Ah, the DS. The good old clam-shelled beauty that virtually everyone had in the 2000s. No, really, it sold a whopping 150 million units across its many, many iterations, so you’d be hard-pressed to find someone who didn’t have one at the time. With its dual screens, Wi-Fi connectivity, touch screen and backwards compatibility with the GBA, why wouldn’t you want one? Whether you’re just discovering the pleasures of the DS or want some extra games to play on your 3DS, here are 50 of our recommendations for wonderful games to play on everyone’s favourite handheld console.
How much of this list is just going to be Pokémon? Let’s find out! – Sean
1. Harvest Moon DS – Melty
“I’m glad to meet a new friend like you.” — Leia
Harvest Moon DS was my introduction to the series, and by far the game I played the most on the DS. Before Stardew Valley, our main farming game series was Harvest Moon, created by Victor Interactive Software (which was acquired by Marvelous Entertainment by this time) and Natsume. Inc. This game was released before the split between Marvelous and Natsume, and it truly does show in the gameplay. It is much more polished than the games we received post-split; however, many may argue that later games in the series are better editions.
I love this game. No matter how many times I try to immerse myself in a Story of Seasons or Harvest Moon game now, none will grip my attention quite like Harvest Moon DS. Because of this, I end up returning to the game every few months, no matter if it’s… 20 years old?! What the fuuuuuck.
Anyway, this game connected to the GBA game Friends of Mineral Town for extra content. As a child, I didn’t have this ability, and I’ve yet to try the connectivity between the games. This shows that even though it’s not 100%-able without the other game, it is still incredibly fun to play.
You can only play as a male in this game; however, there was a remake of the game released with the ability to play as a female. Harvest Moon DS: Cute. This came with more marriage candidates and a few glitch fixes; however, it is mostly the same as Harvest Moon DS.
2. Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars – Riley
“You want a piece of my pie?”
A GTA game on a Nintendo platform? Sacrilegious! Well, it happened on the DS, and not just a downgraded port of an existing title, too. Whilst taking a lot of cues from the original titles with its top-down perspective and mission structure. It offers a unique story from the perspective of a Chinese immigrant living in Liberty City and the strife that entails. For a game based on a PlayStation playstyle, it works surprisingly well; the driving and action are quite intuitive for such basic gameplay.
My personal favourite part of this game was the drug-dealing side mission. You start small, buying small-time drugs and reselling them when their values rise. This turns into a game of buying up valuable drugs and selling them to the highest bidder, and working the drug stocks system to the best of your ability. I got rich incredibly quickly this way and my subsequent arsenal of weapons made the game trivial. Whilst some may not like this approach, I find making myself as overpowered as possible early on to sweep through the difficult moments incredibly satisfying and well worth the effort.
3. Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood – Melty
“There’s a well! I wonder if that’s the one Timmy fell into.” — Tails
I’m not going to sugarcoat it: I’m pretty shit at Sonic games. However, take the hedgehog and put him into a turn-based RPG… and I’ve got a game I can play with the blue blur as the main protagonist. To make things even better, this game has Chao in it. If you’re a regular reader of our content, you’ll know that I’m a massive fan of Chao.
With a diverse range of cast members being playable and a story split into two sections, this game is ideal when you want to play something story-driven. Following the disappearance of Knuckles the Echidna, it’s up to Sonic, Tails and Amy to recruit other members of the series to aid in finding and rescuing the powerhouse. Following this story, the next introduces Shade the Echidna. In this story, it’s your team’s mission to prevent the invasion of their world by Ix, the leader of Shade’s tribe.
4. Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of Starry Skies – Blaze
“Looks like you’re doing your level best to get to higher levels. Level with me: are you trying for the top?”
Being the best-selling Dragon Quest game in the series, it had to be on this list. Your adventure starts high above the clouds as an angel of the observatory, the home of the Celestrians. You are the guardian of a little village in the human realm who gathered enough “benevolessence” from helping people to be granted a fygg from the world tree and ascend to the realm of the almighty. All is well until a mysterious attack upon the observatory sends you and the fyggs below the clouds. Now stuck in the land below, you must gather the fyggs and find your way back to the observatory.
