• Hey everyone, staff have documented a list of banned content and subject matter that we feel are not consistent with site values, and don't make sense to host discussion of on Famiboards. This list (and the relevant reasoning per item) is viewable here.

Retro Nostalgia hour: Let's talk about favourite games and memories related to the DS and 3DS family of systems!

Irene

Irene

Soar long!
Pronouns
She/Her
The DS and 3DS are wonderful machines, who kickstarted a new era of Nintendo handheld dominance, bringing fireworks and whistles in the form of touchscreen, extensive game libraries and, of course, maps. A lot of maps.

What are your favourite games on the systems, and do you have some fond memories related to those games (or others)?

My earliest memories of the DS only started years after its release, and it includes being with my ex, who had a bunch of games that we played together. I got really attached to Super Mario 64 DS (that they despised, they preferred NSMB) which I to this day really like and consider to be underrated. They had Mario Kart DS, which I still think holds up to this day. After getting my own DS Lite, we played a lot of matches together with friends, and also strangers on anime conventions. But first and foremost, this was the time where I was properly introduced to Ace Attorney. We were supposed to play them together, but I was so captivated that I sometimes took their DS and snuck out at night to continue on my own. I made sure to not save, so that I was never found out.

My favourite games on the system are of course Ace Attorney, Mario Kart DS and also Tetris DS, my favourite version of Tetris shy of Tetris Effect.

In regards to the 3DS, I mostly remember it for sucking me back into Zelda, after being lukewarm on the franchise across the DS games and Skyward Sword. In the summer of 2014 and with the reveal of "Zelda U", I was shaken awake yet again, reminded of why this franchise was my favourite. I had saved up enough money at my first proper job to buy a pink version of the standard 3DS that I still own. I got A Link Between Worlds and Ocarina of Time 3D, as well as Zelda 1, and I binged them. It was wonderful, like finding my way back home again. Then, I got a call from my boss that said that there had been some kind of contractual misunderstanding, and that I was supposed to not work over the summer. We worked it out so that I would start work at a different place in the autumn, and that I had the summer free. Despite the confusion, I was happy about it, and spent the summer in Hyrule.

My favourite games on the 3DS are as follows:

1. Ocarina of Time 3D
2. A Link Between Worlds
3. Style Savvy: Trendsetters
4. Metroid: Samus Returns
5. Kirby: Triple Deluxe
 
Last edited:
I used to carry around a bag of DS games when I was in high school. The risk of it is what probably pushed me toward being 99% digital these days.
 
All of my DS and 3DS memories involve Pokemon in some fashion or another. Heck, I'm still playing Pokemon on my 3DS on a semi-regular basis, and this past Spring I got a new battery for my DS so I could play LeafGreen and Emerald again.

Both of my top memories also happen to involve being on vacation. I was on vacation when I beat Platinum for the first time, and I was on vacation, laying on the floor at 2AM playing SoulSilver in an attempt to finally fall asleep.
 
0
DS was a great time for me since it was the first portable console I bought for myself (usually had to share it with my brother). The most important memory for me is that it gave west the chance to experience a more friendly version of DQIV and finally get DQV and VI so I spend a lot of time with those games. But also it offered some experience that until that point you wouldn't think of , like Trauma Center being a surgeon sim was really cool and even some decent online gameplay with Phantasy Star 0
 
0
One of my favorite memories of the 3DS is when I played my first-ever megaten game, SMT4. I was about to take a plane trip across country, and I had bought a 3DS to play Pokemon X/Y not too long before but I wanted a new game for the plane. I went to Best Buy and glanced around for an RPG, and ended up landing on SMT4 since it caught my eye. Anyway, flash forward to being on the plane, and I fired up the system and this piano chord hits:



I was pretty much hooked straight from there.
 
I'm half-tempted to use this topic as an excuse to type up an essay on why I think Sonic Chronicles is actually good, but I don't know if I have the energy for that, and I don't think people are ready to hear it.

But beyond that, I loved my DS, it was an RPG powerhouse and I liked what the dual screen added to the genre by making menus more accessible and crucial information like HUDs given its own room away from the gameplay screen. It was my first experience with Chrono Trigger which would become one of my favorite games, plus the Zenithian Dragon Quest ports/remakes, Etrian Odyssey, Rune Factory, Radiant Historia, and those Matrix Software remakes of FF3 and 4. Despite being something of a black sheep to most people, I was really obsessed with that FF3 remake for a while. The opening CGI animation with the new arrangement of Eternal Wind is burned into my memory. I also remember Matrix then tried to make their own original JRPG in the same style as the remakes, Nostalgia Winds of Change, which most people view as bad and forgettable. I won't defend it, but it had its charms.

