Bundled Switch Grip peripheral doesn’t charge Joy-Con controllers

The Joy-Con Grip gamepad that comes in the Nintendo Switch box will not charge the machine’s Joy-Cons.

In order for gamers to be able to charge their Joy-Con controllers, they will need to purchase an extra 24.99 – on Nintendo’s official store; 27.99 on Amazon – special Charging Grip. The peripheral that ships in the box merely holds the two controllers.

In order to charge the Joy-Cons, gamers have to either fork out for this peripheral or connect them to the Switch itself. The firm has said that Joy-Cons have a 20-hour battery life.

That the packaged Grip controller would not charge gamepads was spotted by Polygon during a post-Switch event Treehouse stream, which distinguished the the Grip and Charging Grip accessories.

This news comes after Nintendo announced the – admittedly rather high – price points for its Switch peripherals.

A new pair of Joy-Con controllers sets consumers back 74.99; a single Joy-Con costs 42.99 while straps for these have a 4.99 price point.

That’s on top of the 280 that the console itself costs.

Despite this rather high price point, initial stock allocation for Nintendo’s new machine has sold out on both Amazon and GameStop, while an update from GAME says the Neon Red and Blue SKU has sold out, while the retailer isn’t sure how many consoles it is getting from Nintendo.

At a London event last Friday, MCV was lucky enough to get our hands on Nintendo’s new machine – here is what we thought.