IX has a wonderfully in-depth and well-paced story, taking you far across the land in a world where no two places are the same. Everything is fresh and fun to explore, whether you are travelling on land or by boat. You will meet a plethora of interesting characters, all with a story to tell and some with side quests that will keep you entertained for hours on end. Some special quests will grant you access to new vocations and mastery of weapons, so find the one that suits you!
Early in the game, you will receive a treasure map for a grotto. Upon defeating the boss of said grotto, you will receive rewards to improve your strength and additional maps for more dungeon crawling. These grottos are great for post-game content as they can provide virtually hundreds of hours of gameplay. If you’re lucky enough, they might even have rare drops and items.
IX has all its classic gameplay with a few modern twists. It’s the first game to allow you to fully customise your character and party’s appearance and equipment. You can switch out vocations to maximise abilities and weapons to create your perfect hero for battle. Continuing with the traditional turn-based battles, IX introduces a new ability called coup de grâce moves. These allow you to overpower the enemies depending on your vocation.
As you travel, you’ll see the monsters roaming on the overworld, giving you the choice to battle instead of random encounters. Alchemy also makes a comeback in the form of “Krak Pot”, so get crafting for your perfect gear! Unfortunately, the online content is no longer available, but the game still has local co-op play for up to 4 players, where you can travel to each other’s worlds and battle together.
5. Transformers: Decepticons – Sean
Who are you? How long have I been frozen? – Megatron
The first Michael Bay Transformers movie received video game adaptations on practically every platform at the time, and I consider the Nintendo DS version to be the peak of these. Not that it’s a particularly high bar, but it does have its merits, making it worthy of a look if you’re a Transformers fan.
The DS game was split into two games, similar to the dual-release of each Pokémon generation. The gameplay and mechanics remained the same, but the story was unique, with one game focusing on the Decepticons and the other on the Autobots.
Though the games had you playing as the named movie characters, the real selling point was being able to create your own character (aptly known as Create-A-Bot) and follow them through the story. By exploring each free-roam level, you can scan various vehicles, which then get added to a database of things you can transform into, which changes both vehicle mode and robot design. Personally, I was always a fan of the helicopter that makes you look like Shockwave.
I consider the Decepticons game to be the superior of the two, as the characters feel a lot more lively and personable than their grunting counterparts in the movie, with a good balance of banter and backstabbing that you’d expect from those baddies. The story (somewhat) follows the film up to a certain point, after which it takes a hard turn into its own path, which I won’t spoil just in case, but I’ll just say that Starscream does what he usually does.
6. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Dave
Turnabout is fair play
For the uninitiated, Capcom’s Ace Attorney games see you play as an underdog defence lawyer in a world with an incredibly corrupt legal system (even by real-life standards; trials last no longer than 3 days because there’s basically an emotionally compelling homicide every hour and every case is decided via ambushing the opposition with inadmissible evidence and sometimes literal sorcery). The West’s introduction to the quintessential legal drama visual novel series was on the Nintendo DS. It came with all the content of the original release on the GBA, plus an additional feature-length case that utilises more of the DS’s features. If you ever wanted to dramatically scream “objection” in public, this gives you an excuse.
Cases are well-paced: there’s plenty of time to navigate the crime scene and interact with the quirky cast of characters that will inevitably populate the witness stand. Each case is incrementally more difficult (the first few will show you the culprit, you’ll get no such grace afterwards), but the game is short enough to be very replayable.
7. Mario Kart DS – Riley
Ready, Set, Touch!
Mario Kart DS is the first 3D handheld game in the series and feels on par with a console experience, even once boasting online multiplayer. It was also the first game to include Retro Cups, which doubled the total courses in the game with fan favourites from older titles. The roster is solid, and the unique karts felt tailor-made for each character. From Luigi’s Poltergust car to Waluigi’s crane, each vehicle oozes personality.
