DSiware Games - What are they and which ones are good?

[Makar | 1,946]

Has anyone played DSiware games? The DSi came out after the DS and the DS Lite, and I’ve never met anyone who played DSiware games, even after they added them to the 3DS eshop. You could download DSiware games to your DSi through the DSi shop back in the late 2000s.

DSiware games seem to be mostly lost to time and rather unknown. I was curious if there are any DSiware gems out there that are worth downloading from the 3DS eshop while that’s still a thing. This is a list of all DSiware games for those interested. All DSiware games are on the 3DS eshop as far as I know. https://www.nintendolife.com/dsiware/games/browse?sort=popular

What’s interesting is most (if not all of these games) are not listed on Nintendo’s eshop website. You wouldn’t know they exist for purchase unless you googled them or went to the eshop on your 3DS. 

I briefly browsed through all 18 pages of DSiware games on the 3DS eshop last night. These were the notable ones that stood out:

BlayzBloo: Super Melee Brawlers Battle Royale (DSiware exclusive) - A fighting game that looks like a lesser super smash bros. No idea how good it is. 

 

Cave Story (on multiple systems) - Cave Story is an awesome platformer. The 3DS has Cave Story 3D, so I’d just get that one instead unless you want to save some money. They’re the same game but 3D has some updated graphics. 

 

Commando Steel Disaster (on physical DS and DSiware) - The most confusing one I saw. It looks like a Metal Slug copy. Run and gun kind of a game. What’s weird is a couple things. This game had a physical release on the DS. It’s also not listed on Nintendo’s eshop site (as far as I could tell). If you don’t want to pay $85-100 just for the DS cart, eshop is the way to go. 

 

Crystal Monsters (DSiware exclusive) - Looks like a Pokémon clone but I can’t tell if it’s actually good or not from the pics. 

Dragon Quest Wars (DSiware exclusive) - The only DSiware game I’ve ever played. Didn’t even know this game existed. Is it great? No. Is it worth checking out if you’re a dragon quest fan, sure. I don’t remember it being too challenging or memorable from playing it years ago but it did give me a couple hours of entertainment. 

 

Mario VS Donkey Kong: Minis March Again (DSiware exclusive) - mouthful of a title. If you like this series, here you go. 

Photo Dojo (DSiware exclusive) - looks like a unique fighting game. I’ve read it’s good. 

 

Shantae: Risky’s Revenge (on multiple systems) - It’s the sequel to the original Shantae. If you like Shantae, well here you go. 

 

WarioWare: Snapped! (DSiware exclusive) - if you’re a warioware fan, here you go. 

 

Zenonia (on multiple systems) - Solid RPG from everything I’ve read.

[Lynda Monica | 350]

You my friend happened to stumble into somewhat of a DSiWare expert! I bought a DSi back in the day because I was hyped for a game called "Mighty Flip Champs", and I played a lot of DSiWare.

Here are the top picks from me!

Mighty Flip Champs: Wayforward's first Mighty game, and easily the best one. Very inventive and fun puzzle platformer well worth picking up.

Mighty Milky Way: Wayforward's second Mighty game before the series because exclusively restricted to Mighty Switch Force. This one is also excellent, though not quite as intuitive as Mighty Flip Champs. Both of these games are infinitely better than any of the Mighty Switch Force games, and you should pick them both up while you still can.

G.G Series: Horizontal Bar: A two dollar entry point for a highly inventive, and fun momentum based platformer about spinning around on a horizontal bar, and propelling yourself to the next one. It takes quite a deal of practice to get good at, but it has extremely accurate controls that work flawlessly once you understand them. Highly worth picking up.

99 Seconds: A really simplistic, yet highly stylish score chase game that originated on DSiWare. It was later ported to the Wii U! Very fun game.

Gaia's Moon: Not as strong as the ones listed above, but still a fun score attack game. It's similar to the rocket barrel levels of the modern Donkey Kong Country games, but with many more things coming at you. It's simple, but lovely.

Abyss: Also ported to the Wii U, this is a short, but wonderful underwater maze game that oozes style. Very much style over substance, but the style is worth the two dollar asking price.

Dark Void Zero: Remember the Capcom game Dark Void? Of course you don't! Though many people remember this game, which was an 8bit parody game that pretended to be a long lost NES Capcom classic. Many people still believe the marketing stunt they pulled about it to this day, but a marketing stunt it was. Even still, the game is quite good, and has some kicking tunes too.

