Toy Story 3

Toy Story 3: The Video Game for Nintendo DS is a 2010 action-adventure based on Disney•Pixar’s Toy Story 3. Developed by n-Space and published by Disney Interactive Studios, this handheld version was released in North America on June 15, 2010, alongside the film’s launch period. It follows Woody, Buzz Lightyear, and their fellow toys as the familiar characters face a new chapter in Andy’s life. Rather than being a reduced copy of the home-console release, the Nintendo DS game has its own portable structure, built around Story Mode and a separate Playtime mode for the system’s two screens and touch controls.

Story Mode turns scenes inspired by the film into a sequence of compact adventures. Players take control of Woody or Buzz as the toys tackle outsized hazards in the human world, including a speeding train, space-bound enemies, and a downhill wagon ride that has run out of control. The campaign combines platforming, light combat, movement challenges, and character-focused set pieces, keeping the toys’ small scale central to the action. As the journey unfolds, the game draws on the film’s central group of toys and its themes of friendship, change, and making sure that no companion is abandoned.

The two heroes bring their own identity to the adventure while sharing the screen with the broader Toy Story cast. Woody’s sheriff persona and Buzz’s Space Ranger identity frame the game’s contrasting western and science-fiction imagery, letting the DS version move between toy-box fantasy and everyday places made perilous by a toy’s perspective. Collectible Pixar balls can be gathered during play, and progress can open rewards such as outfits. The result is a level-based game designed for short handheld sessions while still linking its events to the story of Andy preparing to leave for college and the toys’ uncertain future.

Playtime is the Nintendo DS version’s distinctive companion mode, not the free-roaming Toy Box found in several console and computer editions. It uses themed playmats such as an Old West setting, a prehistoric world, and an alien planet as tactical stages. Players choose Woody or Buzz and protect a home base from marching enemy toys by selecting toy weapons and placing them with the touch screen along the enemies’ route. Defeated opponents leave blocks behind, which can be collected to buy additional defenses, so positioning and spending resources become part of each match.

New Playtime playmats are unlocked through Story Mode, tying the two halves of the game together. The mode also supports local multiplayer through DS Download Play-style multi-card wireless play: two players with their own game cards can join a Playtime session, select characters, and defend an unlocked map together. The cartridge is DSi Enhanced as well, and on a Nintendo DSi it can use the audio modulator to alter recorded voices with Alien-themed effects. Those features make Toy Story 3: The Video Game on Nintendo DS a version with a specifically handheld emphasis on touchscreen defense play, portable story levels, and local cooperative play.