this post was submitted on 12 Sep 2023

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Nintendo has filed a patent for ‘smart fluid’ joysticks, perhaps to eliminate drift | VGC (www.videogameschronicle.com)

submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

47 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Let's hope this isn't just a random patent, and we actually get better sticks next generation.

all 48 comments

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[–] [email protected] 48 points 11 months ago (2 children)

It is absolutely amazing that nobody seems to have clicked through to the actual article.

So for all the "just use hall effect sticks" people, the patent is apparently not just for a solution to drift but also a way to add variable pressure to sticks, kinda like what Sony does to triggers.

It took me like fifteen seconds to read deep enough to find that.

For what it's worth, I think it could be interesting, especially if applied in a Nintendo-like way, bur proprietary stuff like that tends to go underutilized. You know, like the triggers on the PS5 controller.

[–] n3m37h 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

You do know Sony utilizes hall effect in the triggers?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

For the haptic feedback? No, it's a mechanical screw with a physical stop to keep it from turning at the right time. You can see it disassembled here. The sensor may be a hall effect sensor, I don't actually know, but once again, the patent isn't about drift.

Watching that video gave me flashbacks about how much of a pain in the ass these are to disassemble, too, which is why I have several of these with stick drift issues just gathering dust instead of actually repairing them.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 11 months ago (1 children)

It’s not clear, then, whether developers would be able to change the resistance of the fluid to provide some sort of force feedback, or a resistance similar to that of the triggers in the PS5‘s DualSense controller (for steering in racing games, for example).

For someone who supposedly read the article you seem to be making big assumptions

[–] [email protected] 23 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (2 children)

No, I read the whole thing, including that line, but that's entirely editorializing from the reporter. The quotes from the actual patent are pretty clear, machine translation word soup aside.

You being nitpicky made me go dig up the full patent, which makes it even clearer: "(...) The intensity of the magnetic field can be designated from the application. Thus, it is possible to perform flexible control in accordance with the application".

I don't blame the commenters for not going that extra step, though, that's just me being fastidious. I do blame the reporters focusing on stick drift because mah clicks for not reading the patent properly, though.

EDIT: For what it's worth, I find the idea of a stick being full of ferrofluid or whatever else they're using for this to be... likely finicky and potentially messy and fragile, depending on how much you need in there to make it work properly. This sounds intriguing and weirdly high-tech, but if you made me bet I wouldn't feel comfortable putting money on this showing up on a Switch 2 just yet. Could be wrong, though.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

I found a comment about the accuracy of the reader combined with a factual difference from the article very ironic and should be elaborated, which you did. +1

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Reading your edit here.

I won't buy a Nintendo controller again until they're out for awhile and I know they're good.

The two I have are garbage and I didn't even get drift. The stick flick makes a lot of high precision games unplayable. And most of the time I use a third party controller that's better, more reliable, and half the price.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

I mean, that's fair enough, I suppose. Like I said elsewhere I've had more problems with the PS5 controllers than the Switch ones, but my guess is this is luck of the draw. Some people just don't like the Joycon form factor, and that's also fair. I have some wrist issues and split controllers are amazing for my specific issues, so I'm very on board with the design for very specific reasons.

FWIW, I suspect a lot of the issues people report with those things are down to connectivity, not build quality. The BT antenna in those is terrible and it's being power starved to run on their tiny batteries. I've used literally hundreds of Joycon at one point or another and rarely seen legit stick drift, but I've had controllers where in a noisy environment just your hand grip could make the connection get all flaky. What the Switch does in that scenario seems to be to just hold your stick position and call it a day, which isn't great.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Jesus Christ just use the same sticks as everyone else does

[–] [email protected] 41 points 11 months ago (3 children)

I don't know about Xbox, but drift issue is pretty common in PS5 controller too, and I recall reading that all companies uses sticks from same manufacturer.

Everyone online sings praises of 'Hall-effect' sticks, but no one (Sony / MS / Nintendo) is currently using them, probably because of higher cost.

If this works, this will probably solve the issue for Nintendo at least.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 11 months ago

i bought my pack of 10 hall effect sensors for like a couple bucks. i know things scale but my bet would be on planned obsolescence

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I've had far more stick issues on PS5 than Switch, but that's probably just luck of the draw.

For the record, the patent isn't about removing drift at all, from what I can discern, it's about adjustable resistance sticks.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago

Well, it's for new type of sticks, and the design seems to be good for removing drift too.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 11 months ago

But they are, and they all have drift problems.

The quick, easy and convenient solution is moving to Hall effect sticks.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

As Mudman stated, the article is really about Nintendo patenting analog L3 and R3 so it’s pressure sensitive. No one is making those yet.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Using the larger, potentially more durable, joysticks would mean a larger potentially less portable Switch. Given that portability is the core feature of the Switch I can understand Nintendo's reluctance to implement them. Especially when other companies are experiencing similar issues with their sticks. In my opinion a novel approach is the way to go here. Hall effect is nice, but it is costly and could potentially present some legal challenges at the moment.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

@JonDorfman, what legal challenges?

@Cicraft

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago (2 children)

A company already makes hall effect joysticks that are JoyCon sized and they claim to hold a patent for them. I haven’t taken the time to verify, but even if they don’t have a leg to stand on they could still take Nintendo to court.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

@JonDorfman I wonder how they would do that while also not violating patents on JoyCons that I suppose Nintendo has.

