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Gameware Nintendo DS Lite Games Wallet
by delasandro
I don't play my Nintendo DS anymore but when i did i used to play it alot. So when i went on holiday 3 years ago i desperatley wanted to take my DS with me as it was fashionable at the time and also would be great for the long train and plain journeys, and also the delays etc at the airport. However, as you can imagine, this could have ... been a great pain as it would mean I would not only have to carry the DS, but also the games themselves which are tiny, yet the cases for them are quite a big size and they're not thin either. At the time I was hooked on 3 games, and i have 11 more which i didn't play but wanted to take with me just in case i felt like it. I was so close to not taking them, yet the hassle would still remain of having to carry around my DS plus 3 main games I like on top of all the other luggage i had. But fortunately i came accross this in GAME store when i was looking to buy spare stylus's.
The price of this game case is pretty cheap at only £2.99 as i had payed at the time. But as is the case with most thing - You get what you pay for! This was never going to and was never designed to set the world alight. It's just meant to be a basic wallet to store your Nintendo DS game cartridges without the hassle of having to carry around such huge cases.
This wallet allows you to carry upto 15 games as it has 15 slots. These slots are big enough to fit the full amount of game in comfortably without damaging them buy squashing them together etc. That's basically it about the product and what its meant to be used for. The thickness of it when full and closed is actually the same size/ slightly thinner than one DS game case alone so it shows it's use fully in this category.
However there are many things to be wary of when buying this case. The material used all round is pretty cheap and can be bent easily. This is bad if your giving this to kids as they may play with it while unknowingly at the same time damaging the games inside. The games inside are also not protected very well. Although it has only happened a few times, some of the cartridges do seem to slip out of their positions and although it hasn't happened to me, you may lose the game. However, i think that the wallet when closed is tight enough for it to not fall out of the top or bottom of it and maybe thats why i haven't lost any.
Overall, very basic product designed to make it more portable to take Nintendo DS games around. It's cheap and you get what you pay for. It was good enough for me but if your giving it to kids then i would suggest possibly investing in a stronger one which would cost a bit more.
5/10 for doing it's job and being cheap.
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R4 Cartridge Revolution for DS
by maoflro
This is a great little device if you just simply can no longer afford to buy games for you Nintendo DS or DSi. The first thing to me noted is that this does not come with a Micro SD card, so you will need to purchase one separately to this, but depending on what size you want you should be able to easily pick one up for less than £10. ... I'm not going to tell you the intricate details of how to download a game onto it, because I'm just here to pass my judgement on whether I think it's good or not. This is great if you want to download MP3s or any DS game onto your DS completely free. All you have to do is download a ROM of any DS game from somewhere on the internet. There are loads of websites all over the internet where you can download ROMs to put on the Micro SD card.
Once you have a ROM on the Micro SD and The Micro SD in you R4 in your DS, all you need to do it start it up like a normal game, select games and select the game you want to play. Once you have done this any game you select plays just as if it were a normal game in your DS.
One thing to note is that this will not work in a Nintendo 3DS and if you have a Nintendo DSi, you should stop updating it because Nintendo send out updates to stop these from working.
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Orb DSi/DS Lite Play Case
by Nar2
My first foray into Blockbusters video shop last week for a very long time made me scan the shelves for Nintendo DS games rather than look for the latest films, which a friend of mine who was accompanying me visits almost every night searching for the latest films out on the shelf. Since the purchase of my Nintendo DS hand console three ... years ago, I have been going through carry cases approximately one a year apart because up until now I've always used clear Perspex holders that bond onto the top and bottom of the DS console to protect it. The clear Perspex holders are cheaply priced from Ebay and although well made for general protection, the shoulder buttons on my DS have had to be replaced because of the design of the cradle inserts. They don't always expose the shoulder buttons correctly, with a slight wall of plastic getting in the way and putting pressure on the buttons themselves, which eventually attracts dirt from the static nature of the Perspex and speedy fingers!
Briefly there are so many Orb type cases at Blockbusters from the downright tacky with light colours like pink, red and navy blue with fake stitching patches to simple "all clean" perimeter stitched leather look cases, the latter of which I was attracted to as it makes the Nintendo DS look rather like a small Filofax and at best, the least offensive compared to the plastic or chrome badged, zipped affairs on sale. The colours would have been tempting had they not been a dull coloured PVC and the best looking without needlessly being too shiny proved to be the black "leather look" edition. At a cost price of a reasonable £5-99, (£6-60 Amazon) I thought what I came away with was a reasonably good price, especially considering the money I had paid out previously online at double the charge plus an extra P&P fee.