A Kappa's Trail: A game that's essentially impossible to describe, mainly due to the creativity of its creators. Brownie Brown was responsible for A Kappa's Trail, and you may remember them from Mother 3 and Magical Vacation fame. It's a solid game worth owning, and any fan of the Mother series should support the developers other work.

Trajectile: An extremely polished shooter puzzle game brought to us from Q Games. This is a must own, and one of the top titles on DSiWare.

X-Scape: A sequel to the Japan exclusive Game Boy game "X", and a really radical DSiWare exclusive. Pick it up!

Link 'n' Launch: One of Nintendo's most underrated first party games, Link 'n' Launch is on paper a simple tile puzzle game, but in reality is a really head scratching and fun space navigation puzzle game. It has incredible music too, none of which has been posted on Youtube. Pick this one up for sure.

As for the original post, DON'T buy Crystal Monsters, as it's terrible.

There may be more that I know of and have forgotten about, and some of the good games have already long been delisted, but if you want a bucket list of DSiWare games, pick up ALL of the ones I mentioned before they get delisted. They're fantastic little games that will be lost to time soon.

Edited June 15, 2022 by Lynda Monica

[Tanooki | 4,942]

It used to be on iOS but aged out with their 32bit requirement minimum, but there was Flight Control.  Overly basic looking overhead thing, various speed planes and a chopper too.  Make flight paths with the touch panel so everyone lands safe, no crashes or game over.  I miss it, hate the mobile version aged out.

There was also that gimme of Zelda Four Swords too

[fox | 1,668]

Starship Defense all day

[twiztor | 851]

18 hours ago, Lynda Monica said:

Dark Void Zero: Remember the Capcom game Dark Void? Of course you don't! Though many people remember this game, which was an 8bit parody game that pretended to be a long lost NES Capcom classic. Many people still believe the marketing stunt they pulled about it to this day, but a marketing stunt it was. Even still, the game is quite good, and has some kicking tunes too.

never heard of this, but i am SOLD!

[Makar | 1,946]

19 hours ago, Lynda Monica said:

You my friend happened to stumble into somewhat of a DSiWare expert! I bought a DSi back in the day because I was hyped for a game called "Mighty Flip Champs", and I played a lot of DSiWare.

Here are the top picks from me!

Mighty Flip Champs: Wayforward's first Mighty game, and easily the best one. Very inventive and fun puzzle platformer well worth picking up.

Mighty Milky Way: Wayforward's second Mighty game before the series because exclusively restricted to Mighty Switch Force. This one is also excellent, though not quite as intuitive as Mighty Flip Champs. Both of these games are infinitely better than any of the Mighty Switch Force games, and you should pick them both up while you still can.

G.G Series: Horizontal Bar: A two dollar entry point for a highly inventive, and fun momentum based platformer about spinning around on a horizontal bar, and propelling yourself to the next one. It takes quite a deal of practice to get good at, but it has extremely accurate controls that work flawlessly once you understand them. Highly worth picking up.

99 Seconds: A really simplistic, yet highly stylish score chase game that originated on DSiWare. It was later ported to the Wii U! Very fun game.

Gaia's Moon: Not as strong as the ones listed above, but still a fun score attack game. It's similar to the rocket barrel levels of the modern Donkey Kong Country games, but with many more things coming at you. It's simple, but lovely.

Abyss: Also ported to the Wii U, this is a short, but wonderful underwater maze game that oozes style. Very much style over substance, but the style is worth the two dollar asking price.

Dark Void Zero: Remember the Capcom game Dark Void? Of course you don't! Though many people remember this game, which was an 8bit parody game that pretended to be a long lost NES Capcom classic. Many people still believe the marketing stunt they pulled about it to this day, but a marketing stunt it was. Even still, the game is quite good, and has some kicking tunes too.

A Kappa's Trail: A game that's essentially impossible to describe, mainly due to the creativity of its creators. Brownie Brown was responsible for A Kappa's Trail, and you may remember them from Mother 3 and Magical Vacation fame. It's a solid game worth owning, and any fan of the Mother series should support the developers other work.

Trajectile: An extremely polished shooter puzzle game brought to us from Q Games. This is a must own, and one of the top titles on DSiWare.

X-Scape: A sequel to the Japan exclusive Game Boy game "X", and a really radical DSiWare exclusive. Pick it up!

Link 'n' Launch: One of Nintendo's most underrated first party games, Link 'n' Launch is on paper a simple tile puzzle game, but in reality is a really head scratching and fun space navigation puzzle game. It has incredible music too, none of which has been posted on Youtube. Pick this one up for sure.

