The following shoulder button patent application filed by Nintendo was published last August by WIPO, this May in China, and again in EU just recently. Since it could be used for misinformation, I’ll cover it here even though it’s not new.
Image 1 below shows a shoulder button (411). Depending on how user’s finger presses it and how long the pressing shaft (43) is, the shaft may hit the switch (91) at an angle that doesn’t result in accurate operation. To suppress this, a tapered base (45) is added between the spring (10) and support shaft (44). Because two corners (L3 in img 2) of the base are tapered much more than the other two corners (L2), the pressing shaft will be guided toward the optimal angle when the shoulder button is pressed, resulting in more accurate operation.
This invention is particularly useful on a smaller gaming device (img 1 below), because a) the pressing shaft can be longer to accommodate a smaller PCB, and b) the ZL/ZR buttons may be placed next to L/R (instead of stacked; img 2) without causing the L/R buttons to be pressed at suboptimal angles.
The patent also includes an embodiment that is a mini controller with only one stick and one top button to demonstrate another application of the invention (imgs 1-2 below). It is not a hint of Switch 2 Lite or new Wiimote, but part of a broader R&D Nintendo’s been doing with miniaturized consoles.
[Originally posted on 2026-08-15 Pacific Time]
