The “How to Train Your Dragon” Video Games

What fan of How to Train Your Dragon wouldn't want to interact with or even ride one of the dragons? Especially the Night Fury Toothless from the movie franchise. Well, the closest you'll probably ever get is to play a console/PC video game or “Massively multiplayer online role-playing game” (MMORPG) over the Internet.

Note that the “free to play” games available, like most others of their kind, require either lots of time spent playing to earn rewards, or “upgrade” purchases with real money.
Lots of kids these days are getting addicted to video games, and especially MMORPGs and “free to play” games. Many are spending all their pocket money (or parent's money) on upgrades, missing out on school, becoming physically ill and so forth. However, in moderation (just like most things), video/online games can be quite fun. Keep an eye out for invasive privacy policies with online games.
The paid PC/console games can be played without further payments/microtransactions, which is good.

The following games can still be played, but (mostly) defunct games are not listed:

Dreamworks Dragons: Dawn of New Riders

By Outright Games Ltd., this game doesn't let the player play as Hiccup or Toothless, but instead focuses on a new Rider/Dragon duo - Scribbler and Patch, the “Chimeragon” dragon. The duo's task is to defeat the villians who've destroyed a dragon sanctuary created by Hiccup and the Dragon Riders.

Graphics-wise, the game has a chibi-style rather than aiming for realism. It's mostly a dungeon crawler adventure game without much flying. The story of the game attempts to explain and tie in some events between the second and third movies, the “School of Dragons” MMORPG, TV series and even graphic novels.
Some reviews have mentioned that while these tie-ins were noticed, they didn't really contribute to the overall Dragons story in a serious way.
Generally seems to be regarded as a fun little game, that won't take long to complete.

(Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, PC)

Dragons: Titan Uprising

A reasonably standard match-3 puzzle game by Ludia. You can collect and level-up dragons, and crossbreed them - for example a Deadly Nadder with a Stormcutter (not that such a thing would work if they were real).
Criticised as overly commercial and having “slot-machine” elements to it, but also praised for its quality graphics, good bug-free performance and fun factor by a number of reviews. Apparently, the game becomes increasingly difficult to complete without spending real money.

(Google Play, iTunes)

Dragons: Rise of Berk

A “village-building” game by Ludia, once again praised for its quality graphics and artistry, but appears to share much of the criticism regarding “Titan Uprising”.
It's apparent that a lot of work went into creating this game, and although having been launched in 2014, it continues to be upgraded with new features and content.
According to long-time players' reviews, actual money is required to make solid progress further into the game. (This is common with so-called “free-to-play” games.)

(Google Play, iTunes, Amazon Appstore, Facebook)

How to Train Your Dragon

Mostly a tournament fighting game pitting dragon against dragon along with a few somewhat related mini-games, which doesn't make much sense as Hiccup would never pit dragons against each other. There's no meaningful attempt to follow the Dragons story either.
The game didn't receive especially good reviews, however can be bought cheaply second-hand nowadays. How much is interacting with one of the movie's dragons worth to you? You can play as Hiccup or Astrid and fly with their dragons - that alone sounds pretty good!

(Wii, Xbox 360, PS3 and Nintendo DS)

How to Train Your Dragon 2

Much in the same vein as the previous game, however has made some attempts to improve on its predecessor's flaws. Still received a number of poor reviews, and essentially remains a collection of mini-games.
Still... you get to fly Toothless as Hiccup! Maybe it takes an actual fan to overlook the game's weaknesses.

(Xbox 360, Nintendo 3DS, Wii, Wii U, PlayStation 3)

DreamWorks Super Star Kartz

A go kart racing game with DreamWorks Animation characters, where Toothless actually sits in one of the karts! Where else can you ride a go kart as Toothless? You can also ride as Hiccup, if you want.
Once again, the reviews weren't especially good for this game and apparently it does have some annoying bugs here and there, but people did manage to enjoy it for what it is.

Toothless riding a go kart?! Hahah!

(Xbox 360, Nintendo 3DS, Wii, PlayStation 3)

School of Dragons

The MMORPG game, which can be played over a computer's web browser with the Unity plugin or on tablets and smartphones.
Has been around since 2013 and can be free to play, however will require actual money to be able to fly Toothless and get other “upgrades” - it's a very commercial game, like a lot of its kind.
For a number of years, the game seems to have been affected by unusual bugs that disrupt gameplay, and a lot of people have been complaining bitterly on forums and review websites.

A good portion of this game's reviews are quite disturbing and paint a picture of increasing commercialism and sales-tactics within the game - when the game first was released, these elements apparently weren't as obvious. Some reviewers have complained of not receiving their purchases after paying with credit card, or losing their purchases afterwards, with apparently no support or resolution. You'll need to agree to a number of lengthy terms and conditions when registering, so consider those things before jumping right in.

However it's certainly popular, had a lot of work put into it and continues to receive regular content updates.

(Google Play, iTunes, Amazon Appstore, Facebook, PC/Mac with Unity 3D browser plugin)

HiccupTheViking.com

You can find games related to the original book series by Cressida Cowell as well. These are little interactive games on the HiccupTheViking.com website. You'll need the Adobe Flash plugin installed on your web browser.
These little games aren't like the ones from the movie franchise, that have had tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on them.

On the website you'll also find picture downloads, character biographies and more information on the original book series. Everything 100% free, without intrusive ads.
See the "Fun Stuff" page with the games by clicking here - opens a new browser window.
(Adobe Flash browser plugin)

More information

For greater insight into the How to Train Your Dragon video games, as well as now defunct ones, you can visit the HTTYD wiki pages that go into fine detail:

https://howtotrainyourdragon.fandom.com/wiki/Category:Video_Games
See the HTTYD wiki here, you will go directly to the video games category.

• Tidbits and factoids on each game that you noticed, and feel may interest others as well
• your own experience with playing each game, good or bad, such as bugs or other problems that affected gameplay, as well as the real-world money involved in playing it - something that rarely or never seems to get mentioned in reviews
• ways of owning or playing each game legally, but also more cheaply than paying the standard expected prices - finding a bargain
• what you liked or disliked about the game
• if this page should be separated into a basic overview, with the extra information put into "review" type blog posts.

See our Planned Updates & Updates Log blog post for more details.