In a year in which Nintendo has continuously pulled moves that cause outrage within its normally loyal fanbase, this move might prove to be arguably the most petty of them all. For Nintendo has shut down production of custom Joy-Con shells based off of the deceased YouTuber Etika.
Desmond Daniel Amofah, widely known as Etika on the internet, was a beloved content creator that was most widely known for his live-streams, especially those featuring his signature over-the-top reactions. Sadly, following a series of mental health episodes that raised major concern among fans, Etika passed away in June of 2019. Fans have paid tribute to him in many different ways, including making custom Joy-Con shells (dubbed Etikons) bearing his popular slogan, Joycon Boyz. He also has a mural dedicated to him in his hometown of Brooklyn, which became a Poké Stop in Pokémon GO following the request of many fans, and he’s still greatly missed to this day within the Nintendo community.
YouTuber JoyConBoyz, AKA JoyConJames, made a video announcing that the creator of these JoyconBoyz shells, CptnAlex, was no longer making the shells due to a Nintendo-issued cease-and-desist received in September. This was later confirmed by a tweet from CptnAlex, who provided images of the legal document and all the shells that couldn’t be sold. CptnAlex explains in the video that the reason for the cease-and-desist derived from the word “Joy-Con,” as the name is a Nintendo trademark. However, JoyConBoyz also argues that the group’s Switch controllers don’t use the exact same terminology. Their argument is that “JoyconBoyz” doesn’t contain a hyphen and is a parody of the original property, and it should therefore fall under fair use.
This has been a continuation of what has been building up to be a pattern of anti-consumerism from Nintendo. The hashtags #SaveSmash and #FreeMelee trended on Twitter following a Nintendo cease-and-desist order that put a stop to a Super Smash Bros. Melee tournament, in which players were going to use a harmless mod to enable online play during a deadly pandemic. On March 31, several Nintendo games will no longer be on sale in a bizarre and blatant artificial scarcity bid, and even the new and successful Super Mario 3D All-Stars. For many, the bitter icing on the distasteful cake came when Nintendo canceled its own Splatoon 2 tournament stream recently, which was presumably done to punish and/or suppress players seeking to show solidarity with the previously shunned Super Smash Bros. players.
This latest action taken against the late Etika and his friends comes across as cruel and petty, as it’s not only is a direct rebuke of the legacy of a deceased Nintendo superfan, but because it achieves so little – the funds raised from JoyConBoyz sales go to mental health awareness in Etika’s memory. While the legality of the cease-and-desist is within Nintendo’s right, the potential money players’ will spend on official Nintendo Switch Joy-Cons instead of the alternative potentially pales in comparison to the amount of bad PR Nintendo has earned itself here.
