I just noticed this. You never had a DS, Mop it up? That blows me away! Especially since you were an early adopter of the 3DS. Wowzers. So, what are you playing from its software that you like?
I didn't say I never had one, I just didn't have one when I bought a 3DS. Back in 2008 I got a DS Lite for Christmas, and got New Super Mario Brothers, Super Mario 64 DS, and Mario Hoops. At that time I was mostly interested in the Mario games on the system, as you can see. When I looked into getting some more games like Mario and Luigi: Partners in Time and Pokémon, I found them to be pretty expensive! So after beating the games I decided to sell it all off instead, a decision I still don't regret. I've never really been into handheld gaming, finding console systems to be the better experience in every way, and without a way to play DS games on a TV I'm not willing to pay much for them.
What I do regret is buying a 3DS for several reasons that I won't get into. I was actually about to buy another DS Lite since the price had dropped to $100, and a lot more DS games had been released that interested me, and DS games had dropped in price a lot. But when I went to buy it, I saw an offer on Amazon to get a $25 gift card when you buy a 3DS. I decided to get that instead, because I didn't think it would drop in price for a long time, and I could use it to buy and play DS games as I wait for 3DS stuff to get released and drop in price. It seemed worth it as a 2-in-1 sort of deal. I somehow missed the memo on 3DS sales falling off a cliff, so I should have deliberated over that decision more.
I actually hardly used the 3DS until the 3DS XL came out. I bought one not too long after that in a holiday sale, and then was able to sell my original 3DS for a nice price due to being the holidays. The exchange cost about $10 and was way worth it. The XL is still no TV, but it's a lot better than all non-XL models for sure. The Circle Pad Pro XL also helps make it more like a controller, further increasing its tolerability.
That was probably more than needed to be said, but oh well. So far, best thing on the DS for me has been the Etrian Odyssey series. It's got elements of old-school RPGs and dungeon crawlers without all the limitations and primitive designs, so they're a lot of fun. Dragon Quest V is a similar deal, old-school charm, new-school package. Pokémon Mystery Dungeon, surprisingly fun, surprisingly addictive. Dare I say better than the mainline games. Picross 3D, what a great puzzle concept. Tetris DS is pretty cool, too. There are a few other games that stand out to me, but I'll leave it there. I'm mostly interested in the RPGs on the system since that's one of the few types of games that have been lacking on consoles for at least a decade. I've got many more games I haven't gotten around to playing as well.