.

Otherwise, it's basically been rereleases and small budget games like Clubhouse Games. Some of them are very good, Xenoblade has a dedicated fanbase, and Pikmin 3 is in my opinion one of Nintendo's greatest games ever released, but it's still not nearly as nice as new content. Age of Calamity is next month but that's it. I guess Mario Kart Live might be cool for those who are willing to spend the money on it.

Overall I think 2018 was a worse year for the Switch, but it felt very lacking compared to 2019 or 2017.

Not very good, I got the Mario 3D Allstars collection but that's it (I actually got two...). Never cared about Animal Crossing at all.

D. This was one snoozer year for Nintendo and the Switch. Not much more than some quick and lazy remasters. I don't care for Animal Crossing or Warrior's games either.

I'd still rank 2020 above 2018; I've bought 5 Switch games so far this year and plan to get 3 more for a total of 8, while there were only 3 Switch games from 2018 I thought were worth getting.