Broken Nintendo Joy Cons Pay for Your Gaming and More

[G33ksquad]

This may get 0 views, but I’m bored of this and can’t really scale due to lack of overall inventory availability.

No pyramid scheme or makeup sales here, I’ve made around $700-$1000 a month while also covering my console costs and gaming accessories. I thought going into detail may help others.

Step 1.) Set up an eBay search for joy con, sort buy it now, newly listed.

Step 2.) Get a chrome refresher extension you will need to dedicate some time even if 30 mins a day to catch the new listings. I find late nights and early mornings most effective. Buy sets around $10-$20 , recently even at $20, after tax it’s not as worth it now that the value at GameStop has dropped.

Step 3.) Get well versed is recognizing fakes, no logo shown is a don’t buy, there has also been a surge of fake boxes lately, look closely many times the colors listed on the box are actually wrong and don’t match the pictured color. If they include an instruction manual this is also a sign, real joy cons don’t have an instruction manual. I also typically avoid limited editions to help avoid fakes.

Step 4.) Use Nintendos free repair program, they pay the label and 4 joy cons can go in one box, don’t send more than one box at a time as their repair center starts to get repair numbers all jumbled and it gets a little weird.

Step 5.) Get the joy cons back and trade them into GameStop. If you get them at a low enough price this can take your initial investment and double it into “credit” , buy high value items like PlayStation Portals, refurbed steam decks, these items translate to usually the same amount of cash. Look at the used games and controllers, I ran into a few gems last year like the Halo elite series 2 that really helped make for a better month.

I wanted to share, if you have any questions on the process I am more than happy to assist. Many people are doing this, you’ll start to notice eBay listings where they are just selling the Nintendo refurbs straight on eBay. I preferred GameStop as no customer service and months where I got low cost joy cons I could opt for cash over credit.

 

[hippy dave]

I think here in the UK, Nintendo only fix drift for free, not other faults, so might limit buying options. Nice scheme tho if you can make it work.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

This may get 0 views, but I’m bored of this and can’t really scale due to lack of overall inventory availability.

No pyramid scheme or makeup sales here, I’ve made around $700-$1000 a month while also covering my console costs and gaming accessories. I thought going into detail may help others.

Step 1.) Set up an eBay search for joy con, sort buy it now, newly listed.

Step 2.) Get a chrome refresher extension you will need to dedicate some time even if 30 mins a day to catch the new listings. I find late nights and early mornings most effective. Buy sets around $10-$20 , recently even at $20, after tax it’s not as worth it now that the value at GameStop has dropped.

Step 3.) Get well versed is recognizing fakes, no logo shown is a don’t buy, there has also been a surge of fake boxes lately, look closely many times the colors listed on the box are actually wrong and don’t match the pictured color. If they include an instruction manual this is also a sign, real joy cons don’t have an instruction manual. I also typically avoid limited editions to help avoid fakes.

Step 4.) Use Nintendos free repair program, they pay the label and 4 joy cons can go in one box, don’t send more than one box at a time as their repair center starts to get repair numbers all jumbled and it gets a little weird.

Step 5.) Get the joy cons back and trade them into GameStop. If you get them at a low enough price this can take your initial investment and double it into “credit” , buy high value items like PlayStation Portals, refurbed steam decks, these items translate to usually the same amount of cash. Look at the used games and controllers, I ran into a few gems last year like the Halo elite series 2 that really helped make for a better month.

I wanted to share, if you have any questions on the process I am more than happy to assist. Many people are doing this, you’ll start to notice eBay listings where they are just selling the Nintendo refurbs straight on eBay. I preferred GameStop as no customer service and months where I got low cost joy cons I could opt for cash over credit.

Supposedly you can buy gift cards with store credit at GameStop. So that could be another option.

 

[G33ksquad]

I think here in the UK, Nintendo only fix drift for free, not other faults, so might limit buying options. Nice scheme tho if you can make it work.

Never hurts to send in, officially here in the US they don’t fix physical damage or say the joy con thumbstick is missing. But repairs are a 3rd party that tends to be lenient. They reserve the right to bill you, but often don’t even when they should.

Supposedly you can buy gift cards with store credit at GameStop. So that could be another option.

You can buy gaming credit Xbox, psn, Nintendo, with trade credit still as of now anyway.

 

[HellGhast]

This may get 0 views, but I’m bored of this and can’t really scale due to lack of overall inventory availability.

No pyramid scheme or makeup sales here, I’ve made around $700-$1000 a month while also covering my console costs and gaming accessories. I thought going into detail may help others.

Step 1.) Set up an eBay search for joy con, sort buy it now, newly listed.

