A Nintendo DS/DSi/3DS discussion thread

[RetroSonicHero]

I'd argue the original DS/DS Lite is bordering on retro/modern gaming at this point, but I figured I might as well group it with the rest of the systems.

 

With the death of the 3DS eShop earlier this year and the Online service on its way out in March of next year, it's been a bit sad to watch one of my favorite portable systems of all time fall away from the support of its original creator. But at the same time, I've still got all of the wonderful memories of me as a young lad happily playing New Super Mario Bros. 2, Mario Kart 7, Monster Jam, and many others inherited from my mom way back when. I don't like to get rid of things, so I've still got most of my original games and even my original DS Lite hand-me-down from my mom to remind me of simpler times..

 

As a 2000s kid, the DS and 3DS were my entire world. Whenever I had the free time, that was the system I played for hours upon hours on end. So many great games only held back by hardware limitations such as the small screens, low resolutions, and processing power. As a kid, this never bothered me. And on the contrary, the 3DS absolutely blew my mind at the time as I had never seen portable gaming like it before. (Never owned/used a PSP, nor even knew about its existence. But that's a story for another day).

 

I wanted to create this thread to serve as a place to discuss all things Nintendo DS. Including hardware, games, quirks, technical issues, modding, homebrew, sharing memories, and whatever else we can think of. I'd like to think that other people on this site have been similarly impacted by these consoles legacies, or at the very least have some fondness over them.

[Austin]

Ahhh, thanks for the reminder that I need to dust off and clean up my DS Lite, 2DS and 3DS units to sell/get rid of. They seem to be in demand these days and I just don't use them anymore.

 

I did a lot of DS back in the day. It was a great system for its time and the fact that it doubled as a GBA was super convenient. The Castlevania games were by far my most played titles on it, especially Dawn of Sorrow and Order of Ecclesia. I put a lot of time into Contra 4 as well, along with Pinball Pulse: The Ancients Beckon (DSi) and Metroid Prime Pinball (both of those are some of the best digital pinball games ever made, in my opinion).

 

I wish I had done more with the 3DS, but outside of when it was new and exciting, I just never used it and it would collect dust. I enjoyed Star Fox 64 3D when it was new, and I played through New Super Mario Bros 2, but that was about it. My use of handhelds in the last ten years have basically dwindled to nothing.

[roots.genoa]

The 3DS is probably my favorite video game system of all time, but I'm not sure I have interesting stuff to say about it.

[RetroSonicHero]

5 hours ago, Austin said:

Ahhh, thanks for the reminder that I need to dust off and clean up my DS Lite, 2DS and 3DS units to sell/get rid of. They seem to be in demand these days and I just don't use them anymore.

 

I did a lot of DS back in the day. It was a great system for its time and the fact that it doubled as a GBA was super convenient. The Castlevania games were by far my most played titles on it, especially Dawn of Sorrow and Order of Ecclesia. I put a lot of time into Contra 4 as well, along with Pinball Pulse: The Ancients Beckon (DSi) and Metroid Prime Pinball (both of those are some of the best digital pinball games ever made, in my opinion).

 

I wish I had done more with the 3DS, but outside of when it was new and exciting, I just never used it and it would collect dust. I enjoyed Star Fox 64 3D when it was new, and I played through New Super Mario Bros 2, but that was about it. My use of handhelds in the last ten years have basically dwindled to nothing.

Demand is definitely high, with the New 2DS XL easily selling for $200+ on eBay. For perspective, it retailed for much less than that. So yeah, if you wanna sell them now is a good time.

 

I think for me as a little kid, I loved the idea of portability. So being able to take a fully fledged mario game with me wherever I went was amazing,

[RetroSonicHero]

2 hours ago, roots.genoa said:

The 3DS is probably my favorite video game system of all time, but I'm not sure I have interesting stuff to say about it.

There's a lot more to the system than meets the eye. For instance, going down the homebrew rabbit hole is an entirely different ballpark with amazing results. This system can be made into something incredibly useful with just an hour or two of your time. It's so easy to hack a 3DS, at this point it's become a bit of a meme.

 

Is it the best homebrew system? Nah. But it works well enough for basic emulation, and the native GBA support is fantastic.

[BawesomeBurf]

Still have my modded DSiXL, but rarely use it anymore. Play all my DS games on PC now. Mostly the Castlevania games with touch controls disabled.

[Ninjabba]

The New 3DS could be my favorite handheld if it weren't for the amazing PSP library. I definitely bring it around more often though.. went a bit wild in the last 2 months before the eShop closed getting all the exclusives.

Initially started with a 2DS which I bought from a friend who somehow ended up with 2 of them.. I really hated the design of that device so I traded it in for a discount for the New 3DS with Xenoblade Chronicles. Wish they did a few more titles for this specific piece of hardware.. only a handful of games were made for it and the C-Stick does an amazing job in controlling 3D environments.

[Ross PK]

I very recently upgraded from my DS Lite to a Dsi XL for the bigger screens.

 

I really love the Dsi XL. Because of the bigger screens I enjoy playing DS games a lot more, I love the colour of it too.

 

 

 

Since there was no stylus with it I recently bought and received a promotional Pac-Man stylus, it came with copies of Pac Pix when the game was first released.

 

 

 

Edited November 30, 2023 by Ross PK

[Hwlngmad]

Personally, I just got a 2DS XL that I have since had it modded.  In fact, I used that on my family's recent trip to Lima, Peru.  The only downside was that I didn't realize the power supply was for NA only, so since I didn't bring my portable stepdown adapter, I didn't use it as much as I would have liked to.  Still, I do enjoy the DS and 3DS platforms and am looking forward to exploring both libraries further than what I have done thus far.

[+jgkspsx]

On 11/23/2023 at 6:40 PM, roots.genoa said:

The 3DS is probably my favorite video game system of all time, but I'm not sure I have interesting stuff to say about it.

What are your favorite games?

[roots.genoa]

7 hours ago, jgkspsx said:

What are your favorite games?

It would take time to do that... The Monster Hunter, Zelda, Mario, Phoenix Wright games, and a lot of eShop games (Pushmo & Co). The thing is my favorite games ever (Die Hard Arcade, Resident Evil 4, Metal Slug, etc.) are not necessarily on the 3DS, but the 3DS is still my favorite system for 3D and a great balance of games. My 2nd and 3rd favorite systems being the GameCube and Saturn, the 3DS kinda offers a mix between the two, with both SEGA 3D Classics and Luigi's Mansion 2 for instance. Of course it could have been even better with a Metroid Prime game and a Shining Force 3 port for instance.