Sonic Rush (and it's pirate-themed sequel, Rush Adventure, which I actually like a little more than the first) and Kirby Superstar Deluxe were probably my most played non-RPGs on the system. Mario and Zelda entries on the system didn't really interest me at the time admittedly. I was also disappointed with Dragon Quest 9 as a follow-up to 8 at the time and passed on it back then, now I feel silly about that.
 
0
The DS might still be my favorite system of all time, honestly. All of my friends had one, and we were playing a crapton of games, competing in multiplayer, trading cartridges, all the fun stuff.

Favorite games on the DS? Oh boy I’m making a separate thread for that. Suffice to say for now that the game I would generally put as my number one was birthed on DS: The World Ends With You. And that ain’t all, I could list like thirty DS games off the top of my head that I’d consider all-time greats.

I wish I’d spent more time with my 3DS, but it coincided with a very busy time in my life, so I don’t have a lot of memories with it. Kid Icarus Uprising was banging, though.
 
Despite being a Nintendo kid and owning a GBA, I did not own a DS during its original run. I remember getting the original black 3DS for a Christmas in 2012, and at that time I had just finished my first semester of college. Really loved the aesthetic, the software, the 3D “gimmick”, and the hardware. Despite its limitations (power compared to Vita, eShop navigation, region locking), I have nothing but fond memories of this time that coincided with my college years and early 20s. The Switch era has been a phenomenal time to be a Nintendo fan, but I have a real soft spot for this era.

Favorite Games:

Fire Emblem Awakening
Kirby Planet Robobot
Super Mario 3D Land
Shin Megami Tensei IV
Steamworld Dig
 
SammyJ9 said:
One of my favorite memories of the 3DS is when I played my first-ever megaten game, SMT4. I was about to take a plane trip across country, and I had bought a 3DS to play Pokemon X/Y not too long before but I wanted a new game for the plane. I went to Best Buy and glanced around for an RPG, and ended up landing on SMT4 since it caught my eye. Anyway, flash forward to being on the plane, and I fired up the system and this piano chord hits:



I was pretty much hooked straight from there.
Click to expand...

SMT IV was my first MegaTen experience and I will never forget being immediately hooked once you step foot in Naraku for the first time. Let’s hope that game gets a rerelease or something in the future. Way too good to be kept trapped on the 3DS.
 
I am using my 3ds at the moments since its still my favorite handheld. For the games on the list I have a physical copy with the case and manual since I really like them. My ds/3ds were mostly a pokemon machine (so no pokemon games) but there are some gems:

DS games:
-The title is in the thread lol: Nostalgia, a fantastic rpg
-Hotel Dusk (I need to find the sequel)
-A controversial pick: Lunar Dragon Song
-Etrian Odyssey 3

3DS games:
-In order to make a smaller list: All atlus developed games
-All FE games
-7th Dragon III Code: VFD (Sega bring it back)
-DQ8

Those are the one that popped into my head.
 
For the DS my most prominent memory is Phantom Hourglass. I got stuck at some point (10 yo me wasn't too smart lmao) for literal months until I was on a vacation to a Six Flag with my family and unveiling a whole new portion of the map. I was in awe.

For the 3DS, surprisingly enough I was at six flags again several years later when the demo for Dream Drop Distance was out. I'd never played any demo before but I loved it so much and kept replaying it. Needless to say, when i got the game for Christmas it absolutely was a charm
 
For the DS, Etrian Odyssey (particularly EOIII), the Dragon Quest remakes, Professor Layton, SMT Strange Journey, the Castlevania and the Hotel Dusk games are probably my strongest memories of it. Plus Ghost Trick, Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes and Radiant Historia. I had so many games on it, it was super varied in what was available if you liked slower, quirky stuff that wasn’t 3D action games.

On the 3DS, EO again, but SMTIV blew my mind with its big reveal at the end of act 1. My MonHun addiction just went ballistic on it though, I spent so much time in MH4. My flatmate couldn’t believe that I spent more time playing online on a 3DS than he did on his home console.
 
