Back in March, Switch owners were warned against using third-party docks after it was discovered they could brick the console. The problem is linked to the release of Switch firmware version 5.0 and portable docks from Nyko and FastSnail. Now Nyko is facing a class-action lawsuit because of it.

As Kotaku reports, Michael Skiathitis filed a class-action lawsuit against Nyko in the US district court of central California. The Nyko portable dock bricked his Switch, which was then sent to Nintendo for repair and as a consequence all save data was lost.

The lawsuit is based on Skiathitis' claims that the Nyko Portable Docking Kits "are prone to causing numerous problems to the devices that they are intended to support." He also points to Nyko not making it clear this can happen through use of their dock.

Nintendo confirmed that it is having to repair bricked Switch ($299.99 at Best Buy) consoles because of these docks. And as you'd expect, Nintendo recommends you only use officially-licensed products. As to why a dock can brick a Switch, it's apparently related to the way in which the Switch handles AV output for an external display while docked.

Nyko will now have to defend itself against the lawsuit and explain why it doesn't seem to have done anything about the problem since March. I suspect Nyko portable docks will disappear from sale until this is resolved, and depending on the outcome they may never reappear for sale again.

Further Reading