Free on Nintendo DS, Android, and in your browser
An endless descent.
Fight, choose, fall, descend again
Think Hades, squeezed onto a Nintendo DS. You start at a campfire in the woods with a sword, a handful of daggers and a crypt that goes down forever. Every room is a fight. Every door is a bet. When you die, and you will, the gold you carried out buys permanent upgrades, and you walk back in stronger.
- Four areas, four bosses, and then the dungeon loops, meaner every lap.
- Sword, daggers, dash and a blast that hits everything around you the moment the meter fills.
- 13 boons and 15 permanent upgrades. Stack boons mid-run, spend gold between runs, and skip ahead with waypoints.
- Three save slots, so everyone in the house gets their own dungeon, their own upgrades and their own record.
- SNES-style pixel art in a 3D world. Torches, campfires and lava throw sparks and smoke across both screens.
- Free, three ways. Play it in your browser right now, put the
.ndson a flashcart, TWiLight Menu++ or an emulator, or install it on your Android phone. Your save moves between all three.
In motion
Depth 6. Orcs, mages and a warlock all want you dead. Swing in combos, dash through the hit, throw a dagger at the one you can’t reach. Every hit you land fills the blast meter, and when it’s full, one button hits everything around you.
The loop
Every run starts at the same camp: a crypt to climb down into, a shrine that sells upgrades for the gold you earned, and a training dummy that takes a beating for free.
- Clear the room, pick a boon. Three choices, and they last the whole run.
- Choose a door. Each one shows what’s behind it, gold, healing or treasure, on the door and on the touch screen. Play it safe or get greedy.
- Every tenth depth is a boss. Beat it and the next area opens up as a waypoint.
- Die. The summary shows what got you, and the gold stays with you. Go buy something and try again.
Four areas, four bosses
Every run builds its rooms from a fresh seed: squares, crosses, rings around a pit, rooms split by a chasm and a bridge, ragged caves, rivers of lava. Then come the hazards. Spike traps, fire traps, saw blades, explosive barrels, floors that crack and drop you. Clear the fourth area and it all starts over, harder.
-
The Dungeon
Depths 1 to 10. Torch-lit halls packed with orcs, mages, brutes, archers and stone idols, and more of them every floor. At the bottom waits the Orc Warlord.
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The Sunken Sewers
Depths 11 to 20. Slick stone, black water, pits everywhere, and shamans who keep summoning slimes. The Slime King rules the bottom.
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The Crystal Caverns
Depths 21 to 30. Glowing crystals that shoot back, bats overhead, crabs that burrow up under your feet. Down here lives the Cavern Yeti.
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The Molten Depths
Depths 31 to 40. Lava rivers, floors that crack as you cross them, fire slimes, imps and charging magma brutes. And the Magma Lord, a dragon.
Face the bosses
Every tenth depth ends in a boss fight, and no two fight alike. Learn the pattern, find the gap, and keep an eye on the touch screen: that’s where the boss’s health bar lives.
- The Orc Warlord charges straight at you, then fills the room with rings and fans of fireballs.
- The Slime King leaps across the room, sends out shockwaves, bursts and splits into slimes.
- The Cavern Yeti hops, slams the floor and brings the crystals down on your head.
- The Magma Lord, a dragon, breathes fire, sends rings of flame and floods the edges of the room with lava.
Grow stronger
- 13 boons per run, and most of them stack, so a lucky pick snowballs: Keen Blade, Wide Arc, Twin Daggers, Piercing, Quick Draw, Flame Dash, Shock Dash, Fleet Foot, Overcharge, Big Bang, Vampiric, Thick Skin and Gold Rush.
- 15 permanent upgrades at the shrine: more hearts and damage, a faster dash, an extra dagger, more gold, Second Wind to survive one killing blow, and two three-step paths. Go Hunter for speed and piercing daggers, or Warden for thorns, healing and a longer breather after every hit.
- Waypoints. Beat an area’s boss and later runs can start in the next area, with free boons to make up for the rooms you skipped.
- Three save slots. Pick one after the title. Each shows its best depth, runs, time played and upgrades, keeps its own run history and settings, and the game remembers which one you played last.
- Records. Best depth, kills, bosses slain, time played and your last runs, so you always have a number to beat.
Made for the DS
The 3D dungeon fills the top screen. The touch screen keeps your stats, the room and your door choices in view. D-pad to move, A to swing, B to dash, Y to throw a dagger, X to set off the blast, shoulder buttons to zoom in and out.
Left-handed? There’s a mirrored layout. Would rather not mash? Switch on auto-attack. Every menu works by touch. The soundtrack is tracker music, mixed to sound clean on the DS’s own speakers.
No DS handy? The browser version plays the same dungeon with a keyboard, a gamepad or a touch pad, on one screen: the touch screen’s panels sit below the game, or over it when it needs an answer. Android plays it the same way, upright or sideways, with a touch pad below or beside the game.
