Nintendo DS

The first classic 2D Mario game in fifteen years; a return to the series' platforming roots.

The first Mario Kart with online racing against the whole world; a reason on its own to own a Nintendo DS.

A remake of the pioneering 3D platformer with new playable characters and expanded content.

The brothers fight side by side with their baby selves from the past; a fresh action RPG.

The player controls both the brothers and Bowser himself from inside his body; the series' high point.

Zelda adapted for touch controls; a direct continuation of the story from Wind Waker.

This time Link drives a locomotive instead of a horse; an unusual but surprisingly effective premise.

The first Pokémon on the dual-screen DS; the Sinnoh region and changes that shaped the whole series.

An enhanced version of Diamond/Pearl with a chilling atmosphere and the surreal Distortion World.

Considered by many fans to be the best Pokémon remake; your Pokémon follows behind you.

Samus with stylus aiming on the touchscreen, long before mobile FPS games.

A sequel to Aria of Sorrow with the soul system; the first Castlevania on the Nintendo DS.

Two heroes jump through painted portraits into separate themed worlds.

The darkest of the three DS Castlevania games; a glyph system replaces classic weapons and spells.

Turn-based strategy that uses both DS screens for battles on two fronts at once.

A remake of the series' very first entry from 1990, officially available to Western players for the first time.

A JRPG from a dream team of creators behind Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, and Dragon Ball.

A groundbreaking story starring the dark knight Cecil, which pushed JRPG storytelling forward.

The only mainline Dragon Quest game released directly for a handheld; a bet on DS multiplayer.

A one-of-a-kind action RPG with fashion, cell phones, and the atmosphere of Tokyo's Shibuya, instead of swords and dragons.

You don't control Kirby directly, you just draw his path with the stylus; an elegant use of touch controls.

A remake of a collection of several standalone adventures in one, a so-called game full of games.

A fairy-tale village full of puzzles; it kicked off one of the most beloved series on the DS.

A courtroom drama that turns the player into a defense attorney; the famous "Objection!" is known even to non-players.

A dead hero without memories manipulates objects to rewrite his own death; pure originality.

Three dancers save the world through rhythm; one of the craziest rhythm games on DS.

A pure distillation of speed across both DS screens; the series' return to its roots.

The linear action series was replaced by an open, interconnected world with backtracking to old areas.

An uncompromising run-and-gun tribute to the 8/16-bit era; both DS screens combine into a single level.

GTA returned to the isometric view of the original games; a surprisingly full-fledged crime epic.

You write a word and the object instantly comes to life in the game; dizzying freedom when solving puzzles.

No enemies or ending, just a village flowing in real time; a daily ritual for millions.

You touch a puppy on the screen with the stylus and that's it; a small miracle among simulators.

Short math and language exercises turned the Nintendo DS into a daily ritual for adults.

An immortal classic wrapped in Nintendo nostalgia; the blocks here meet Mario and Zelda.

Chaotic, unfair, and fun competition for stars, brought to a handheld console.

A crossover of Shonen Jump magazine heroes in a fighting game with an original comic-panel system.

Illegal street racing and intense police chases condensed into a handheld console.

The historic first joint appearance of Mario and Sonic on the same Olympic track.

Escaping a sinking ship as a brilliant puzzle; the foundation of the cult Zero Escape series.

A JRPG telling the story of three generations of one family; many consider it the pinnacle of the series.

A distinctive adventure played with the console turned sideways like a book; a dark noir story from 1979.

A collection of dozens of short rhythm minigames; controlled with just the stylus or the microphone.

The fifth generation of the series leaves familiar territory for the first time; the Unova region inspired by New York.

A rare direct sequel in the series' history; Unova two years later, with the return of N.

The addictive tower defense from PCs also arrived on DS; plants versus waves of zombies.

The second entry in Level-5's mystery series; a search for a box full of family secrets.

A sequel to the famous SNES platformer; swapping babies for power-ups is the main new feature.

Classic Kirby on the hunt for a cake; new combinations of abilities with items.

Brutal action controlled almost entirely with the stylus; an unusual but functional idea.

Stylized cinematic action uses both screens; a companion jumps between the displays.

A sequel to Mega Man ZX; transforming into Biometal forms changes both combat and movement style.