Step 2.) Get a chrome refresher extension you will need to dedicate some time even if 30 mins a day to catch the new listings. I find late nights and early mornings most effective. Buy sets around $10-$20 , recently even at $20, after tax it’s not as worth it now that the value at GameStop has dropped.

Step 3.) Get well versed is recognizing fakes, no logo shown is a don’t buy, there has also been a surge of fake boxes lately, look closely many times the colors listed on the box are actually wrong and don’t match the pictured color. If they include an instruction manual this is also a sign, real joy cons don’t have an instruction manual. I also typically avoid limited editions to help avoid fakes.

Step 4.) Use Nintendos free repair program, they pay the label and 4 joy cons can go in one box, don’t send more than one box at a time as their repair center starts to get repair numbers all jumbled and it gets a little weird.

Step 5.) Get the joy cons back and trade them into GameStop. If you get them at a low enough price this can take your initial investment and double it into “credit” , buy high value items like PlayStation Portals, refurbed steam decks, these items translate to usually the same amount of cash. Look at the used games and controllers, I ran into a few gems last year like the Halo elite series 2 that really helped make for a better month.

I wanted to share, if you have any questions on the process I am more than happy to assist. Many people are doing this, you’ll start to notice eBay listings where they are just selling the Nintendo refurbs straight on eBay. I preferred GameStop as no customer service and months where I got low cost joy cons I could opt for cash over credit.

Genius!

 

[rookiesearcher]

Now how are you going to trade them in for enough to output the costs of buying?

Step 5.) Get the joy cons back and trade them into GameStop. If you get them at a low enough price this can take your initial investment and double it into “credit”

On eBay, it looks like you can get yourself joy-cons to be repaired for around 16 - 20$. Outliers in the forms of low shipping costs and snagging things in auctions for slightly cheaper.
https://www.gamestop.com/trade/details/?pid=207872
I went to GameStop's site, and these only trade in for $12, which isn't going to be enough to cover the cost of you buying the Joy-Cons.

I think what might be a better money scheme is searching for "For Parts" switches. You can buy a moddable v1 switch that needs a fan replacement, battery, screen, case, and so on and so forth for only 75-80$. The replacement part is likely around 10-20, which means your total cost for getting this HAC-001 switch was around $100. Then, sell it as a moddable used switch for $160. You are looking at around a 60$ gain per console, and every console that comes in and you can't repair it gets cannabalized for free replacement parts on other switches.

 

[G33ksquad]

Now how are you going to trade them in for enough to output the costs of buying?

On eBay, it looks like you can get yourself joy-cons to be repaired for around 16 - 20$. Outliers in the forms of low shipping costs and snagging things in auctions for slightly cheaper.
https://www.gamestop.com/trade/details/?pid=207872
I went to GameStop's site, and these only trade in for $12, which isn't going to be enough to cover the cost of you buying the Joy-Cons.

I think what might be a better money scheme is searching for "For Parts" switches. You can buy a moddable v1 switch that needs a fan replacement, battery, screen, case, and so on and so forth for only 75-80$. The replacement part is likely around 10-20, which means your total cost for getting this HAC-001 switch was around $100. Then, sell it as a moddable used switch for $160. You are looking at around a 60$ gain per console, and every console that comes in and you can't repair it gets cannabalized for free replacement parts on other switches.

So I did try that with consoles as well, and it’s a great idea! I got more banned and poor condition consoles than it was worth for me personally. In terms of the trade in the left joy con is $13 and right Joy Con is $16, so you really have to get them at a low cost now to be worth it, for most of the pandemic trade in was around $22 for each side making it $44 total for each set. This is where waiting on a hardware boost makes the most sense, this week Switch consoles get an extra $25, so a broken complete console is $98, I’ve gotten many complete for $60-$70 and when they are say water damaged and totally useless this is a way to get back some of those costs. But it used to be much more profitable when trade in values were higher. Many people are selling them on eBay, look for the “refurbished by Nintendo” listings, so there is always that route.

 

[G33ksquad]

I'm so frustrated with Nintendo's Joy Cons. They are expensive, poorly designed, and prone to breaking. I've had to deal with drift, connectivity issues, and chipped plastic. Nintendo should be ashamed of selling such low-quality products to loyal customers. They should offer free repairs or replacements for all defective Joy Cons, not just in some countries. It's not fair that we have to pay for their mistakes. We deserve better from Nintendo. Joy Cons should enhance our gaming experience, not ruin it.

