Handheld advice needed

[Deleted]

Sooo... I've got a bit of money to spare and would like to get myself a handheld, seeing as I don't like mobile phone-gaming.
I'm going to university by train, which takes ~3 hours every day (1.5 per ride).. won't be going there every day, seeing as my university is kinda nice in that aspect...

Now to the problem at hand:
I want a handheld to entertain me on those rides and when I have some free time at university.
I do NOT want a Vita, as it's not worth it for me... at least for now, might change when the price drops to ~150€, plus a new Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts or Monster Hunter or something to get me entertained...

Now here is important information regarding the games I like to play:
I want to play games that are time sinkers... AND I really like RPGs.
I also like JRPGs, so something like "Chrono Trigger", "Final Fantasy", "Kingdom Hearts" and more are something I really like.
I also like Adventures.. and a lot of stuff Nintendo does.. like pretty much all Mario-stuff. Don't like the new Mario Kart-games though... always remembering the old games which were just awesome at their time.



So what it comes down to, aka TL;DR:
- no Vita
- like RPGs and JRPGs
- like Adventures and stuff.. as long as it's not the "Professor Layton"-stuff... I'm clever enough to play that, but I really don't find it entertaining.
- want to have enough time sinkers



I've added a poll and would really like to read peoples opinions and what would also help is posting some games you could recommend.

Thanks for reading!

[Kankuri]

I highly recommend purchasing a 3DS. I bought mine at launch, and it was rather iffy at the beginning. The launch titles were okay, but all the hype was reserved for the holiday season. I definitely wanted one before the inevitable price drop and crazy scarcity around Christmas.

Now I have:
Mario Kart 7
StarFox64 3D
Pokemon Rumble Blast
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D
Super Mario 3D Land
Super Street Fighter IV 3D Edition
Harvest Moon: A Tale of Two Towns
Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater 3D
Resident Evil: Revelations
Tales of the Abyss
Tekken 3D: Prime Editon
Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Overclocked

All of the purchases were completely worth it, and it will only get better this year.

I also point you to this thread. It's our local DS/3DS discussion thread where you might find some things to sway you in purchasing a 3DS.

[Coldkil]

Got a 3ds in exchange of my old DSi for a lot less money + splinter cell and zelda:OoT.

Best buy ever.

[Crow_eyeS]

Get a PSP with Monster Hunter Freedom Unite.
Imho that solves the problem, taking into consideration also the fact that regular mission lenght (at max) is 50 minutes,
I think that would serve you quite well during those boring train hours, I know that for a fact, since my university is more than a hour of train away and i was in your same position.

[Deleted]

*snip*

Thanks for the post, I went to the thread and just went to the last page to read from there.
Found out from the post of Mistral again that I'm such a huge sucker for jRPGs -.-
Saw "Tales of the Abyss" marked as jRPG, went to YouTube and after ~3 minutes I'm already in love with it :/

Really need some great RPGs and jRPGs to play!

[Mechazod]

I am sure the vast majority of people will say DS or 3DS but I would have to suggest giving the games on the original PSP a look. There were some amazing titles on it that seemed to have gotten overshadowed not from the fact that they were bad but just because of the system they were on.

PSP actually has a pretty big and decent list of RPGs for it since you mention you liked those, so does DS but personally I think I like the ones the PSP has more, some of my favorites being Half-Minuet Hero, PoPoLoCrois, the Disgaea series, the remakes of the Legend of Heroes series, remakes of Final Fantasy 1,2,4 and Tactics, Jeanne d'Arc and of course there is also Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep and Crisis Core.

If you like games like the Zelda series but don't like the touch screen controls of the DS ones then check out the Ys series on the PSP, they play somewhat like the original Zelda games but at a much much faster pace, especially Ys Seven which is in my opinion one of the best games on the system.

There are also a lot of great remakes for PSP such as Gradius Collection, Valkyrie Profile Lenneth, Street Fighter Alpha 3, Breath of Fire 3 and even some better remakes of DS games like Metal Slug XX.

Finally above all my favorite feature of the 2000/3000 model PSP units is the fact that you can connect to a television set and play your games on a large screen, that is one thing that definitely makes me prefer the original PSP over DS and I really hope Nintendo has plans to do something like this for the next version of the Super Game Boy/Game Boy Player planned for Wii U to play DS and 3DS games on. If however you do get an original 1000 model PSP then you don't have this feature but you do have access to custom firmware and emulators.

Oh and PSP has a couple Monster Hunter games.

Either that or get an original model DS/DS Lite so that you can play DS games and also have access to the Game Boy Advance library. I couldn't honestly recommend 3DS at this time just because there is nothing on it currently that has caught my attention other then Kid Icarus and Paper Mario.

[Duruka]

The DS has quite a few JRPGs I believe. Pokemon is a big time-sink if you haven't played it already. There's also the Zelda games and a couple Mario ones, if you like those. You can play GBA games on the DS too.

I believe there's a Kingdom Hearts and a Monster Hunter game coming to the 3DS at some point, as well as some JRPGs and a Zelda game. Eventually they'll stop making games for the DS, so this might be a good choice. The only downside is the battery life, which only lasts about 3 hours.

[rafein]

for RPG's, it's kinda a Push, though there are not that many great RPG's on 3DS yet.

At least 3DS lets you play DS game, and there are A LOT of really good RPGs for DS to hold you over until good games come for 3DS.

PsP has a nice selection, mostly on the PsP network. The original FF tactics, Disgaea, SMT:Persona 1 and 3. A lot of nice downloadable game.

If I had to choose 1, I'd go 3DS, though.

[Primernova]

I would say get a good smartphone but the 3DS is a solid system.

[McNeil]

I like the 3DS personally, bought mine at launch. But I have no experience with JRPG's at all. If someone finds a good JRPG game for the 3DS, then please say me which one so I can try it out

[Zeta333]

If you dont want a PSP then the only other option is a DS, dunno what the point in asking. Id recomend books myself, seeing as how iv been more entertained by books than the current or past few gens of handhelds. You could get a laptop, load it up with tv shows and watch on the ride or play minecraft. If you have the cash that would be my biggest recomendation.

[Gallahadd]

if you want a handheld with decent RPG's espeically JRPG's get a PsP, buy Final Fantasy Tactics and kiss the next six months of your life goodbye

p.s. I would recommend making your character a Monk, with Ninja as secondary for Dual Attack, use the Samurai defense skill and Guts secondary tree :P

oh, and USE ORLANDEAU :P