Yeah, Tetris DS was awesome! It was one of the first game I got for the Nintendo DS, along with Super Mario 64 DS, the weird and wonderful Project Rub by SEGA. There were so many great titles released on it, from Clubhouse Games to Space Invaders Extreme to Resident Evil, but my personal favorite is probably the remake of Final Fantasy IV.
 
0
One that always comes to mind for me happened with Elite Beat Agents in 2008. My hometown got hit by an inland hurricane and the power went out for a week. I got home from school the day of the storm to find nothing working, so I lugged a piece of cold pizza out of the fridge (before it all went rancid, of course), hauled my ass upstairs, and decided to give EBA’s hardest difficulty one last go. I finished Jumpin Jack Flash and passed out. What else was I going to do?
 
MSnap said:
I used to carry around a bag of DS games when I was in high school. The risk of it is what probably pushed me toward being 99% digital these days.
Click to expand...
I was kinda the opposite. I got a DS as a 10-year-old casual Nintendogs/Mario Kart/Brother wanted Pokemon type, and was just intoxicated by the feeling of getting new games. I got so into collecting them. If ever I had the choice between one brand new games or a bunch of cheaper games, I'd almost always choose the bunch. I started reading the magazines (NGamer, ONM) to obsessively keep up with DS games, know what the good ones were so I could keep an eye on all of them. They were all so proudly displayed on my window ledge in my room (Which lead to a lot of sundamage it turns out but hey). The joy of seeing that collection grow and swell has made me stay 99% physical. A huge part of buying a new game on Switch is adding it to my new library, this time under the TV instead of on the window ledge.

I've recently started to get into retro game collecting, too, which is a whole new avenue for fun considering how much I loved it as a teen.
 
Oh man, the DS. Great memories with that handheld. I don’t know if I could rank my favorite games, but here’s a few games that hold a special place in my heart:

Picross 3D
Meteos
Tetris DS
Mario Kart DS
Electroplankton
New Super Mario Bros
Elite Beat Agents
Final Fantasy III
Pokémon Soul Silver

If I had to pick an absolute favorite, it would either be Mario Kart DS or Picross 3D, with a special shout out to Tetris DS. So many good memories of playing those three games with my sister and with my friends in high school.

For the 3DS, I think I played it more than the DS but it’s not as nostalgic for me. Probably because I was older, and not as into video games as I was when I was in high school. A small selection of my favorite 3DS games would be something like this:

Zelda OoT 3D
Super Mario 3D Land
New Super Mario Bros 2
Pilotwings 3D
Pokémon X
Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D
Luigi’s Mansion Dark Moon
Metroid Samus Returns

I’ve got a decent backlog of titles I’d love to try out for both systems, too!
 
Favorite DS games:
  1. Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia
  2. Contra 4
  3. Phantasy Star Zero
  4. Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow
  5. Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin
I have a bunch of games in the backlog that I picked up during the pandemic like Pokémon: Platinum Version, Okami-Den, Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story, Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, Trace Memory etc. DS was mostly my Castlevania machine though many of my favorite memories involve multiplayer with my brother. Also, he was so proud of how he would troll “snakers” online (EDIT: in Mario Kart DS). Even his custom player icon was a snake with a red line over it.

Favorite 3DS games:
  1. Super Mario 3D Land
  2. The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds
  3. Castlevania: Lords of Shadow - Mirror of Fate
  4. Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D
  5. Resident Evil: Revelaitons
Super Mario 3D Land and The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds are more like 1 and 1.a.

My all-time favorite memory was the Super Smash Bros. for 3DS demo. I didn’t sign up for Nintendo’s promotional emails at the time so I didn’t get the demo codes email. On the old Nintendo forum I frequented, a kind soul said they only needed one of theirs so they gave me the other three codes. No questions asked, no future favor implied. I think they even signed up to the forum just to give me the codes because they weren’t a prolific poster or anything. It was a really nice thing someone did I’ll never forget.
 
Last edited:
3ds: albw, kid Icarus uprising, bravely second, m&l dream team, pokemon sun in that order.

Ds: castlevania aria of sorrow, bowsers inside story, Mario kart ds (peak Mario kart until wii modding took off), pokemon bw1/2, spirit tracks (ds Zeldas are hella underrated), honourable mention to radiant historia.

I really miss "hand-held design", Bite sized but still meaty, needed a lot of novelty, fun, easy to pick up, then pushing gameplay concepts to logical extremes to fit a $40 cart. Switch games are largely modern console games or shrunken modern console games except for maybe turn based rpgs that don't change much (much like the psp or vita was for example). Most indies also don't quite feel the same to me, I can't quite put my finger on it, but they do come in a large variety, so I'm probably missing some).
 
