Joysticks: Probably Still Drifty
Joy-Con joysticks use a potentiometer to read the voltage at a wiper that slides across a strip of resistive material. That material wears down over time, or plastic and dust can dirty the sensors.
Stick drift is a huge problem with other Switch models. One survey found that 40% of Switch owners had problems with their Joy-Cons drifting, and things didn’t get any better with the Lite or OLED editions. After a bunch of lawsuits, Nintendo’s president even admitted it and apologized, setting up a free repair program for customers in some parts of the world.
450 USD and they won’t spend an extra 40 cents on hall effect sticks?
It’s intentional. How else are they supposed to sell you a new set of joy cons every year?
Have you even thought about the shareholders?
Joysticks still drifting is an embarrassment.
It would be, if that were the case.
This article is not alledging a systematic pattern of stick drift in the Switch 2, like there was with the Switch. It isn’t even saying that so much as a single case of stick drift has been found.
What it’s saying is that the Switch 2 still uses potentiometers, a technology which can be susceptible to stick drift. You know, like every single other major console ever launched. So, as of now, we have no particular reason to believe that the Switch 2 will drift worse than the PS5 or any other system.
That said, all the major players are dragging their feet a bit longer on Hall effect sticks a little bit longer than is warranted, Nintendo included.
like every single other major console ever launched
dreamcast would like a word
Dreamcast can’t come to the phone right now, it’s dead.
You’re absolutely right! Dreamcast and Saturn make a very good point: The major players are dragging their feet way longer than is warranted.
What do they use? Is it Hall effect sticks?
yep!
Nintendo doesn’t want to use Hall for the same reason neither of the Steam Decks have, the increased power consumption. From there it was easy for them to justify a magnetic locking mechanism for the new joycons.
But also fuck Nintendo
Hi, are you able to share more about the power efficiencies of each type of sensor? Some cursory browsing of TI datasheets gives me the impression that both types use a similar amount of power. I may be missing some context, though.
I did also find this cool report there. Could be pertinent, although from what I understand of the technology I don’t see why you couldn’t use the same techniques to save power with a digipot.
HE uses like 25% more power compared to the usual sensor. Meaning a huge decrease of about 2% in joycons battery life.
Not sure if that’s supposed to be sarcasm
The more I learn about the Switch 2, the less I want to buy it. thanks Nintendo I’ll wait until Ryujinx 2 comes out
I will never, ever buy the switch 2 then.
My gamecube controller still doesn’t drift. Nintendo can do better.
Your Gamecube controller also isn’t Hall Effect.
Yeah, I think we should wait and see how prevalent the drifting is this time around before freaking out. Of course it’s going to happen to some people because every stick that uses this technology has some incidence of drifting, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to be as bad as last time. I have lots of these kinds of sticks on lots of gamepads over the years and only the joycons have ever drifted.
everyone: Nintendo is a horrible company that does shit that’s harmful to consumers and the gaming industry!
also everyone: WOW can you believe I was able to buy a Nintendo Switch 2 the literal day it released?!?!
We really showed them. 🤷♂️
Yet suckers keep buying that junk. Luckily I just hate Nintendo.
I’ve genuinely had more fun with an 80€ Anbernic loaded with old Gameboy games than any other modern console.
Honest question; was it not possible to mod the original JoyCons to add hall-effect joysticks?
Yes, end users should not be responsible for having to do this - but if a cottage industry exists to repair/upgrade drifting joycons that would be awesome to see.
The problem is that it requires disassembling the controller. Apparently that’s a quite the pain for the switch 2
Yeah, I did it. It was annoying. It seems it will be more annoying for the switch 2 (which I’m loving begrudgingly).
Yes, it is possible
That exists, you can get switch form factor hall effect joysticks on aliexpress.
Everyone was telling me that this time they would have fixed it. Called it. I think I’m down to one joycon that doesn’t drift :P
I’ve never had stick drift with PlayStation or Xboxes despite people telling me it’s a problem. The switch though is awful for it.
I don’t know what they do to make their analogue sticks so bad but they’re definitely getting them from the world’s cheapest supplier, apparently one that even Sony and Microsoft turned up their noses to.
PS/Xbox controllers have more internal space, so their joystick modules are much, much larger than what goes in the joycon. That means they can have more material in the potentiometers, meaning less susceptible to wear and dust/dirt intrusions.
