The release began yesterday in Australia and Japan, and continued this morning in Europe and North America; the ten free GBA games for 3DS Ambassadors are now available!
If you bought a 3DS and connected to the eShop before the system price drop on August 12 of 2011, the following games are yours as a thank you from Nintendo: Yoshi’s Island, The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap, Metroid Fusion, Warioware Inc., Mario Kart Super Circuit, Kirby and the Amazing Mirror, Warioland 4, F-Zero: Maximum Velocity, Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones and Mario VS. Donkey Kong.
As before with the ten NES games, head to “Settings” and check under “Your Downloads.”
Yoshi’s Island is one of my all-time favorites, and I can’t wait to finally play Minish Cap. My 3DS has suddenly turned into the greatest single collection of games I’ve ever held in my hand! No word yet on when these (and other?) GBA games will become available for sale on eShop, but I hope Nintendo will make an announcement soon.
Cass
Excellent, these are all really good games 🙂
XCWarrior
A great list, thank you Nintendo for delivering us some high quality free stuff.
Mohan
Awesome!
David
DOWNLOADED! My 3DS screen is getting full!
Jo
V12 rolling! Nintendo going platinum.
NimH37
Am I wrong..? Nintendo originally said that the GBA games were exclusive to Ambassadors, and that they’d remain that way.
mustache killer
I can’t wait for these games. I have to wait untill i get home to download them. only played yoshis island and wario ware. can’t wait
Kaherka
If we do fill up our SD cards… can we just drag and drop this stuff over to a bigger SD card? Or is it more complicated than that?
Infendo
Minish Cap > than all those others combined! (Sorry, I had to)
wakko1337
I’m a bit disappointed that there is no sleep mode or even the ability to get to the home menu. Also, the GB/GBC games can have a border, but the GBA games don’t. Nintendo missed out on that, but I’m loving the games! Between MK7, SNES Mario Kart for “free” download, and Super Circuit, Nintendo has allowed me to complete my MK collection!
Kaherka
wakk01337, Just hold down select and start when you launch the game. It works on the GBA games too.
wakko1337
I did that, it just made it smaller. I was hoping for a GBA border.
cowmanodoom
I have to agree with Blake on this one.
Richard
@Blake and Cowmanodoom:
Yoshi’s Island is one of the greatest games of all time. If Minish Cap > Yoshi plus all the others listed, then I am reeeeeally looking forward to experiencing this Zelda adventure for the first time! 🙂
Yellow Bear
i wish they would have made warioware twisted as the game instead of the first one…that could have been fun
ghettoska
Nimh37 I believe you are correct, these are for us only.
And I have played minish cap (due to blakes talk ups, and I did love the game), so what game should I start with? How is the kirby? Which other of these games are you guys’ favorite? (Besides MK because that has to be a good one)
Richard
@ghettoska: Yoshi’s Island is one of my top 3 favorite games of all time–Nintendo imagination and game design in full force! The GBA version is 99% as good as the SNES original. Also, Warioware Inc. is still just as weird and fun as it’s always been. Can’t wait to try Minish Cap!
monkat
I would just like to add that these games look great! I feel like (though I could be dead wrong!) they are stretched a bit to make full use of the screen, but not so much that it looks chunky.
Unfortunately, there is no sleep mode, and no save states, the latter being announced previously. It’s not a huge complaint–especially when these things are free–but it is something worth noting. Especially when there is a GBA emulator (for a specific cart) for the regular DS that does support those features.
Sal
10 years later I still can’t figure out how to control my vehicle in F-Zero and Mario Kart Super Circuit… One of these days I will get it down. I can’t put my 3DS down! Wish I didn’t have to work today 🙁
Ac
Yea I agree that the stretched screen isn’t good. Playing in original resolution by holding start or select is the way to go, tho the screen becomes the size of the gba micro. Any case from comments I’m reading throughout the net there are many complaints about the resolution and many people that don’t know yet they have the option to play in original resolution.
Ben P
Maybe it’s just me, but I really think Nintendo should have given us some more options with the 3DS VC. Using A and B for GBA games instead of B and Y to me is awkward as heck. I guess a Super Game Boy-type interface is asking too much…
monkat
@Ben
Why is that awkward to you? All GBA models have diagonally-aligned buttons just like the 3DS.
Anyway, options are always nice, but not exactly Nintendo’s M.O. At least we got these games, eh?
My one complaint about the selection is the lack of Drill Dozer. I really would have loved to get rid of my GBA, or at least put it away. Oh well, free games are free games!
wakko1337
Maybe it’s because I’ve played all the ones I like so many times before, or that I just don’t care for some of these games, but I’m finding them AND the NES games to just be space fillers on my 3DS that I can show off…oh well, I’m grateful they thought of us lol.
Lau
Mario Kart Super Circuit is the best by far!!
Ben P
@monkat
It’s more of a personal preference for me. A lot of GBA games are sequels/ports/spiritual successors to SNES games, and the B-Y configuration used by the latter’s games feels more natural to me. I’ve had this gripe before with games like Kirby Super Star Ultra.
I usually feel like Nintendo games’ great default control settings mitigate any need for options. It’s not that big of an issue, but when there’s a precedent control scheme in place, it would be nice to have options.