Nintendo hardware has long leaned into the weirdest ends of gaming. In turn, accessories for the company’s peculiar consoles have gone even further into the realms of the downright peculiar. With the announcement of the fantastic-looking Nyxi GameCube controller for the Nintendo Switch, recreating one of our favourite controller designs of all time, we thought we’d investigate the strangest peripherals your money can buy for the handheld device.
Describing these items as “weird” is definitely not to say they’re bad! Some of these are epic, alongside others that are downright strange. A couple you’ll consider moving to Japan for.
Dragon Quest Slime Controller
Inexplicably no longer produced, but available at absolutely astonishing prices on eBay, is the unfathomable Dragon Quest Slime Controller, made by peripheral stalwarts HORI.
Made in exactly the shape of a Dragon Quest Slime, despite just how obvious that it’s wildly inconvenient for play, I’ve never so strongly wanted a device I would never want to use. The whole thing was so intensely, clearly never intended for regular gaming use that it came shipped with a bunch of flat cardboard to build into a treasure chest on which it can be displayed.
To actually use the Slime as a controller, you have to flip it upside down, where two analogue sticks and the usual Switch buttons are hidden, rendering the entire device the most impressive presentation of style over substance.
Still, it’s a tragedy HORI no longer makes this, because a few hundred dollars is perhaps a little more than I want to pay for a controller I’d never want to actually use.
Fidget Pop Bubble Case
We haven’t given this Nintendo Switch Lite case justice at all in the title above the image there. To give it its full name, it’s the “Jowhep for Nintendo Switch Lite Silicone Case Fidget Toy it Funny Fun for Switch Lite Games Cover Soft Design Shell for Girls Boys Kids Cases for Switch Lite Controllers (Colour Bubble).”
I love me some funny fun, so this is surely a must-buy? Except that, even someone as riddled with ADHD as I is daunted by the notion of a person for whom playing a game on the Switch isn’t enough for their fingers to be doing at any one time. It’d be fiddlier than even that last sentence.
Sure, we live in a universe where this has to exist, given our timeline features every possible permutation of “poppet” silicone shapes. Also, and this is perhaps pertinent, the more I look at it, the more I want it. Pop, pop, poppity-pop.
HORI Microphone Cover
This has to be the weirdest officially licensed Switch peripheral money can buy. It’s described as a “microphone cover,” but I think we can all agree it’s a hairdryer attachment for shouting into.
The idea is, apparently, that this allows for greater improvements in all your Switch-based karaoke, being a “soundproof” cover for a microphone that stops all your beautiful singing leaking out all around the room. I hate it when that happens, some of my notes not being appropriately gobbled up by the microphone and fed into the machine. Just look how totally normal and not like a crazy person you look when you use one:
Just to be sure, he’s me shouting into a remote control stuck into my wife’s hairdryer thingie:
Confirmed.
Zuiki Go By Train!
Densha de Go!! is a big deal in Japan. This long-running series of train driving sims are hyper-realistic, and the Switch’s 2020 release, Hashirou Yamanote Sen, was no exception. Designed to replicate the daily life of a train driver, these are deliberately down-to-earth, no-explosions simulations with mundanity at their core. But you don’t want to be doing any of that on your Joy-Cons. You want a peripheral that accurately simulates the controls of a real train.
That’s where Zuiki steps in, with the “Dedicated One Handle Controller.” This thing is not messing about, combining all the buttons you need for a Switch with all the levers you need for pulling out of a station.
I love that this exists, and I wish such eccentric controllers weren’t confined to Japan. There are train nerds the whole world over, and they all deserve this too.
Amor3 NuType Keyboard
OK, please join Kotaku in the middle of an argument. I maintain this keyboard attachment for the Switch is the silliest thing imaginable. My boss and editor-in-chief, Patricia, maintains it’d be the most fantastically useful device, especially when playing something like Monster Hunter. Pick a side.
I’m afraid that no matter the quality of the argument, I still find this the funniest-looking thing. I can’t imagine trying to play a game with my hands held such a peculiar width apart, let alone work out how I’d navigate my hands to typing on the keyboard in any way that would be useful. Also, that cable! It’s not even wireless!
Despite this, according to answers on Amazon, it doesn’t charge the Joy-Cons while they’re plugged in, although the cable is apparently a lot longer than it looks in the image. But all this aside, I really struggle to imagine times when I want to be typing while using my Switch. The device is an enormous touchscreen! You can type on it just fine! The store page declares, “Makes typing in the eShop search bar and logging in an easy task,” but has anyone ever struggled with that?
Still though, looking at the Amazon reviews, I can’t help but notice people agreeing with Patricia: it seems this really is — and very specifically — the ideal Monster Hunter addition.
However, I have convinced myself with an entirely different angle: It really looks like someone found a way to attach Joy-Cons to a Spectrum 48K, and now that’s all I want in the world.
Fastsnail Joy-Con Grips
You might look at these and think, “At last!” I look at them and think, “That’s the cutest Among Us character I’ve seen yet.” But as much as my instincts are to laugh at this teeniest of controller grips, I think they’re kinda brilliant.
The way creators Fastsnail present it on their Amazon page is hilarious, and doesn’t make it easy to take seriously. Look at this, using shots of red, glowing owies in people’s hands, making it look like one of those infomercials for gardening kneelers.
There’s got to be a better way!
And yet, well, they’re right, aren’t they? If you’ve played Mario Kart with friends, and without one of those daft plastic wheels, it really bloody hurts your fingers. A sideways Joy-Con is a neat idea, but it’s just too small for regulation-size adult hands. And this really does look like a neat answer! But, also, utterly adorable.
It looks like a Minion in a Halloween costume. It’s the cutest robot at the Catwoman cosplay. I wanna hug it.
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