The Nintendo DS version of Tony Hawk's Proving Ground was developed by Vicarious Visions. Its gameplay is very similar to the DS version of Tony Hawk’s American Sk8land. In the game's story mode, your objective is to progress as a career or hardcore skater. This entails completing various goals across three different categories: Career, Hardcore, and Neutral. By accomplishing these goals, you earn money that can be used to enhance your skate park. As you tackle enough challenges, professional skaters make appearances, and their challenges, when completed, allow you to acquire new skate park elements and advance to the next level.

This version of the game incorporates certain gameplay features from the console versions. Aggro kicking enables the player to gain speed more rapidly. Some missions involve executing Gesture Tricks, where you replicate motions on the touch screen, reminiscent of the Nail The Trick feature in the console versions. Most missions are completed at different difficulty levels, and challenges are scattered throughout the levels, both of which were introduced in Project 8. However, this version lacks the open world design. The downtown areas of Philly and Baltimore are absent, and the Air & Space Museum incorporates elements of the National Mall. Additionally, several levels have been redesigned to suit the hardware, with Lansdowne being the most notable example. The Xbox 360 and PS3 versions' skate lounge is replaced by a sizable customizable skatepark.