JoyCon 1s also have a flap that dust can get into, and that’s likely a large part of the problem. This is fixed with JoyCon 2s, so I’m not sure why everyone’s jumping to the assumption that they will be equally brittle.
did the nintendo management change or something? did we get new laws about repairable devies standards?
so im just wondering what did you guys expect
Yeah, I’ll just buy a 3rd party joycon if it’s supposed to drift anyway, at least they last a bit longer and cost much less
That will show them
Anyone else getting a 404?
Works fine for me.
If its still there and its obviously a well known issue, they left they in there so you artards would have to give them more money for repairs 🤣🤣
They’ll just get sued again if they try that.
What do you mean try? It’s done.
It’s been out like a week I don’t think there’s been time for anyone to experience stick drift yet.
Dw, it’ll come.
You can’t bring a lawsuit for something you think might happen.
Oh wow what incredible insight, here i was thinking time worked in reverse soz man.
Oh, yeah!
You gotta get sDrifty
You gotta get sDrifty in here
It’s time to get sDrifty.
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Why fix something that is making you even more money?!
Exactly this. Lots of companies have figured out that filling our landfills with cheap plastic crap is a lucrative business model. In this case, it’s cheaply made and expensive to replace - making it hugely profitable. Shareholders would be furious if they were to fix this issue.
But the invisible hand!
I like how they raised the price on the controllers and only used magnets for a non-issue and not for the thing that is the problem.
Eh, those rails were a huge issue over time for people who primarily used their switches in handheld but did swap/remove joycons semi-regularly. My launch model (that I ended up giving to a friend’s kid when I got my Steam Deck) would often need me to attach and detach the right joycon a few times to make it fully register that it was connected.
But yeah. Tinfoil hat and all but a LOT of speculation is that the magnetic based connection is to prevent hall effect aftermarket sticks from working since those are also magnetic. TMR isn’t impacted by that but the vast majority of folk would have never considered TMR for a gamepad until the past year or two.
And the deluded fucks still charge more than US$250 for their half-a-console. It’s got good processing power and stellar shell construction, but charging the same price Xbox and PlayStation do for their full entertainment consoles, for a handheld main with the same defect-prone joysticks, tiny battery, stickers for the Joy-Con socket decal, plastic screen and 1080p display? In 2025?
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Tears of the Kingdom is one of the best games ever made, shame they keep it exclusive though.
Emulators play it better than on original hardware 🤷
I disagree, and I think open world games are basically the cheapest way to pump a game out. Game development has stagnated, and basically, everything Nintendo releases is a testament to that. Indie games are basically the only realm in which real game design is happening.
While I’m not a huge fan of BotW and TotK, I think it’s a disservice to say they were a cheap way to pump out games. You can see the design intent in both exploration and gameplay mechanics. There’s a lot that works well in those games that allows for the player to continue playing for a while and still have fun.
And this is probably the only time I’d be seen defending those games.
I don"t know if it’s in question that open world isn’t the cheapest way to make a game. It really is. You can make a series of discrete challenges without really needing to take time to consider context or even put any set pieces together. You create mechanics, and you let players create their own fun. I will concede that I am MOSTLY disparaging BOTW.
I would disagree with this sentiment on a basic game design level. I don’t know about the Zelda games, I didn’t care enough about BotW to play more than a few hours, but designing a large map that incorporates multiple biomes in a believable way is much more difficult than creating a bunch of smaller levels that don’t have to have any relation to each other in the slightest. You can get away with a lot more in terms of map geometry and set pieces when you load into each level individually.
This is obviously different when you’re talking about Bethesda-style load into every building style environments vs Elden Ring “You see that castle in the distance? You’ll be going in there eventually” design, but the fact that Bethesda makes their interiors separate from the rest of the world is how they cheap out on their games. It’s less hardware intensive and you can cheat a lot more in your design. And on a gameplay level that goes for Ubisoft-style collectathon map objects (and Zelda shrines in this case), but that’s not unique to open-world games - it’s a lazy cop-out that game devs have used forever to pad out their games. Collecting all the secret skulls in Halo is the same thing, but because it’s implemented well and doesn’t drag on forever with no reward like most open-world collectibles, it feels totally different.