A platformer built around disguises - each mask grants a different ability for progressing.

Its own side-scrolling DS version, closer to classic Sonic games; Wisps grant abilities.

Instead of one Kirby, you control up to ten of them at once with the stylus - unique in the series.

An unusual hybrid of a platformer and a falling-block puzzle - the action on both screens intertwines.

A remake of an older game; the blob transforms into objects depending on the type of jellybean you give it.

A DS launch title built around the stylus; an endless runner focused on score rather than classic levels.

An Atlus JRPG with an elaborate story; traveling between two timelines changes history.

An old-school dungeon crawler where you draw the labyrinth's map yourself on the touchscreen.

A dark sci-fi SMT; a military team investigates an anomaly consuming Antarctica while recruiting demons.

A turn-based strategy in besieged Tokyo; every morning a death prediction arrives on the COMP device.

A return after years to the beloved GBA duo; the children of the original heroes play a generation later.

A remake of the classic; the story is split into chapters with different heroes before they unite for the first time.

The last of the trio of DS remakes; the boundary between the dream world and the waking world can be crossed.

A real-time tactical RPG following on from FFXII; battles with flying islands and machines.

Fills in the missing chapter between the first and second installments; reveals Roxas's fate.

A standalone story in the spirit of Suikoden; a world divided by twelve signs and their runes.

An action-adventure with robot piloting among islands full of anthropomorphic animals.

Arcade racing adapted to the DS's weak hardware; short time-trial and head-to-head races.

Namco's arcade recipe brought to the DS - drifting as the main mechanic of fast circuits.

Handheld version of the PC hit; build and race acrobatic tracks with your own editor.

A remake of the N64 classic where cars are joined by boats and planes as equal ways to race.

A lighter, arcade spin-off from an otherwise more simulation-focused series; drifting and flash over physics.

A crossover of Mario and Sonic in winter disciplines controlled with the stylus and microphone.

Arcade 3-on-3 basketball ruled by power-ups and special attacks, not realistic rules.

Brings the core of the Tony Hawk series — combos, grinds, and manuals — to Nintendo's handheld.

A simplified but recognizable version of Konami's football series, with an emphasis on teamwork.

Sega icons from Sonic to Samba de Amigo in arcade tennis with special shots.

A compilation of ten sports controlled with the stylus; quick fun over simulation depth.

SNK's legendary run and gun with pixel art, the SV-001 tank, and two-player co-op.

Treasure's crazy shooter where deflected rockets flood the screen with dozens of explosions.

A modern remix of Taito's classic with a combo system and colorful bonuses on top of the shooting.

Star Fox controlled by stylus for the first time; turn-based route planning alternates with aerial dogfights.

One of the first proofs that the DS could handle an ambitious 3D shoot 'em up, from Shin'en Multimedia.

A sequel with more polished graphics, more weapons, and more varied camera sequences.

An atmospheric horror FPS that showed even the DS could carry a terrifying first-person experience.

An improved sequel to the horror FPS with smoother controls and a darker story.

A sci-fi FPS from the creators of Dementium, set on an abandoned lunar base under alien attack.

Arena robot battles with deep customization of weapons, body, and movement modules.

A companion FPS to Modern Warfare 4 with its own campaign adapted for the handheld.

The most ambitious entry in the original trilogy; a journey into a strangely familiar future London.

A Japanese nonogram for Nintendo's handheld; you reveal a hidden picture through logical elimination.

A collection of quick-fire puzzles that turns your result into a humorous brain weight in grams.

Fast-paced puzzle action from the creators of Lumines; chaining colors blasts blocks back into space.

An unusual blend of match-three puzzle and RPG; battles are fought out on a board of symbols.

The first WarioWare built purely around touch and microphone; the microgames speed up until you lose.

Instead of directly controlling Mario, you build a path for wind-up Mini Mario toys.

Daily mental workouts overseen by neuroscientist Ryuta Kawashima from the original hit.

An addictive match-three game with animals, carried over unchanged from its arcade original.

A calm adventure from Cing, where the DS's bottom screen serves as a notepad.

Nonograms in 3D: instead of filling in squares, you chip away at a block with a hammer according to numbers.