I have not checked, but would be surprised if they do not.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Nintendo doesn’t hold a patent on the JoyCon joysticks. As far as I am aware they are an off the shelf component.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

@JonDorfman, I did a quick online search for Nintendo’s JoyCon patents, and interestingly found a US one from 2023 (2020 in Japan) about what looks Hall effect analogue sticks:
https://patents.google.com/patent/US20230280850A1/

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

That patent is what I was referring to when I mentioned a novel approach.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

@JonDorfman, right, but Hall effect analogue sticks themselves have existed for a long time, so that technology in general (except any novel addition) is (most likely) not patented anymore.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 11 months ago

To be fair I hope anybody and everybody that has a leg to stand on in court does so and wastes their time and money there.

Nintendo consistently uses it's legal might in anyi-consumet ways to harm its biggest fans. As somebody that loves Nintendo games, fuck Nintendo.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 11 months ago (2 children)

the problem with the current switch is that the joycona are unusablely small

Increasing the size neard the size of the steam deck really won't decrease the portivility as your gonna carry a power adapter and a case with it anyways

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago

I find that the JoyCons work fine for most games, granted I have small hands. As for power adapters and carrying cases, I don’t carry an adapter and the case I use is very slim. Just enough to protect from drops really.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago

I use both frequently, and the size of the switch is a big feature for me. I carry a low profile case and no power adapter. Increasing the size would be a big mistake in my opinion- it would just be a worse steam deck without some really killer new features. In my opinion they should just offer larger joycons for people who want them!

[–] [email protected] 14 points 11 months ago (2 children)

This problem is already solved, but I guess Nintendo prefers some propietary solution.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Maybe because of all those "Patented" points. It's possible Nintendo doesn't want to be 100% dependent on them and want an in-house solution to their problem.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

They probably don't want to use that particular design anyway. I've run into a good number of headaches with those joysticks. Not bad enough for me to pull them back out, but certainly enough to be annoying.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago (1 children)

What type of problems?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I've encountered two noticeable issues while using these. The first is probably just shit tier QA, but the second could be that or a design flaw. I haven't taken the time to tear one apart and reverse engineer it, so I can't say for sure what the cause is. Anywho, about a third of my sticks will wig out and send complete garbage data when they are pushed to their maximum on one axis. Sometimes it is the X, sometimes it is the Y. Either way it makes the impossible to use and I actually did remove those and replace them. Of the remaining sticks a number of them will depress the under stick button if pushed all the way in one direction. It's pretty easy to avoid this and it rarely matters so these ones I left alone and didn't bother to count how many displayed the behavior.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

I was hoping hall effects could be the solution. Maybe best that can be hoped for is ones that can be popped out for easy replacement like the dualsense edge.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago

I have swapped out my Switch analogues with these, and they're great, I also did it with my Ayn Odin, and the 2nd set had slightly stronger magnets, that caused some touch screen issues, so I swapped out my switch analogues with the odin ones. So I'm gonna guess that the next Nintendo console will be another portable, and they probably don't want the issues of magnets near screens.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 11 months ago (3 children)

Look up "potentiometers" if you want to understand the workings behind a thumbstick as well as why drift happens.

So, drift happens because the graphite resistance element inside the potentiometers wears out over time due to friction, but these potentiometers are absurdly cheap compared to the alternatives and one company, ALPS of Japan, has dominated this market (not just for the Switch but for everybody) for 20 years that they pretty much out-prices everybody else. So, now you know why companies still use these thumbsticks despite the fact that drift always develop eventually.

Hall Effect sensors are definitely better, but also tend to be heavier and bulkier, so we'll see if this works out.

[–] n3m37h 4 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Have you not seen Guili kits replacements for the switch joycons?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I've seen them, they are an order of magnitude more expensive than the potentiometer based ones. Good for enthusiast hobbyist upgrades, but I doubt Nintendo is going to go for that considering the pricetag of the Hall Effect sticks.

[–] n3m37h 4 points 11 months ago

That's just because there is only one company making them so... yeah we got expensive joystick replacements. If Nintendo just paid a bit more and went with the HE joysticks in the first place they wouldn't be in this situation. Why do you think they're patenting these joysticks with magnetic fluid in em? They don't want this to happen again so they do what the Japanese do best, over engineer a simple solution.

I'm just gonna sit back and eat some popcorn

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Theoretically, these could be better than Hall effect ones.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

It's a tradeoff of price/size for reliability, essentially. "Better" is subjective in this case.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

I understand, I was saying maybe the new ones will be objectively better. More reliable at cheaper price. Won't know until we see them in use.

[–] n3m37h 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

The hall effect sensor on my 3d printer can measure 0.01mm. Does it really need to be "more accurate" than that?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Ahan. And the hall effect sensor on joysticks have same accuracy?

[–] n3m37h 2 points 11 months ago

I mean I could edit the firmware and make it go to 4 digits, and they use the same fkn tech so yes accuracy is just as high

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

As a big keyboard nerd it is cool to hear about Alps in another context. They used to dominate the mechanical keyboard market too back in the late 80s.Thanks for sharing!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago

That patent doesn't sound like it's to eliminate drift. Besides, how would you patent something that people already do and have a name for?

It sounds more like force feedback for sticks.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 11 months ago

Just use hall effect sensors like everybody else. You can buy hall effect joycon joysticks and 3rd party controllers comparable to the pro controllers that use hall effect joysticks as well. They don't drift.