NYXI Wireless Transparent Pro Controller (Hardware)
Official GBAtemp Review
Product Information:
Ever since I first held, nay, cradled a Nintendo Switch in my burly man hands, I had one complaint: the Joy-Cons were simply too small. Identifying this shortcoming, I immediately invested in an official Nintendo Switch Pro Controller, and never looked back. As controllers go, it's perfect for shooters like Splatoon 2, it's incredible for fighters like Smash Ultimate, and it's thoroughly rock-solid for everything else in between--but you know what it hasn't got? RGB lighting!
The NYXI YS10 Wireless Switch controller takes a dash of PowerA styling, a hint of RGB, and the various functionality of Kitt from Knight Rider to provide you with the ultimate low-cost solution to your Switch gaming needs. This controller comes in at just £35.05 which is just over half that of the £54.99 official first-party pad, and it offers rumble, gyro controls, turbo modes, and a slew of lighting features.
Holding the controller in your hand it feels lightweight, sleek, and kind of slippery, but not too slippery, just the right amount of... well.. slippery. It pulls no punches as it couldn't be textured else it would gain an opaque quality that would diffuse the RGB lighting within, instead; it is crystal clear and as smooth as you like. During testing, I didn't get particularly sweaty so I couldn't account for those with tepid moist meathooks, as to whether if the pad got impossibly slippery when wet and therefore you could possibly lose your entire grip on the thing.
Coming in at just a few millimetres bigger all around than the official Nintendo Pro pad, the NYXI Pro Controller feels a little more like holding an Xbox Controller than a Switch Controller. The A/B/X/Y Face buttons are clustered in a perfectly equidistant 45-degree tilted square as opposed to the official Nintendo layout being that of a somewhat squashed diamond, meaning ultimately that X and A are slightly closer together on the NYXI than on the Pro.
The joysticks and the D-Pad have a satisfyingly concave design language to them, veering away from the traditional Joy-Con style convex Analogue stick tops and opting for something there is no way your thumbs could possibly slip off of mid-game. The outer ring of the sticks have tactile rubber dots all around that really give you a great level of grip to each thumb. The D-Pad is clicky rather than mushy and sits prouder than that of the official Pro controllers D-Pad, which in my opinion is a good thing. For fighting games, in particular those with flaming balls of energy needing to be cast out of your character's hands, the ability to input Down > Down Forward, > Forward swiftly comes easily with this D-Pad though the tough rigid plastic with its less than rounded edges may well give blisters to any unseasoned fighting gamers delicate little handy-pandies.
The Triggers appear similar though they too are elongated downwards to extend the ZL and ZR buttons' reachability which makes for some slightly more accessible triggering in some games and allows for a looser style of grip when holding the controller on the whole. In addition to the face buttons you also have the Plus and Minus buttons as their symbolic shapes instead of being round buttons with the characters embossed into them, and there is also an additional T button to control turbo functions, whereby you hold the T button and press one of the face buttons to initiate firstly rapid-fire when holding the button, and then secondly a handsfree automatic rapid-fire, which can be cancelled out by holding just the T button for 5 seconds once more. There is another button down to the bottom right of the right analogue stick that controls those LEDs, and the RGB functionality of this pad is great and really easy to implement on the fly too, as long as you can remember all the combinations; and boy there are a lot of them!
Tapping the LED button by the right stick turns on the LED's and then tapping it repeatedly cycles through the various 8 colours and multi-colours available. LED button plus D-Pad up or down increases or decreases the brightness by 25% increments, and LED button plus the X button started up the rather spiffy reactive mode that sees the left Joystick tilt granularly controlling the LED brightness from 0% to 100%. The more you tilt the brighter the LED, so if you're playing a game like Smash Bros and flicking the stick in copious directions per second that pad will flicker more than a flame in the wind.
Punching the LED button plus the Y button engages the gyro reactive mode which means the more you tilt the entire controller, the more the LEDs awaken from 0% to 100%. Tilting up yields yellow, down; red, left; blue and right; green. Gingerly pressing the LED button plus the A button will put the LED into breathing light mode, which is rather more subdued than the other modes and far more relaxing to observe. Lastly, LED button and B puts the LEDs in vibration mode, so when the pad vibrates in-game, the LEDs light up in perfect synchronicity.
The NYXI also holds a couple more features, one of which allow you to recalibrate the gyro with Minus and B held whilst powered off, and most critically, reset the analogue sticks by holding A, X and Home to perform a controller self-calibration to hopefully mitigate any drifting issues you may face. During my time with the controller I never once noticed any drift, and every input was clean and precise with a similar expected amount of input lag as the official pad.
As far as third-party Switch controllers go; the NYXI is a decent outing. There are other pads out there that offer more buttons, various amiibo trickery, and controllers of every imaginable colour and patterning; however, the NYXI comes at you with a more basic approach, focussing on RGB, Turbo and Gyro as its USP and it performs brilliantly. You'll also be happy to hear that this little USB-C powered pad charges for 2 hrs and gives back 6 hrs of play or up to 25 days of standby time, just in case.
Everything I threw at it worked great with no notable issues; it was a very pleasant and smooth experience with no major quibbles at all. If there was one desire I had, perhaps to let us use it on iOS devices too to make it more appealing to take with me on the move, but honestly, it really is no big deal, after all, it's primarily a Switch controller!
Verdict
- Turbo, LED and Gyro functions are great!
- Ideal for a spare controller.
- RGB lighting is great in reactive modes.
- Not compatible with my existing Switch clip grip :(
- No Amiibo/NFC support.
- Doesn't work on iPhone (but then neither does the official Pro pad)
