I’m still not over the epicness of the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct last week. The next generation is sure to be a huge crowd-pleaser with hardware improvements and exciting games on the horizon, but there’s one question many of you may have: Will the Switch 2 Joy-Cons be better than the first iteration? While I remain hopeful that will be the case, a recent interview confirms that the controller doesn’t feature Hall Effect sticks.
Speaking to Nintendo Life, Nintendo of America’s senior vice president of product development and publishing, Nate Bihldorff, explains that “the Joy-Con 2’s controllers have been designed from the ground up,” but “they’re not Hall Effect sticks.” While it’s clear that Nintendo doesn’t want another situation like the flood of lawsuits it got following the shoddy performance of its Switch Joy-Cons due to drifting, it’s still somewhat baffling that the company is choosing not to use Hall Effect sticks.
To put it in layman’s terms, the selling point of Hall Effect technology is that the components inside your controller don’t require a physical connection. In contrast, traditional analog sticks, such as what you see in the Switch Joy-Cons and the Switch Pro Controller, rely on the components touching. Over time, this connection can cause wear and tear on the components, leading to the drift issues that the Switch Joy-Cons suffer from.
Hall Effect sticks, meanwhile, require no connection between the components as they rely on electrical conduction instead. In the interview with Nintendo Life, Bihldorff didn’t mention whether or not Nintendo implemented the technology in the Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller. Still, as he doesn’t discuss it, I’d wager that it doesn’t.
None of us can judge the performance of the new Joy-Cons until the Nintendo Switch 2 release date arrives, but I’m sure Nintendo is putting its best foot forward to avoid past mistakes. Nobody wants to be stuck going in the wrong direction in the new Mario game – who knows where you’ll end up in Mario Kart World with its open world?
If you’re ready to part with some cash and secure the upcoming hardware, we can tell you what you need to know about the Nintendo Switch 2 price and the Nintendo Switch 2 pre-orders.