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Xbox Elite controllers cause class-action lawsuit

Xbox One

Microsoft has been hit with a new class-action lawsuit from a gamer in the state of Washington over Xbox Elite controllers. The lawsuit claims that Microsoft and Xbox have consistently refused to deal with obvious design flaws with the high-end controllers.

Plaintiff Donald McFadden filed the suit in the US District Court for the Western District of Washington, earlier this week. He claims that a brand-new Xbox Elite controller started to exhibit drift after a short while. He replaced it with another brand-new Xbox Elite controller, when the issue occurred again without fail  “three or four months” later. McFadden claims that Microsoft and Xbox has knowingly designed their controllers with these issues, but “failed to disclose the defect and routinely refuses to repair the controllers without charge when the defect manifests.”

The suit goes on to state that “a large volume of consumers have been complaining about stick drift on Xbox One controllers since at least 2014,” and that there are “multiple forum and message boards dedicated to stick drift; YouTube instructional videos of users attempting to fix the issue on their own; and even replacement joystick components from Amazon and other sellers.”

This would suggest that Microsoft is keenly aware of the issue. However, since they have failed to respond adequately, the lawsuit has tried to force their hands. It appears that the goal is to both seek compensation for affected users and to force Xbox to acknowledge that Xbox Elite controllers are defective, with the aim of at least offering free repairs as mitigation.

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This is a similar to an outcome for Nintendo to a very similar case. When widespread lawsuits and backlash against stick drift in Nintendo Switch Joy-Cons was reported shortly after the console launched. The company later offered free repairs for all users, something they are still doing.

Source: VGC

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