Street Pass, I LOVE Street Pass! Dragon Quest IX was so awesome with it. I wish Switch had a Street Pass feature 😔
 
0
The DS is my blindspot when it comes to Nintendo systems. It came out when I was an older teenager and wasn't as into Nintendo or video games more broadly. I did own one for maybe 3 or 4 months in 2008 though. I bought a used 1st Gen DS (Blue) to play Phantom Hourglass (which was fine but didn't really leave a strong impression on me). I also owned Advance Wars: Days of Ruin and Viewtiful Joe DS; neither of which I played for more than a few hours. I ended up selling it and my games to one of my friends for like $80 and bought a bunch of metal CDS with it. I did also play Spirit Tracks on my little sister's DSI later on but I really disliked that game and ended up just giving it to her.

3DS I owned for a long time and have more memories of. With that said, much like the Wii U, my main use of it was to reexperience the Zelda games I grew up with (Ocarina 3D, Majora 3D and the Gameboy VC Zelda games) in my 20s when I was most nostalgic for them. With that said, I still enjoyed a few original 3DS titles like A Link Between Worlds, Kirby: Planet Robobot, Smash 3DS, BoxBoy, and Shovel Knight but I still feel like I let alot of it's line-up pass me by. I do feel it was the better Nintendo Console to own compared to the Wii U though and most of Nintendo's most interesting output during the 2010s was on 3DS.
 
The DS was my most played handheld of all time probably, though the Switch might have surpassed it by now. I got the DS close to launch and went on to play a ton of games for it. I think one holiday I actually got nearly ten games at once. I guess that’s part of why I look back fondly on it. That and having a friend in school who had a DS and Mario Kart and was generally interested in the same things I was. I played the DS during class, and even skipped class a couple of times and played in the restroom. Yeah, I really stopped caring about school at that point and ended up dropping out lmao. Great system.
 
NDS:
Ouendan 1 & 2
Rub Rabbits 1 & 2
Ninja Gaidan: Dragon Sword
Metroid Prime: Pinball
Trace Memory
Viewtiful Joe Double Trouble
Meteos
FF III & FF IV 3D remakes
Kirby's Canvas Curse
Trauma Center
Animal Crossing: Wild World
Grid Racing DS
Professor Layton
Wario Ware Touched!
Scribblenauts
Mario Hoops 3 on 3
9 9 9: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors
Solatorobo: Red the Hunter
Dragon Quest IX
Brain Training

The DS had insane variety! Even more than Switch.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I think I missed out on most of what people fondly remember these systems for. I've never played the vast majority of beloved DS games. These days I mostly remember 3DS for A Link Between Worlds, Kid Icarus Uprising, and Planet Robobot. I feel like it ended up having a very underwhelming first party library in hindsight, but I have basically no idea what else released on it. It also destroys my hands to use it, which I think was always the case but I just kind of ignored that in the past. Good news: Mario Kart DS holds up! Bad news: holding a banana behind me is physically painful!
 
0
I remember during one year at school playing DS during certain classes took over to the point we had people bringing power bars so we could basically have charging stations, and there were enough spare DSs going around that when one got confiscated, we just bestowed temporary replacements to people.

It started when one guy would always just be playing DS in class instead of paying attention and we were quickly like "how is he getting away with this" cut to "well I guess we could get away with it too".

The biggest coup was when we got the girls to start playing. Not that girls didn't play, but the girls in our class didn't play, initially, while most of the boys did. But then when we got most of them on board it was pretty much over for the teacher.

Of course this didn't work in every class. But for the weaker willed or more apathetic teachers it worked fantastically. I have no idea how we passed some of those classes that year.

This probably wouldn't be as noteworthy to kids now considering these days I assume they're just doing this with phones and any other devices. But back when all you had was a DS, an ipod mini and a motorola razr, this was as crazy as it got, lol.
 
The 3ds is probably my favorite platform of all time. In terms of first part support, it’s definitely some of nintendos finest output. Im currently replaying the excellent link between worlds, and i beat mario 3d land again earlier this year
 
All of my most fond memories of the DS are for the visual novels/adventure games as that’s where I discovered the genre. Ace Attorney, Ghost Trick, 999, Hotel Dusk, Professor Layton would all probably rank among my favourite games for the system.
 