As for the original post, DON'T buy Crystal Monsters, as it's terrible.

There may be more that I know of and have forgotten about, and some of the good games have already long been delisted, but if you want a bucket list of DSiWare games, pick up ALL of the ones I mentioned before they get delisted. They're fantastic little games that will be lost to time soon.

Wow thank you for the extensive list!! I’ll be checking all these out. Trajectile already looks solid and one I’ll very likely be picking up. Thank you for the insight into Crystal Monsters too. That’s kinda what I figured. The mons kinda look like what someone would do if they made a fake Pokémon game. Doesn’t look very polished. 

5 hours ago, Tanooki said:

It used to be on iOS but aged out with their 32bit requirement minimum, but there was Flight Control.  Overly basic looking overhead thing, various speed planes and a chopper too.  Make flight paths with the touch panel so everyone lands safe, no crashes or game over.  I miss it, hate the mobile version aged out.

There was also that gimme of Zelda Four Swords too

Looks like Flight Control is still on the eshop for $5. I almost added Zelda four swords to the list in the original post but saw you can’t download it for free anymore. 

45 minutes ago, fox said:

Starship Defense all day

This one looks solid too. Thanks for the tip!

[phart010 | 1,708]

On 6/15/2022 at 2:10 PM, Tanooki said:

It used to be on iOS but aged out with their 32bit requirement minimum, but there was Flight Control.  Overly basic looking overhead thing, various speed planes and a chopper too.  Make flight paths with the touch panel so everyone lands safe, no crashes or game over.  I miss it, hate the mobile version aged out.

There was also that gimme of Zelda Four Swords too

I’m still real upset that Nintendo only released the Zelda game for a very short window of time. That’s ridiculous 

[Makar | 1,946]

59 minutes ago, phart010 said:

I’m still real upset that Nintendo only released the Zelda game for a very short window of time. That’s ridiculous 

Sounds like it was mainly a promotion/celebration type deal. 
 

“Released as part of the 25th Anniversary of The Legend of Zelda series, the remaster was made available as a free download between September 28, 2011 and February 20, 2012 internationally via the DSi Shop and Nintendo eShop.[7] It was later made available again as a free download between January 30 and February 2, 2014 in North America, exclusively via the Nintendo eShop, after the release of A Link Between Worlds to celebrate its critical acclaim,[4]including the Game of the Year award from GameSpot.[8] Currently, the game is not available for download.”Released as part of the 25th Anniversary of The Legend of Zelda series, the remaster was made available as a free download between September 28, 2011 and February 20, 2012 internationally via the DSi Shop and Nintendo eShop.[7] It was later made available again as a free download between January 30 and February 2, 2014 in North America, exclusively via the Nintendo eShop, after the release of A Link Between Worlds to celebrate its critical acclaim,[4]including the Game of the Year award from GameSpot.[8] Currently, the game is not available for download.

[wongojack | 217]

On 6/14/2022 at 11:44 PM, Lynda Monica said:

 

Dark Void Zero: Remember the Capcom game Dark Void? Of course you don't! Though many people remember this game, which was an 8bit parody game that pretended to be a long lost NES Capcom classic. Many people still believe the marketing stunt they pulled about it to this day, but a marketing stunt it was. Even still, the game is quite good, and has some kicking tunes too.

 

I went looking for a like-minded soul to discuss Dark Void Zero, and this was the only comment I could find here directly related to the game.  I got this who knows how long ago on Steam and just started playing it this week.  I think it is pretty genius and not sure why there are so many bad reviews on Steam for it.  They mostly focus on the DRM that was implemented when it was first released with a few negative comments like "It's too hard."

 

Anyway, I suppose there's no DRM for DSiware, but I guess you can't buy it anymore.  As for the game being too hard - ha!  If it had been a "real" NES game, it would have been harder and made much less sense.  They mixed in a lot of "modern" game design stuff, and I think it is really fun to play.  It is only 4 levels, but it has some collectibles to find and difficulty levels.  Anyone who likes the NES Capcom stuff should give this a play wherever you can find it.

[Sumez | 2,969]

Always thought Metal Torrent looked really cool. Actual original shoot em up from the geni muses at Arika, and it's a DSiWare exclusive! 

[koifish | 556]

I played a LOT of the game AlphaBounce. It was like Breakout or Arkanoid, but was an adventure game. Interesting and fun concept. Somewhere along the way, I lost the game install (and the save data) and gave up on the game.

[Estil | 1,265]

Don't forget the non-game stuff too!