Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day! for DS

Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day! is a puzzle game that Nintendo published for the Nintendo DS in 2005, built around daily short tests led by a caricature of neuroscientist Ryuta Kawashima. Metacritic prints a Metascore of 77, and Wikipedia reports worldwide sales of 19.01 million by 30 September 2015.

Overview

The game appeared in Japan on 19 May 2005 and reached North America in April 2006. In PAL regions it was named Dr Kawashima’s Brain Training: How Old Is Your Brain? It belongs to the Touch! Generations line of games aimed at a more casual audience and is meant to be played a little each day, like Nintendogs and Animal Crossing: Wild World.

Wikipedia credits development to Nintendo SPD, with Kouichi Kawamoto as director and Shinya Takahashi as producer. It describes the game as edutainment, and it was released as an entertainment product. There has been controversy over how well it works as brain exercise.

How it plays

The DS is held on its side like a book. Everything is controlled by writing on the touch screen or speaking into the microphone. At the start the player confirms the date, the writing hand, a name and a birth date.

The core is the Brain Age Check, which presents three puzzles and then reports a “brain age”. Per Wikipedia the best possible result is 20 and the worst is 80, based on Kawashima’s idea that the brain stops developing at 20. A Stroop test, where the player says the colour of a word instead of the word itself, usually comes first for people who can speak. Alternatives that avoid the microphone include Calculations x 20, Word Memory, Connect Maze and Number Cruncher. Word Memory shows 30 four-letter words for two minutes.

Besides the check there are Training, Quick Play and Sudoku modes. Finishing a puzzle yields a time, a speed label running from bicycle to rocket, and a hint. Only the first attempt of each day counts toward scores, and stamps earned each day unlock harder variants and more puzzles. Kawashima sometimes asks for a drawing from memory or for a recollection of yesterday’s meal, which he asks about again several days later.

Up to four people can keep profiles on one card and compare their top-three results. Through Download Play, a copy can pass a puzzle to another DS, and the Calculations x30 variant accommodates up to sixteen people.

Release and credits

Dates on Wikipedia are 19 May 2005 for Japan, 16 and 17 April 2006 for the United States and Canada, 9 June for Europe and 16 June for Australia. Metacritic prints 17 April 2006 as the date, one day after Wikipedia’s United States entry. Wikipedia lists Nintendo SPD as developer, where Metacritic says Nintendo.

Sales in Japan reached 2.32 million by June 2006, and Europe passed two million by January 2007. The sequel, Brain Age 2, followed, and Wikipedia mentions two later redesigns, a DSiWare edition and a 3DS title. A Wii U eShop release reached Japan in mid-2014.

Reception

Metacritic’s score rests on 58 critic reviews. Wikipedia says Western reviews were generally positive, with some criticism of poor voice and handwriting recognition at times. Edge gave it its EIEF06 Edge Award for innovation. The Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences named it Handheld Game of the Year at the 10th Interactive Achievement Awards in 2007. Wired placed it fifth in a list of the fifteen most influential games of the decade.

Can you still play it?

The cartridge runs on a DS, DS Lite and DSi, and the 3DS family handles it in DS mode. A Wii U or a Switch has no way to read it. Wikipedia’s article on region locks puts non-DSi DS cards outside regional restrictions, so a European “Brain Training” copy runs the same as a North American one.

The software uses no online service, which means the Wi-Fi closure of 20 May 2014 did not change it. The Wii U eShop edition, sold only in Japan, went with the shop’s closure on 27 March 2023. Nintendo discontinued the 3DS line on 16 September 2020.