Loved the DS. Favourite games on it were 999, Radiant Historia, Devil Survivor 2, The World Ends with you, Etrian Odyssey 3, Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light, Chrono Trigger, GTA Chinatown Wars, DQ IX.

On the 3DS my faves were RE Revelations and Fantasy Life. The visuals in the former blew me away at the time - impressed me a lot Capcom managed that on a handheld. Looking forward to another FL this year.
 
If I think about my DS, first memory that comes to mind is fishing late at night in Wild World and talking to my villagers outside who were still awake. :)


4bbfdce6040154d1e7ea8c0915a03ca3_w200.gif
 
I thought the 3ds was an underwhelming platform. Sure I had fun with some games like Mario, but overall disappointed, especially with pokemon.

DS (lite) on the other hand was fantastic.
I put 555 hours into diamond.

I had sooo many games. An underrated one was attack of the saiyans

55-EvilAssault.gif
 
0
My favorite 3DS game is probably A Link Between Worlds. Stuff like Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright and Dark Moon was amazing as well. Donkey Kong Country Returns too if we want to count ports. Oh and can't forget Pushmo

DS was a hella strong generation for Pokémon. Platinum, HGSS and B2W2 are all-timers. Loved quirky games like Ghost Trick. And I will always have a special place in my heart for Scribblenauts. So much fun just messing around
 
0
DS is probably still my favourite Nintendo platform for the variety of games. What a time to be alive for adventure games, felt like a big revitalisation of the genre, whilst the genre was seemingly dying out on PC (the ol' point and click variety), we had all timers like Ghost Trick, Ace Attorney series, Hotel Dusk, Flower, Sun & Rain, Last Window, Another Code / Trace Memory, theresia, 9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors, Nanashi no Game (one of the best games that never got localized) and many others all appearing on the platform.

Mario 64 DS was amazing.
WarioWare: Touched! was one of my most played games on the system with my brother, so we got a lot of playtime with that, was so fun.
Star Fox Command was surprisingly fun after all the discourse I saw online about it.
New Super Mario Bros. was a great 2D Mario game that I got a lot of playtime with at airports/bus stations for replays.
Tetris DS was so damn fun and a really good edition.

Then you had RPGs / SRPGs galore: Devil Survivor 1 & 2, Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume, Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey, Etrian Odyssey series, Dragon Quest remakes, Rondo of Swords, Radiant Historia, Contact and so on.

What also gets me is this was a system where certain devs were firing on all cylinders, giving career best games:

Strange Journey and Radiant Historia are two of the best games Atlus has ever put out, imo. Devil Survivor 1 isn't far behind either.
I also think Covenant of the Plume is probably my favourite Valkyrie Profile game too.
999 is still the best game Uchikoshi has ever made. That game blew me away.
Ghost Trick is Shu Takumi's best to me.
theresia is one of the best hidden gems on the system. A dungeon crawling adventure game with horror themes/storytelling.
Hotel Dusk and Last Window are cult classics. I think I might like Last Window even more than Hotel Dusk. That art style/use of dual screen function, though. So good.
Nanashi no Game is the best handheld horror game ever made. If you like horror games and haven't played it, definitely make time for it, it's fantastic.
Flower, Sun & Rain is obviously one of my favourite games and my favourite Suda51 game, next to Killer7. A journey into the surreal.
Infinite Space is another one of those hidden gems on the system a lot of people missed. Space opera RPG from Platinum Games and Hifumi Kono (creator of Clock Tower and Steel Battalion).
Fire Emblem: New Mystery of the Fire Emblem is one of the best FE games for me, I played it via the fan translation and it's so damn clean and brilliant. Real shame Shadow Dragon killed any chance of this releasing in the West, since it would have gone down as a lot of people's top 3, I feel.

I'm still discovering and playing more even now, on both platforms.

I swear I will reach my 70s and still be playing on my 3DS playing games across both platforms, there really is that many gems. Other great thing for me with OG DS was the GBA BC, so I could continue discovering gems in that library too. I was in my mid-late teens during this timeframe, so I have a lot of nostalgia for this era of gaming on the DS and PSP - the 360/PS3 far less of - I have more nostalgia for Wii than for PS3/360 as well.

First memory of getting the DS launch week? WarioWare: Touched! Never played a WarioWare game before and it was brilliant. Big fan of the series ever since (it also made me want to play the old/the upcoming Wario platformers at the time, which I did).
 