Due to the online mode, Nintendo also added a custom emblem creation tool that allows you to create a 32×32 pixel art avatar for use online and in local multiplayer. What was even better about these avatars is that they would physically appear on the karts themselves, too, adding another layer of customisation.
Another thing Mario Kart DS does that sets it far apart from the others is its mission mode: 49 unique challenges to complete that really put your skills to the test. Each mission list also has a boss (which Mario Kart has never had before this point), such as Big Bully, King Goomba and King Boo. The best part about missions is that each is ranked up to 3 stars, and if you get all the stars, you can show this off to your friends in multiplayer, too. Flex those mission mode skills!
8. Professor Layton and the Spectre’s Call – Melty
Let’s try that again… — Layton
It’s not the first game in the series; however, the story of Professor Layton and the Spectre’s Call gripped my attention like no other. With a full voice cast and animated cutscenes, this game is a perfect mesh between watching a show and playing a game. Though most of the gameplay is navigating through towns in a point-and-click style adventure game and working out puzzles, the story does not fall short because of this.
This game inspired me to go back and play the other games in the series; however, this is the only one I’ve finished. I find the puzzles to be more my speed, and I just love Emmy as a character. I won’t forget to mention the absolute cutie that is Loosha, although I implore you to play this game to the end to get the whole story. It truly is something to behold.
9. Sonic Rush – Dave
Yuji Naka wouldn’t have turned to a life of crime if he had been allowed to head more Sonic Rush games
Sonic Rush is a predictably fast-paced 2D platforming game developed by Sonic Team and Dimps. It and its sequel were probably the best Sonic games with 3D models of the decade they came out. This is in no small part because of its relative simplicity: the only real gimmick is going fast, and this time Sonic goes fast between two screens. There is a bit more to it, though.
I have taken the liberty of illustrating Sonic Rush‘s greatness using the 3 Bs:
- Blaze: Rush introduced the playable character Blaze the Cat, probably the coolest character since Shadow. She has the poise and solitary self-seriousness you’d expect from a Sonic rival, but her friendship with Cream, pyrokinesis, and willingness to wear clothes set her apart from the likes of Knuckles and Shadow. She’s criminally underutilised despite her enduring popularity; her appearance in The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog was a sight for sore eyes.
- Boost: boosting allows your character to increase their speed and plough through enemies/plummet into bottomless abysses quicker. There’s an inherent risk-reward element to it; it’s fun to look at and listen to, and it’s ended up being a foundational part of modern Sonic games.
- Blend: I just wanted a third word beginning with B, but the game does blend elements together a lot. The in-game music utilises a lot of sampling, and most tracks have another version for Blaze. Not to mention the game’s plot is about two dimensions merging together, you’ll be navigating between two screens, and your first few successful attempts on levels will incorporate a lot of starting and stopping.
Sadly, the bosses aren’t great despite their sleek designs. They can be repetitive and require some unreasonable precision in some instances. On the other hand, the secret final boss features a song that samples a speech by Malcolm X, and it doesn’t get much more based than that.
10. Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith – Sean
This is where the fun begins (on the second screen)
The PS2 version of the Revenge of the Sith video game firmly rests in the comfortable nostalgic nooks of the memories of quite a few of my contemporaries, but the handheld version deserves some attention, too. It’s a 2D sidescroller that follows the events of the movie, splitting levels between Anakin and Obi-Wan carving their way through a whole army of battle droids and later, inevitably, clone troopers. It controls well, and there are plenty of new powers to unlock and upgrade, such as the good old saber throw and force push.
It’s not an expansive masterpiece with hours upon hours of exploration and in-depth level design, but it is an enjoyable enough sidescroller that should keep the player entertained for a few hours.
The Game Boy Advance and DS versions of the game are essentially the same, but the latter features added touch screen features and brand new 3D flying sections that are a bit more on the simple side, but are interesting enough additions.
Leave a Reply