Whenever it comes to technology you can carry around with you – whether it be a cellphone, MP3 player, or as in the case of this review the Nintendo DS Lite – it’s always practical and smart to carry around your much beloved (and probably mighty expensive) hardware around in some type of armor for protection. If you’ve been looking for something to protect your DS Lite – as well as get a couple of extra goodies in the process – then the Nyko Ultimate Kit Lite might be just for you.

The Nyko Ultimate Kit Lite comes in one of three colors, ranging from a camo color to mostly black and red or mostly white and gray (for review purposes we looked at the black model). The case is made of a smooth and slick sort of material, feeling like something a light windbreaker or jacket might be made out of. The case also features one zipper compartment, a plastic locking clasp that feels quite strong, and several metallic button compartments that clasp firmly and aren’t easily pulled apart, so you won’t have to worry about something inadvertently opening and something slipping out and being lost or either broken. There is also a strong metallic clip that fits through a loop, letting you fasten it to another bag or any other locking mechanism, and there is a tight loop where, if you wanted, you could slip your belt through it and wear the kit on your hip.

The case is quite nice, giving you two slim side compartments on each side of the case, letting you fit one stylus into each one, which is a good thing when you consider the fact that the kit also comes with two extra styluses, both of which you can store with your kit right off the bat. The styluses feel a bit cheap, which wouldn’t be a terrible thing if we didn’t feel as if the tips were a little too hard, worrying us that we’d be scratching our DS screens at any possible minute.

In the zipper compartment you’ll find eight plastic sleeves where you can store eight separate DS cartridges, and each DS game slips firmly into place, resting easily against either the slick material of the case or against the smooth and fuzzy material on the inside of the flap. The biggest problem with this pouch is that every single side uses the fuzzy orange, which is the material we prefer, though there is one slot only where it uses the black material of the case instead.

The orange material that the cartridges rest against is also the main material used for the inside of the case where the DS Lite fits into place. The system rests comfortably within the center of the case, and is protected nicely by thick and cushiony sidings that give the case a bit of strength and rigidity, making it so that the case won’t easily be crumpled and will hold its shape and protect your DS Lite in the process.

Besides getting a nice and sturdy case to hold plenty of games, two styluses, and your DS Lite system itself, you also get with the kit a car charger so that even if you are away from home or any other source of electricity – say you are out camping somewhere for example – you can use the car charger to keep your gaming habit going and going and going. The charger fits firmly into place within any car lighter and then plugs naturally into the charge port on the DS – give the system a bit of time to charge and you’ll be gaming again in no time at all.

The car charger is a great addition to the ultimate kit, but there are some faults with the package, making it not exactly live up to its name as an ‘ultimate’ kit. As we said the styluses feel a bit cheap and as if they might do some damage to our screen, and there are a few design choices we don’t like about the case itself, namely being the fact that the cartridge section doesn’t match throughout, and when it comes to the buttons and their latches, though they work excellently, perhaps they work too well, as it sometimes feel as if the fabric might rip and tear if we spent a lot of time opening and closing these buttoned portions (namely the buttons on the back where the metallic clasp is). Overall, though, it’s still a really great package for the money.

Rating:
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