Some random Nintendo DS memories:

  • me and my friends played the shit out of Mario 64 DS minigames, pretty sure most of us didn't even complete the main game at the time...just those damned minigames. A lot of time was also spent on Metroid Prime Hunters multiplayer mode, my hands were never the same;
  • bought the console with FF3 remake, good game but jesus christ that final dungeon...took me an afternoon to complete and was sweating bullets the whole time. Never again. Eternal Wind is the best FF world map theme also;
  • GOATed JRPG machine, so many classics...without even counting the unlocalized stuff. We were still in the dark times unfortunately;
  • Pictochat is the greatest pre-installed software;

Sumio Mondo said:
I also think Covenant of the Plume is probably my favourite Valkyrie Profile game too.
Click to expand...

Brilliant game, but the first playtrhough is brutal and i'm not even talking about the difficulty lol
 
My most nostalgic DS memories are of the games I played on the original model: Super Mario 64 DS (especially the minigames), Advance Wards Dual Strike and Mario Kart DS. I remember emailing Nintendo customer support to ask if you can really play the game online before the release, because I didn't believe you could do such thing on anything else than a PC.

I got a Lite at release (one day earlier than the rest of Europe, as the European release day was a public holiday here!), and it stayed with me for quite a while. I remember playing New Super Mario Bros., some Dragon Quest and Mega Man Battle Network games and Elite Beat Agents while living with my parents, for example. Later on when I moved away for studies and hadn't played that much games, DS was what pulled me back in. The Professor Layton games played a big part there. The 3DS was already out by this time, and when I eventually got one, it was the XL model.

The first game I got on the 3DS was Donkey Kong Country Returns 3DS. After that I continued with the Professor Laytons again, but they weren't quite as good as the first three entries on the DS. There are a lot of great 3DS games (A Link Between Worlds is among my favourite Zeldas, for example), but I don't have such vivid memories of playing it as I do from the DS era.
 
AngryNopon said:
Some random Nintendo DS memories:

  • me and my friends played the shit out of Mario 64 DS minigames, pretty sure most of us didn't even complete the main game at the time...just those damned minigames. A lot of time was also spent on Metroid Prime Hunters multiplayer mode, my hands were never the same;
  • bought the console with FF3 remake, good game but jesus christ that final dungeon...took me an afternoon to complete and was sweating bullets the whole time. Never again. Eternal Wind is the best FF world map theme also;
  • GOATed JRPG machine, so many classics...without even counting the unlocalized stuff. We were still in the dark times unfortunately;
  • Pictochat is the greatest pre-installed software;



Brilliant game, but the first playtrhough is brutal and i'm not even talking about the difficulty lol
Click to expand...

Oh yeah Covenant of the Plume is grim as Berserk lol. Extremely sombre tone.

Did you ever play FF4 Remake on DS as well? That game is hard too. Probably the hardest mainline FF game for me. I should get the FF3 remake, one of Asano's earliest projects I think right?
 
Wow I started a 3DS game just the other day, what a coincidence!

The 3DS marked an interesting time in gaming for me. It was an era where the HD consoles were absolutely terrible in terms of games, the lineup was sparse and while I enjoyed the Wii U in 2014 by the time I got a 3DS in early 2015 the system had slowed down. The 3DS was, quite literally, my last alternative to keeping gaming alive for me.

And I'd say for the most part it did a decent job. I got a New 3DS XL near (I wanna say on?) launch date, with Majora's Mask 3D and Fire Emblem Awakening. And those were great! I think in retrospect what's so great about the 3DS was its ability to both feel like a cute little handheld while also having huge immersive console quality experiences on it. And it's games managed to appeal to both of those qualities. Even picking it up to this day, I have a little nostalgia for when Nintendo handhelds were this cute and felt so right in the hands.

My favorite games on it were 3D Land, Majora's Mask 3D, Ocarina of Time 3D, Fire Emblem Awakening, Etrian Odyssey V, and Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate. Those last 5 games especially were very good, those I never finished the last 3.

One of my biggest regrets with the system was that I was pretty bad at finishing games back when I played the system the most, even worse than I am now 😂. I also feel like 3DS games either constantly had stock issues or were kind of overpriced, I specifically remember checking for Ocarina of Time 3D, StarFox 64 3D, and Pikmin 3 on Amazon for years and they'd usually just be out of stock. I regret my library not being bigger, because there was so much choice on the 3DS and a lot of games either took forever to join Nintendo Selects (Triple Deluxe didn't join till early 2017!) or never got price cuts like the later 3DS games. I also got some duds on the system like Monster Huner Generations, Stories and Dragon Quest VII, so that didn't help. By the time Etrian Odyssey V came to the West, I was done buying for the system.

