Nintendo DS

The Dual-Screen handheld was initially named the Nitro System, then later the City Boy (ironic, since it put an end to the Game Boy lineage). Unlike the Game Boy Advance, the DS wasn't more powerful than the console it was based on, the Nintendo 64. Regardless, it was much more successful (obliterating the PSP market share in the process, but Sony's business decisions didn't help matters), with more third-party support and more content with the advent of cheaper high-capacity game cards and the power of LZ77 compression.

It prints money!

Debug Button
Commercially-released DS consoles normally have the buttons A, B, X, Y, L, R, Start, Select, and the D-Pad – the ones used during normal gameplay in commercially-released games. However, there is another button called DEBUG which is only present in dev units. The DEBUG button is stored (like X and Y) under an address for DS-exclusive buttons, unlike the rest of the buttons which were also present on the GBA.

It is possible to get DS games to recognize this button input by using the DeSmuME emulator, but it is otherwise unused.


 * Golden Sun: Dark Dawn - the DEBUG button resets the game, much like pressing L + R + Start + Select.

Unused Banners
All Nintendo DS games have banners that show on the DS menu at start-up when the cartridge is inserted. The graphics for these banners are located in an overlay file called banner, under the ftc directory.

However, many games on the Nintendo DS have duplicate and sometimes unused variants of their banner graphics lying uncompressed elsewhere in the ROM out in the open, often in a banner directory. It is unknown why, since the Nintendo DS doesn't use or check for these files. Notable games having such unused alternate banners include The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass and Learn with Pokémon: Typing Adventure.

On a related subject, Wi-Fi Download Play files are stored as standalone DS ROMs inside the main game ROM. They have data for banners which goes unused anyways. Often it is just a duplicate of the banner for the main game, but many pre-2006 games used a placeholder banner (pictured here) probably from a SDK kit for the banner. The internal title for these is Nintendo DS - Demonstration, translated to all languages.

Similarly, there are many DS games where this banner is a leftover from the DS SDK kit for the multiboot ROM header. The text is the Japanese word for "icon" (アイコン). Examples of such games include:
 * Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates
 * Star Wars III: The Clone Wars

iQue DS (Chinese version)
iQue DS, the Chinese version of the original Nintendo DS, has regional protected games unlike all other versions. They are unplayable outside Chinese consoles, triggering an glowing red error message ("Only for iQue DS", in English). This protection can be circumvented by changing from  to.

For some reason, Nintendo 3DS does not use the protection and will play iQue DS games. There has been a whopping five games released for the iQue (not counting the Nintendogs game included in the iQue DSi internal memory):


 * Polarium (Zhigan Yi Bi)
 * WarioWare: Touched! (Momo Waliou Zhizao)
 * Yoshi Touch & Go (Momo Yaoxi: Yun Zhong Manbu)
 * Super Mario 64 DS (Shenyou Maliou DS)
 * New Super Mario Bros. (New Chaoji Maliou Xiongdi)

Language Select
Regular DS systems have a language option in all firmware. iQue DS replaced Japanese with Chinese, while the Korean DS replaced Italian with Korean.

For DSi systems, the option for changing the DS language is only present in US and European firmware. Japanese, Korean, and Chinese models of the DSi do not have this option and default to their respective language if available (or English for non-Chinese models).

Also, aside from some early Nintendo DS releases (like Project Rub, Sonic Rush, and Super Monkey Ball), many Japanese games that are localized to the US or Europe have their Japanese language option unavailable, even when setting the firmware to Japanese. Likewise, US versions often dummy out in a similar fashion any languages other than English (and sometimes French and Spanish), and Japanese games that have already an English script (like Kousoku Card Battle: Card Hero) makes only Japanese language available.

Wi-Fi Simple Start Mode


Similar to the AOSS option in the US Wi-Fi configuration menu, there is also a Simple Start option, allowing to connect your DS to a Simple Start compatible router. However, since these routers are Japan-exclusive, the button for this option got removed from the Wi-Fi configuration menus in American, European, Australian, Korean and Chinese games.

It can still be accessed in these versions, translated and fully working if used with such routers, but you'll need to offset the Touch Screen calibration: at the very end of the calibration process, when asked to press the spot at the square's center, press its bottom-right corner instead. When you enter Step 2 in the in-game Wi-Fi configuration menu, you can access this option by pressing the pixel in the top-left corner of the Touch Screen.

Revisional Differences
The DS Lite officially added four backlight brightness levels, while the original could only toggle the backlight on and off. However, the last minor revision of the original model (which shipped with v5 firmware) supports multiple levels of backlight in hardware, which can be toggled using homebrew or by installing FlashMe.