Treasure Hunter Simulator Review: Is This the Ultimate Treasure-Hunting Experience?

by Jim Smale · Published March 27, 2025 · Updated March 27, 2025

Treasure Hunter Simulator Review delves into the ins and outs of this unique Nintendo Switch title, offering players an immersive treasure-hunting experience. With two modes, story and exploration, and stunning handheld visuals, the game seeks to charm adventurers and casual players alike. However, frequent performance hiccups, clunky controls, and repetitive gameplay might have you questioning if the treasure is worth the hunt. Dive into our Treasure Hunter Simulator Review and uncover whether this Switch title is a hidden gem or just a buried disappointment!

Treasure Hunter Simulator Review Pros:

Nice graphics.
3.4GB download size.
Controller settings – Invert the axis and sensitivity slider, rotate with the detector option, and toggle run.
Two ways to play – Story mode (you can do jobs but have to unlock maps) and Exploration mode (no jobs but all maps unlocked).
The stick is used like a mouse for the menus, but the arrow does lock onto options.
Treasure finding gameplay.
Opening tutorial level, but it can be skipped.
A full 3D game world with 360-degree camera control.
The game is played in first person.
Your PDA holds the map, jobs, and the camera.
When walking around, your radar will beep and show an icon when near treasure, you then take out your metal detector and move around until the bar fills, and you can then lick the destination in and then dig with your shovel.
Found items must be identified and can be examined via a full 3D viewer and then bagged into your inventory.
Each area will have a legendary item to find, but it usually takes clues to find them.
A handy unstuck menu option.
Your office is fully explorable and will have a pc for jobs and going to locations, whilst the rest of the room populates with your findings.
Locations on the map will have a travel cost associated with them.
Earn money from your findings.
The locations will have a set of treasure-finding percentages for shallow, middle, and deep digs that could garner small, medium, or large items, with a general completion bar for the full location.
Decent loading times.
Looks and plays better in handheld mode.
Great looking locations.
The map will fill in any found treasure spots and points of interest.
It’s a good switch off your brain and do something kind, like a game.
A compass helps with navigation.
You can put your own marker down on the map.
Photo mode built in.
There are two types of jobs – main and optional side ones. You choose them from emails in your office.
Earn prestige and level up to unlock new metal detectors to buy with cash.
Detectors come in analog and digital versions, and each one has unique stats like how good they are at certain depths or sizes of items.
You can sell found items but not legendaries, and rubbish gets automatically discarded.

Treasure Hunter Simulator Review Cons:

You cannot remap the controls.
No real game options.
Generic sounding soundtrack.
The performance is up and down, with slowdowns and pop-ups happening somewhat frequently.
Animations are very wooden.
You never really see the treasure in the ground.
Identifying an item is just a case of rotating it until the bar fills up.
The controls are clunky and are definitely worse when holding the metal detector.
It isn’t as fun on the big screen, with blocky graphics and performance issues aplenty.
If beeping sounds get to you, then this is not the game for you all although you can play it without the beeps; it does lose some of its appeal and atmosphere.
All treasure-digging animations are the same.
Even when you use the metal detector and get the noise that you are in the right place, you then have to do a tedious, exact spot find with it.
Very repetitive.
Finding treasure is just a case of wandering around until it beeps.
It is a very grindy game with prestige and money coming in very slowly.

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