So I loved most of what I played on the system, and I probably put 1000+ hours into it, but my biggest regret is I didn't check out even more.
 
0
Sumio Mondo said:
Oh yeah Covenant of the Plume is grim as Berserk lol. Extremely sombre tone.

Did you ever play FF4 Remake on DS as well? That game is hard too. Probably the hardest mainline FF game for me. I should get the FF3 remake, one of Asano's earliest projects I think right?
Click to expand...

Yeah, i distinctly remember getting wiped in the first random encounter after stepping foot on the Moon lol

I played the Pixel Remaster recently and i was surprised to see how easy it is in comparison. I prefer the 3D remake though, really like the 3D models.
 
I still remember getting a DS, I really wanted one to play wild world because I loved AC on the GameCube.
My parents said they would get me a DS lite the only problem was that came out the day after my birthday so I had to spend my birthday just looking at my copy of wild world wishing I could play it.

Amazing system though so many fantastic games on it.
My favourite has got to be TWEWY I was a teen then and I feel like that was the perfect time for me to play it, still an amazing game to this day
But yeah Pokemon, Ace Attorney, Dragon Quest, Chrono Trigger, Ghost Trick there was so many quality games on the DS

3DS I loved as well favourite game was definitely New Leaf that game consumed my whole summer when it came out and I still played it years afterwards.
 
Not many fond memories on 3DS, between my Wii U and Switch, I didn't play much of it.
Some of my favourite games:
Mario 3D Land
Samus Returns
Link between worlds (but I didn't beat it)
Pokémon Y (loved it but lost interest around gym 7)

DS on the other hand was near me all the time.
I mostly remember playing again and again Ace Attorney. All four of the DS games replayed many times.
Also the Layton games. Played 3-4 of them, especially loved the first one.
Dozens of hours on Pearl and Heart Gold. Played Black also but didn't go far.
Loved NSMB, despite what people say.
Also beat Dawn of Sorrow the only castlevania I ever beat.
Ghost trick was really cool too.
Even play and finished Another Code but I don't remember much.
Mario Kart DS so many hours especially LAN.
Mario 64 didn't work for me (controls)
I even played Nintendogs.
Several hours on Brain Training, mostly sudoku after a while.
Polarium!!! Such a clever game!!
Kirby Canvas Curse was ok but sold it.
42 all time classics was pretty cool too!
I even tried a few rpgs like FF4, FF tactics advance 2 and chrono trigger.
I also got Advance Wars DS but wasn't really my thing.
FE shadow dragon was kinda disappointing.
I liked phantom hourglass, didn't mind the controls but dropped it on the f.... dungeon.

I may forgetting stuff. DS had a huge library! And so many gems!
 
0
DS was amazing imo, very similar to Switchin terms of quality of library. 3DS was decent but did not achieve the greatness of the DS. I remember booting up Nintendogs for the first time and I was amazed by the tech. That game hooked me for a while and the good stuff kept coming afterwards. Games like Etrian Oddysey, Phantom Hourglass, Brain Training, Rhythm Heaven all blew my mind.
 
0
Chrono Trigger for DS sticks out for me. Love it.

3DS, can’t ignore OoT3D and ALBW. Would love to see Nintendo port OoT3D to Switch with updated visuals(resolution/textures).
 
0
one of my first pieces of game preservation work (dating back to 2014) was documenting every DS game which had downloadable content. due to the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection shutdown taking it all down.
Please let me know if there's any games i missed. I will not be making a similar thread for the Wii due to the fact that only one game (Alien Crush Returns) has free DLC. (While Animal Crossing City Folk and Mario Kart Wii had free dlc, the former is now impossible to get even with hacking, and the latter is impossible to get all of them before the Wi-Fi connection service ends.)
Click to expand...
i also did some packet grabs for a few games (Sonic Riders Zero Gravity was one i specifically remember) though i believe it was all Wii games, and i'm not sure if they ever got used.

there was also a recording made of the last 18 hours of Mario Kart Wii's online servers, but due to an error with the streaming setup i was using the resulting footage is incredibly laggy.
 
0
You must log in or register to reply here.


Back
Top Bottom