The darkest Advance Wars: instead of cheerful wars, a devastated world and a fight for survival.

A quiet story about searching for a missing father on a mysterious island, from studio Cing.

Turn-based tactics in Ivalice, where a mysterious book pulls the boy Luso in. Hundreds of side quests.

A localization of Japan's Game Center CX sends the player back to the 1980s to play imitation retro games.

A handheld offshoot of the Cold War campaign full of conspiracies, adapted for the Nintendo DS handheld.

A standalone New York story featuring combat robot Sam, who can hack as well as sneak.

Its own handheld campaign about the war in the Pacific and Europe, controlled via the DS touchscreen.

A faithful port of the classic Taito arcade game complemented by a Quest mode with a pyramid of twenty-eight worlds.

A handheld DS side story telling what Altaïr was doing before the events of the series' first game.

Crash Bandicoot leaves platforming behind for a board-game party of minigames using the DS's dual displays.

A complete 3D rebuild of the eight-bit original, with a reworked job system.

An action RPG starring a pair of siblings; more linear than the original Crystal Chronicles.

A real-time dungeon crawler; the heroes must carry a crystal that protects against poisonous miasma.

A reworked version of the mobile original; a data copy of Sora explores his own memories.

A brand-new story in the Lunar universe starring the hero Jian, true to the series' romantic spirit.

Samus as a Morph Ball on a pinball table split across both of the DS's screens.

A faithful, unchanged port of Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, with fatalities performed via touch gestures.

A JRPG by Level-5 featuring a physical wizard's book linked to the game via the DS microphone.

A radical series reset – not a single older Pokémon appeared in Unova until the very end of the game.

A rarity for the series: a true sequel, not just an enhanced third version like before.

The player wakes up as a Pokémon in procedurally generated dungeons; the story and ending will move even the toughest players.

A reworking of the first game for the handheld; Knife Mode forces you to face zombies with only a knife and touch controls.

The COMP program predicts who in the party will die and when – giving the turn-based battles a chilling edge.

The Septentriones wipe entire regions of Japan off the map; a bus ride through the wreckage gives the story a wider scope.

City building across two screens – tools on the bottom, a growing metropolis on top under your stylus.

Instead of tilting the console, a stylus steers the ball here – different controls than anywhere else in the series.

A different studio than the home version built its own engine here with cel-shaded graphics.

Three paths – Rigger, Aggro, Hardcore – brought into smaller levels built for the handheld.

Instead of playing microgames, the player here designs them using editors for graphics, music and rules.

Released alongside the PSP version, but the stylus and dual screens change the pace and aiming from the ground up.

Unlike the PSP version, it wasn't made by Team17 but by the Dutch studio Two Tribes – a different feel altogether.

Pouliční závody, které si poradí s dotykovým perem místo volantu.

Šplhací hratelnost King of Swing se stěhuje na dvě obrazovky DS a přidává nové úrovně.

Chytrá logická plošinovka; miniaturní Mario hračky se vedou dotykovým perem.

Levné DSiWare pokračování s editorem vlastních úrovní pro pochodující minifigurky.

Chytej, křiž a trénuj monstra na palubě vzducholodi v této odbočce Dragon Questu.

Pohádkové Final Fantasy bez klasických levelů; postavy rostou schopnostmi.

Slavná RTS převedená do tahů; pomalejší, ale překvapivě chytlavá.

Původní DS verze logického RPG, kde se bojuje skládáním jednotek perem.

Závody o kontrolu čtvrtí s tuningem; jednoduché a svižné.

Level-5 a pohádkový styl: JRPG, které přišlo s papírovou knihou kouzel.

Zmenšený Rayman 2 pro dvouobrazovkový handheld s dotykovým ovládáním.

Králičí šílenství na dotykovém displeji: minihry místo mávání ovladačem.

Celá Civilizace v kapse: stylus, dva displeje a partie na cestu.

Sims vyrazí do ulic; nenáročná životní simulace pro kratší hraní.

Na Nintendu DS je to jiná hra - pohled přes rameno a vlastní mise místo velké kampaně.

Na DS dostalo DiRT 2 vlastní editor tratí, který konzolové verze nemají.

Útěk před ohněm teď vodíte perem po dotykové obrazovce Nintendo DS.