Play Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan! (J) Online

Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan! came out for the Nintendo DS in 2005, developed by iNiS. It was one of those early DS games that really made you feel like the hardware was doing something new, something you couldn't get anywhere else. It fit right into that era where developers were still figuring out what the touchscreen and dual displays could really do.

You control a squad of male cheerleaders who help people in over-the-top situations by raising their spirit. You tap, drag, and spin numbered markers on the touchscreen in time with a constant stream of J-pop and rock music. The main objective is to keep a progress bar filled by hitting your cues accurately; miss too many and the character you're cheering for fails their task. The game is brutally honest about its difficulty, especially in later stages where the patterns get intensely fast and complex. It creates a rhythm of frantic concentration and sudden, satisfying relief when you finally nail a tough sequence.