Credits and licences
Delve wouldn’t look or sound like this without the people below. The art and music are the same in the Nintendo DS, browser and Android versions. Their licences, and the notices the libraries in each version ask for, are on this page and together in one file at delve-licenses.txt.
Art and fonts, all CC0
- Shade: Puny Characters, 16x16 Puny Dungeon Tileset, 16x16 Puny World Tileset and Miniworld Sprites: the heroes, monsters, rooms and camp. CC0 1.0.
- devurandom: the Victoria Bold font from a package of 8 bit fonts for grafx2 and linux, which sets the game’s text and the letters of its logo. CC0 1.0.
- Original to Delve: the bat, the clutter, the effects, the flames, the lava and murk textures and the sound effects.
Music
- Kosmo The Cat (CC0 1.0): Calm and simple title music for the title and menus, Wander in a dungeon for the Dungeon and Evil boss music for the bosses.
- Beyond (public domain): Piano tune for the camp and Song0 for the Sunken Sewers.
- Drozerix (public domain): Ambient Starfield for the Crystal Caverns.
- JAM (public domain): Crusaders for the Molten Depths.
Software in the Nintendo DS version
The ROM is built with BlocksDS.
- Maxmod, the music and sound engine. ISC licence. Copyright © 2008-2009 Mukunda Johnson, 2021-2025 Antonio Niño Díaz, 2023 Lorenzooone. Source.
- Nitro Engine, the 3D engine. MIT licence. Copyright © 2008-2024 Antonio Niño Díaz. Source.
- libnds and the default ARM7 program, from BlocksDS. zlib licence, with FatFs by ChaN under its BSD-style licence.
- crts, the startup code, from BlocksDS. Mozilla Public License 2.0; its source is in the sys/crts directory.
- picolibc, the C library. BSD-style licences; see its COPYING.picolibc.
- libgcc, the compiler runtime. GPL 3.0 with the GCC Runtime Library Exception.
Maxmod: ISC licence text
Copyright (C) 2008-2009 Mukunda Johnson (mukunda@maxmod.org) Copyright (C) 2021-2025 Antonio Niño Díaz Copyright (C) 2023 Lorenzooone (lollo.lollo.rbiz@gmail.com) Permission to use, copy, modify, and/or distribute this software for any purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies. THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE AUTHOR DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.
Nitro Engine: MIT licence text
Copyright (c) 2008-2024 Antonio Niño Díaz Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions: The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
libnds and BlocksDS: zlib licence text
Copyright (C) 2005-2011 Michael Noland (joat) Copyright (C) 2005-2013 Jason Rogers (dovoto) Copyright (C) 2005-2021 Dave Murphy (WinterMute) Copyright (C) 2006-2008 Michael Chisholm (Chishm) Copyright (C) 2005-2007 Michael Noland (joat) Copyright (C) 2010 Richard Eric M. Lope BSN RN (Relminator) Copyright (C) 2017 fincs Copyright (C) 2020-2023 Gericom Copyright (C) 2023-2025 Adrian "asie" Siekierka Copyright (C) 2023-2025 Antonio Niño Díaz Copyright (C) 2023 Epicpkmn11 Copyright (C) 2023 profi200 This software is provided 'as-is', without any express or implied warranty. In no event will the authors be held liable for any damages arising from the use of this software. Permission is granted to anyone to use this software for any purpose, including commercial applications, and to alter it and redistribute it freely, subject to the following restrictions: 1. The origin of this software must not be misrepresented; you must not claim that you wrote the original software. If you use this software in a product, an acknowledgment in the product documentation would be appreciated but is not required. 2. Altered source versions must be plainly marked as such, and must not be misrepresented as being the original software. 3. This notice may not be removed or altered from any source distribution.
Software in the browser version
The browser game bundles three libraries.
- three.js, which draws the 3D top screen. MIT licence. Copyright © 2010-2026 three.js authors. Source.
- chiptune3, the music player. MIT licence. Copyright © 2013-2024 The chiptune2.js and chiptune3 contributors. Source.
- libopenmpt, which plays the tracker music, compiled to WebAssembly inside chiptune3. BSD 3-clause licence. Copyright © 2004-2026 OpenMPT Project Developers and Contributors, and © 1997-2003 Olivier Lapicque. Source.
three.js: MIT licence text
The MIT License Copyright © 2010-2026 three.js authors Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions: The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
chiptune3: MIT licence text
All code in this project is MIT (X11) licensed. The only exception are the compiled libopenmpt parts which remain under the OpenMPT project BSD license. License text below: Copyright © 2013-2024 The chiptune2.js and chiptune3 contributers. Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions: The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
libopenmpt: BSD 3-clause licence text
Copyright (c) 2004-2026, OpenMPT Project Developers and Contributors
Copyright (c) 1997-2003, Olivier Lapicque
All rights reserved.
Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:
* Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
* Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
* Neither the name of the OpenMPT project nor the
names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products
derived from this software without specific prior written permission.
THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS"
AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE
DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT HOLDER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR
SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER
CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY,
OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE
OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.Software in the Android version
The Android version runs the same game on two libraries in place of the DS’s.
- SDL 3, with its Java glue: the window, touch, gamepads, graphics and sound. zlib licence. Copyright © 1997-2026 Sam Lantinga. Source.
- libxmp-lite, which plays the tracker music. MIT licence. Copyright © 1996-2026 Claudio Matsuoka and Hipolito Carraro Jr. Source.
SDL 3: zlib licence text
Copyright (C) 1997-2026 Sam Lantinga <slouken@libsdl.org> This software is provided 'as-is', without any express or implied warranty. In no event will the authors be held liable for any damages arising from the use of this software. Permission is granted to anyone to use this software for any purpose, including commercial applications, and to alter it and redistribute it freely, subject to the following restrictions: 1. The origin of this software must not be misrepresented; you must not claim that you wrote the original software. If you use this software in a product, an acknowledgment in the product documentation would be appreciated but is not required. 2. Altered source versions must be plainly marked as such, and must not be misrepresented as being the original software. 3. This notice may not be removed or altered from any source distribution.
libxmp-lite: MIT licence text
Extended Module Player Copyright (C) 1996-2026 Claudio Matsuoka and Hipolito Carraro Jr Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions: The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
Delve is an independent homebrew game by pandymic. It is not affiliated with or endorsed by Nintendo; Nintendo DS is a trademark of Nintendo. It is not affiliated with or endorsed by Google; Android is a trademark of Google LLC. Delve’s own code and original art are copyright pandymic.
Download
Delve 2.5.1 for the Nintendo DS
Free. One file, no installer, no account.
- Version
- 2.5.1
- File
- delve.nds
- Size
- 2.5 MB
- SHA-256
- 714db9886855fa2d364fecc1faa3f2e4e05b55b3cc5282963544085f7a82f973
How to play
- On a DSi or 3DS with TWiLight Menu++: copy the file to your SD card and launch it from the menu.
- On a DS or DS Lite with a flashcart: copy the file to the cart’s SD card and start it from the cart’s menu.
- On a computer or phone: open it in the melonDS emulator.
- Your saves are written beside the ROM as
delve-1.savtodelve-3.sav. Keep those files when you update; a new version picks up where the last left off.
Delve 2.5.1 has been played on a Nintendo 3DS running custom firmware and TWiLight Menu++, and runs in melonDS. Testing on a Nintendo DS Lite with an R4 flashcart is coming soon. Licences and credits, also as a text file.
Delve 2.5.1 for Android
The whole game on your phone. Free, no account, no ads, and it never goes online.
Play Store download coming soon!
- Version
- 2.5.1 (build 12)
- File
- delve.apk
- Size
- 10.8 MB
- Needs
- Android 8.0 or later, 64-bit
- SHA-256
- b5d8e098f7211afc691efbc871dd208bdf17ca950c94a3d8c75cbd847cb7fefd
- To install, open
delve.apkonce it has downloaded. Android asks you to let your browser install apps the first time; allow it, then tap Install. - To update, install the new file over the old one. Your saves stay.
- One screen, upright or sideways. The game fills your phone’s width or height; the touch screen’s panels sit below it, or over it when it needs an answer.
- Touch, gamepad or keyboard. A touch pad in SNES-style pixel art sits below or beside the game, and steps aside when you pick up a controller.
- Your saves move between devices: export a slot as a DS save file and import it on a flashcart or in the browser, or the other way round.
Delve for Android has been played on a Google Pixel 9 Pro. This build’s one-screen layout has been tested on Android’s emulator.
Play in your browser
No download, no account. The same game, on a keyboard, a gamepad or a touch pad. On a keyboard, W A S D move, L swings, K or Shift dashes, J throws a dagger, I sets off the blast, Space pauses, Z zooms and C shows the touch screen’s panels. The mouse works on those panels as on the DS’s touch screen. On a phone or tablet a touch pad appears.
Your runs save in your browser. Export a slot as a DS save file, or import one, to move a save between the browser and a flashcart. The full page can be installed like an app, where your browser offers it.
So far the browser version has been tried in desktop Chrome and Firefox, offline and in the dialog, and on an emulated phone in Chrome. Real phones, Safari and the installed app are untested.
The browser version reports game milestones (a run started, a boss beaten) to analytics, with a random ID kept in your save. Privacy policy.
Feedback
Found a bug, have an idea, or want to tell me what you think of Delve? I read every message.