Hotel Dusk: Room 215 was a bit of a disappointment in my opinion. I thought it had better artwork than Another Code (Trace Memory), but the gameplay was a bit of a non-event. It's a first-person perspective adventure, like Heart of China, but it also has a map. That's all fine. The non-event gameplay occurs when you hit certain predefined conversation points laid out all over the game. The conversations help to progress the story, but they're mandatory and starting/finishing them feels pretty much out of your control. Somebody talks to you and you just have to follow the rather long dialogue trees until they're finished with you. Worse still, some of the conversations have options that effectively correlate to: Die, Die and Progress the Story. Not a very fun experience. The story wasn't that great either, so I don't know why the game was so keen to shove it in my face.
Both games are a bit of a departure from the adventure game norm. I guess this is partially a product of being on the DS. Trace Memory features a top-down perspective, but feels much more like a traditional adventure game. The story's much more tight than that of Hotel Dusk. It's almost a murder mystery or detective story, not sci-fi as you're first lead to believe. And the game's setting isn't used to much advantage other than to limit the potential size of the game's cast. The puzzles (except for one) are too easy. A better game than Hotel Dusk IMHO, but there are better DS adventures out there.
My advice: If you want real adventure gaming on your DS, get good DS port (read reviews) of a PC adventure. There are a few good ones out there. If you're tossing up between the two you mentioned, however, go with Trace Memory.
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