Joycons can slip on and off and enable different style of gameplay. I don't have any of the drift problems, and I suspect if many did you'd hear more about it and it would impact sales through word of mouth. The fact that I hardly hear anyone talk about drift and that the device is still selling amazingly indicates it only impacts a small portion of Switch owners. Therefore, for the vast majority of us, I'd rate the build quality of the Switch as great (never tried the Lite).

-RROD was quite widespread. It was well documented. Word of mouth was in play. It didn't seem to have much impact on sales. People roll over for all kinds of things, and take all kinds of crap from companies that some of us would not tolerate. It was a series of poor, drift-riddled controllers that was a catalyst for me giving up on the 360.

-Anecdotal in the extreme. There's plenty of discourse on the topic. From websites, to fans, to fanboys. The fact that you don't hear anyone talking about it doesn't mean much as it pertains to the situation at large.

Here are a couple articles from the Chartz:

https://www.vgchartz.com/article/444265/nintendo-president-apologizes-for-joy-con-drift-issues/

Some good comments in this one. Top comment from snyps is interesting. I get the feeling he's not lying about working at Nintendo Of America customer support, and the frequency of Joy-Con drift calls they were getting.

And another: https://www.vgchartz.com/article/439554/nintendo-responds-to-switch-joy-con-drift-problem/

Here's one of the threads here on the topic. https://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/thread/240593/joycon-drift/1/

This is a good one because there's lots of discussion among members who are legit Switch owners.  There were 57 members who mentioned whether or not they had any joy con issues. 51 had problems of some sort. 6 did not. Of the 51 members with problems, 48 were drifting joy cons, 1 had a drifting pro controller, 1 had a right joy con that no longer worked independently, and 1 had an L button that didn't work. The drifting joy con problem of the 48 ranged from a one time occurrence, to multiple instances. One of the 51 had 3 Switches, all with drifting joy cons. 1 for himself, and 2 more for his children.

Of the 6 that reported no problems, one mentioned both his nieces had drifting joy cons, one estimated his usage of the console at 10-20 hours, and another said simply " I don't use it much". You participated in that thread incidentally, and were one of the 4 people who reported no problems whatsoever and didn't also attach a caveat of limited usage.

Now, I'm not going to spam this post with links to every website that has covered the topic, but I will leave this link to a poll at Nintendolife, that the registered members at that site participated in, where 74% of the votes indicated joy con drift was something they encountered.

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2019/07/poll_have_your_joy-con_been_drifting

Great might be stretching it. Especially now that there is a sku that binds the still malfunctioning sticks to a portable-only console, making it a true hardware issue. Anywhooo, have a good one man

I didn't say no one has the issue, I just said I don't hardly see anyone talking about it. I know of the threads on this website but that isn't indicative of what the majority of people that bought the product experience. When products work, hardly one goes to forums to talk about it, it's when they don't work that people get riled up and post something online.

For the record, I'm not denying that some % of the Switch population have the issues, and I'm certainly not denying their right for a refund or fix/repair, I'm just questioning how many out of the roughly 80 million Switches out there have this problem. If it were millions I suspect there would be a lot more websites covering it, the big dog websites that only cover major topics. Has CNN, Fox, NBC, etc. covered this or just some gaming websites that have little traffic? Genuine question I have.

The ring of death was everywhere when that happened to Xbox. I'm curious how many people the drift on Switch happens compared to that.

MS: We would like to acquire your company.

Nintendo execs:

Joycon drift is not comparable to RROD. Is it an issue? Yes but most consoles have some hardware kink. Just 8th gen alone earlier PS4 models had problems with the eject button. Some XBO models rejected discs. That kinda stuff happens. The real issue is Nintendo so far not fixing it. Maybe they will with a revision. RROD was a design flaw of a rushed system to get out the door before Sony. It took them 5 years to fix it with a complete redesign. RROD is comparing a $70 set of controllers in 2021 to a $400 console in 2005,06,07 etc. (which with inflation is over $500 today) a controller can be more easily be replaced by either 1st or 3rd party. I never use joycons in the portable mode because I use a Split Pad Pro. Pro controller for docked and never had an issue. I have controllers I've used for 30 years as well for other systems.

Gears games have substantially changed, bud, and for the worse. 

What I mean is. Their main selling point is a mechanic stuck in 7th gen shooters. Waist-high cover pokes out and shoot. Sure it still works but gamer tastes have mostly moved beyond it. Every shooter that gen did that. Shooters are different now but they stick to that and the series popularity has greatly faded by not evolving enough. I don't count one empty world as some big change. Granted I know MS now owns this IP but Doom reboot games still feel like old Doom but new and fresh as well. That's the balance MS fails to find. I would bet a buck that Halo Infinite is just more Halo just a bland open-world slapped on. MS has never (Spencer included) had someone who really overlooks and supervises games. One thing Nintendo excels at better than anyone. Every detail is important to them in the gameplay. There is a long explanation for every gameplay choice. BOTW was not made an open world for the sake of it and wasn't just any open world but one with a lot of detailed mechanics very well thought out. MS just feels like a bland big 3rd party publisher who just also happens to make consoles. MS ..well open-world games are the rage, just slap one on. They don't feel like games you can't get anywhere else. They just feel like retreads of everything else including their own series.

If I wanted to play the games offered on an XBox system, then I'd probably just buy a Playstation system instead.  Even if enough time has passed that I can overlook the RROD, I have enough good experiences with Playstation hardware, that I would probably just get that instead.  Or I might buy a Nintendo system if it had the same games I was interested in, because I've had even better experiences with Nintendo hardware.

"You said Nintendo has never made poor quality hardware."
I should have clarified that I meant the system itself.

"When the sticks on the joy-cons don't work, the Switch can't be used in portable mode until they are fixed or replaced."
This is untrue.  I have a pair of joy-cons that drift.  I've used them plenty of times.  It's definitely irritating, but they still technically work.  It's a lot like driving a car that is out of alignment.  I can get from point A to point B with my car out of alignment, but it's irritating.  I'd rather my car not have that issue, but it still works.  Joy-Con drift is the same type of issue.

Gears changed for the worse? Gears 5 is my favorite out of the bunch. How did it change for the worse?