Some must-play Nintendo Switch games are $20 off

If you’re a newcomer to the Nintendo Switch, or perhaps you’re buying for someone who needs a boost to their game library, it’s always wise to snag the console’s best games when they go on sale, as they rarely do. Best Buy is listing several games that I consider to be must-play experiences for $20 off — both in physical and digital formats. Other retailers, like Amazon and Walmart, are honoring the price cuts, too. Better yet, there’s a range of games included in this sale, suiting people who want a shooter, a turn-based strategy game, or a good ol’ 3D Mario platformer.

Super Mario Odyssey is an inviting and delightful take on the traditional 3D Mario game, giving Mario a throwable cap to vastly extend his move set and to possess objects to get around levels. If you’re fatigued by open-world games that have lots of objectives, it may be refreshing to play this, where your only goal is to jump, climb, and collect shiny things.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses is the turn-based tactical title that I mentioned earlier. The game essentially has two parts: one that feels like a spin on a Persona game, where you’re building relationships with your students-turned-warriors, and the other part that sees you taking on foes in interesting battles that never overstay their welcome.

Splatoon 2 is an off-beat, unique third-person shooter where you play as squid-like humanoids who shoot paint at each other. This game has clever weaponry (sort of akin to Ratchet & Clank), and similar to Super Mario Odyssey, its story mode offers a simple structure, letting you zone out on your way to the goal (which in this game’s case is sniping a lot of enemies).

And, of course, you should buy The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. It was released alongside the Switch, but as my colleague Sam Byford wrote on the game’s five-year anniversary, it set an extremely high bar as an immersive, open-world action game that competing titles have struggled to meet. If you’re a Zelda fan, you’ll probably gobble this up, but new players should have a great time, too.

Amazon is, once again, selling its third-generation Echo Dot smart speaker for next to nothing, with a couple of strings attached. You can get the charcoal-colored speaker for $1 so long as you’ve never owned an Echo device on your Amazon account and so long as you sign up for one month of its Amazon Music Unlimited service, which costs $7.99 monthly for Prime members and $9.99 each month for non-members.

Your total will come out to $8.98 at checkout if you’re on Prime or $10.98 for non-Prime members. And, just so you know, the streaming service subscription will be set to auto-renew each month, so keep that in mind.

Echo Dot (third-gen)

This puck-like Echo Dot is the third generation of Amazon’s smart speaker. It offers better sound than its predecessor, a compact design, and all the smarts that come with owning an Alexa device.

$11 at Amazon

A three-pack of Blink’s wireless Outdoor cameras costs $159.99 at Amazon and Best Buy, down from the usual $249.99 cost for the bundle. This price drop matches the big discount that occurred in mid-February. These cameras run on AA batteries, and the company claims that you’ll get two years of use before needing to replace them.

The camera system includes a complimentary 30-day trial to Blink’s subscription that lets you record, view, and save clips. It costs $3 per month per camera after that or $10 per month for unlimited cameras. Alternatively, if you’d prefer a local storage solution, you can pick up the Blink Sync Module 2 for $34.99, which can save clips and photos from up to 10 Blink cameras.

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