I totally agree, I was actually able to gather some really interesting data over the years, just going off repair order numbers they average 450,000 repairs a year in the US. Joy cons can go two pairs in a box, but say we took it for one pair for each repair order at a retail price of 79.99 for each set as most times sets are just replaced, that’s a lot of money! $35,995,500. The issue becomes taking that amount and looking at it against annual profits it’s less than 1% barely over a half of a percent. It’s sad but I guarantee they are happy to offer repairs when it’s doesn’t even eat into 1% of profits. With such a small financial loss, investors probably aren’t bothered by the issue at all and fixing it permanently may cost more than the estimated 0.6% loss.

They really did make a crummy product, and sadly I hope don’t repeat this for the Switch 2 but don’t have high hopes!

 

[rookiesearcher]

The problem with joycons is that they had to fit to the switch because of the snap on aspect. This greatly limits the width of the controller, forcing it to be too tiny. Also, they had to make them too short too so they would be the same height as the switch. All together, it forces what could be great controllers to be designed awfully just to keep the portability aspect. Luckily, the Pro Controller is awesome, and moddable too.

 

[G33ksquad]

The problem with joycons is that they had to fit to the switch because of the snap on aspect. This greatly limits the width of the controller, forcing it to be too tiny. Also, they had to make them too short too so they would be the same height as the switch. All together, it forces what could be great controllers to be designed awfully just to keep the portability aspect. Luckily, the Pro Controller is awesome, and moddable too.

Absolutely great points, curious to see what they do for their next console, the pro controller is great, really good battery life!

 

[rookiesearcher]

Yeah, the pro controller is amazing in terms of battery life. I feel like for the enxt console they will bite the bullet and make the joycons wider and bigger so they are more ergonomic. My prediction is the pro controller will stay pretty much the same, just look at the wii U pro controller and the switch. It's just the standard video game controller.

 

[Jayro]

Not gonna lie, I was prepared to report this post thinking it was spam, but utilizing Nintendo's free repair shop for Joycons in order to flip a profit is pure genius. Sure, it's a long waiting game, but for the patient people who hate repairing them themselves (I do), this is great.

 

[G33ksquad]

Not gonna lie, I was prepared to report this post thinking it was spam, but utilizing Nintendo's free repair shop for Joycons in order to flip a profit is pure genius. Sure, it's a long waiting game, but for the patient people who hate repairing them themselves (I do), this is great.

Haha I can see that with the title, I could have chosen something better! Honestly time wise you can ship Monday and have them back Friday, not always, but most of the time turnaround is immediate and they use two day shipping. I’m sure it depends on where you live but the process is fast! The worst part is you have to limit it to only two pair at a time, so it can be a slow process when you have a lot of sets but totally worth it!

 

[Jayro]

Haha I can see that with the title, I could have chosen something better! Honestly time wise you can ship Monday and have them back Friday, not always, but most of the time turnaround is immediate and they use two day shipping. I’m sure it depends on where you live but the process is fast! The worst part is you have to limit it to only two pair at a time, so it can be a slow process when you have a lot of sets but totally worth it!

Like, as soon as you get notified your order is shipping back to you, you can mail off the next set of 4, which is really cool. Basically cross-shipping.

 

[G33ksquad]

Like, as soon as you get notified your order is shipping back to you, you can mail off the next set of 4, which is really cool. Basically cross-shipping.

Exactly I was doing this as a broader project of personal interest on how gaming companies handle repairs, after about 30 boxes Nintendo starts sending your repairs to a specific area of the building, after about 45 boxes or 90 pairs they classify you as a business and cut you off entirely, people on eBay I’m assuming just use multiple addresses and keep on going. Sony similarly uses a 3rd party for repairs, the worst part is they charge $10 for the label even under warranty so it’s not free like Nintendo.

 

[rookiesearcher]

after about 45 boxes or 90 pairs they classify you as a business

By this, do you mean that 45 at once, or just 45 total? Like do they store you in a database or something?

 

[G33ksquad]

By this, do you mean that 45 at once, or just 45 total? Like do they store you in a database or something?

45 total, you give an email for each repair so I’m assuming they track by this or maybe address, not sure but they do track it. I received an email at box 45 stating the repair process was for consumers only. Calling Nintendo to get additional information let me know they had flagged my information and I could no longer send any repairs at all, even paid repairs are now off limits.

The one thing that confuses me on their process is they fix anything for any reason, and even though they are supposed to charge in cases of say physical damage, they never do. They don’t even follow their own guidelines, or maybe it’s a flaw of third party repair centers.

Sonys repair contractor is even worse, but that could be an entirely different post.

 

[rookiesearcher]

The one thing that confuses me on their process is they fix anything for any reason, and even though they are supposed to charge in cases of say physical damage, they never do.

Interesting. Also, I feel like this is because nintendo is so afraid of any more backlash due to the Joy-Cons that they just accept it.