Initially I was stuck between two particular designs where both Orb cases looked like mini Filofax folders and annoyingly both designs come in the same box so be warned about this, but whilst one had a swing out page where the DS could be placed whilst behind it lay little pockets for three gaming SD cards to be slid into. Luckily my friend behind the desk pointed out that the one with the swing out folder has been the unluckiest design so far, with many buyers returning to the shop to complain about the swing out partition coming away from the seams. This product in plain black leather with a single magnetic catch and single pull strap (rather like a hand bag) is far simpler to operate and lacks the swing out cradle page holding the DS. It measures approximately 13.5 cm length by 7cm width (when folded over) and a depth of 3cm once the DS or DS Lite has been placed in.
For a start the Orb leather look case has a permanently bonded bottom partition cradle in which the DS can lock into whilst spaces at the top of the bottom eaves of the case allow fingers to use the shoulder play buttons on the DS without any other plastic getting in the way. The difference with the Perspex holders is that there is nothing on the top when the bottom of the DS is locked into this kind of soft feel case. I also note that Orb have concentrated well in building in secondary locks within the plastic cradle that hook onto the two squares either side at the top of the DS to ensure that the console is completely locked in, whilst the top half of the case has the obligatory leather pockets for Nintendo DS game cards - but only three pockets - which minimises variety of game play if you have more than three of your favourite cards on board - or four cards if you put an extra one into the actual game console.
Included with the Orb case are two elasticated slits in the centre that carry one DS Lite stylus and one DS stylus, both of which come free with this product. This is where you'd find ring binders in a Filofax just to give you a clearer idea of what this product looks like. Both styli (?) are pretty similar to the one that is already standard kit with the DS game console and I've used both on my DS, which work extremely well, despite the differences of name per model. The only problem is that the case feels really too stiff to get at the built in stylus on the console as the back outer card is obviously built in, under the soft spongy leather coating but difficult all the same to exert flexibility, to remain strong and sturdy. I'm hoping that this will weaken in time - and even if it doesn't - at least there are two other stylus pens to fall back on that don't fall out due to the tight stitched rolls that keep them in place and both of them are either thinner (for DS Lite) or thicker (for DS) correspondingly with lock tops that would naturally be able to fit into the console themselves - a very good detail here as many replacement stylus pens don't have the flush fitting top. Those slightly cheaper looking-to-the eye pens are a bit easier to pull out in the case than trying to get at the one built into the DS itself.
The interior of the leather case is made up of black felt and leather inserts. Whilst the PVC leather feels like leather with a soft and rewarding touch, the black felt on the backing often catches my finger nails where my fingers would push out instinctively towards the shoulder buttons of the DS when in use. The felt is annoying to say the least and it's a pity here that Orb haven't substituted a kinder, more tactile fabric here, even if it adds a contrasting appeal to the masses of PVC leather on display. The leather pockets are similarly stitched very tightly against the back wall of the holder, which means it can be tricky to take out SD cards in a hurry, as well as pushing them back in without ruining the "finger pick" concave design fitted into each leather pocket slot.
When it comes to general use, without the use of a mains charger and depending on the time you spend with your DS, I find that my hands also get very sweaty very quickly because of the leather exterior, and then added to this the interior of black felt. Inadvertent finger slips are abundant after a couple of hours of game play for example, and it's a pity here that whilst the Orb case is easy to keep clean with just a damp cloth, the exterior is so slippery and heat inducing, it is impossible to continue long hours of gaming enjoyment without grabbing a tissue to let the heat subside into my hands. Whilst the Orb case has a good flip open design, the Orb case is also cumbersome to use once the mains charger is plugged into the back of the DS. The case can't be shut until the mains cord is taken out and it's a pity here that Orb didn't fit an open/shut flap so that the mains cord could be pushed in or taken out with the two eaves closed and locked up - that apart from the PVC leather is about the only downsides.
Over the more expensive Perspex holders my Nintendo DS has seen over the last three years, the Orb case is a much better idea, even though the DS itself isn't protected to the sides and from a distance looks like a leather bound hard back book with the white colour of my DS showing off in the middle and single thick width strap via a magnetic lock to fasten it together. For the fact that the outer eaves have strong card backing with a leatherette exterior, it's not a bad choice as a protective hard case and one I'd recommend with only a serious caution for long term play - otherwise it's a case of warm leatherette - not just a song made famous by Grace Jones! Thanks for reading. İNar2 2011
www.blockbuster.co.uk
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