Nintendo discusses how Switch 2’s new Joy-Con changed during development

In a recent interview, key developers behind Nintendo Switch 2 discussed the making of the new magnetic Joy-Con, revealing that the SL/SR buttons are made of metal and how there wasn’t originally a button that releases the magnet.

Although it’s not something typically done with consoles, the SL/SR buttons are made with metal so that they stick to the magnet included with the Joy-Con. Hardware design lead Tetsuya Sasaki said Nintendo tried out different ideas first, and thanks to technology advancements, it was finally possible. 

Sasaki shared the following with MobileSyrup: 

Sasaki: A notable feature, I think, is for example, the SL/SR buttons, because they’re on the inside – the buttons themselves are made of metal because they need to stick to the magnet on the inside. And actually, in console development, it is incredibly rare for buttons to use metal. And so it was an idea that really didn’t come up very naturally for us in development. So initially, we had a bunch of other ideas on how to make this work. There were many advancements made in the world of technology and we were finally able to get to a place where we could use metal in the buttons. But it took a lot of trial and error until we got there. When you look at the final result itself, it feels like such an obvious answer, but the truth is, when the standard doesn’t exist already, it’s one of those ideas that doesn’t isn’t actually that simple to come up with.

As for the news about Nintendo Switch 2 not originally having a button to release the magnet, that comes from producer Kouichi Kawamoto. He revealed that the system originally had players giving more of a pull to take the controllers off.

Kawamoto stated:

“Originally, we didn’t have the button that would release the magnet. And so you had to pull. And then we discussed, ‘Well, wouldn’t the kids pull it apart?’ So my first request was, ‘Please use a strong magnet.’ And the second was, ‘Okay, if you want to be able to pull it, please make sure you can pull it.’ So I gave that conflicting request to the hardware experts. [laughs] And to take this request and bring it into realization, we had several ideas using magnets, but for some of them, the technology wasn’t quite available to us yet. So again, we just went through so many iterations before we arrived at the solution.”

For much more on Nintendo Switch 2, head on over here.