Does the Nintendo Switch 2 mouse work on everything?

There’s a lot to talk about since the Switch 2 reveal, and one of the jokey-but-not questions from many folks is: Will the Switch 2 mouse work on my pants?

Which makes sense! Rarely are we doing handheld or console gaming with a table in front of us, let alone a large, luxurious desk mat like the ones at the Nintendo Switch 2 hands-on event held in New York. I already wrote a bit on how it feels to play with the Joy-Con’s mouse feature, but let’s get specific: How well does it work on pants? And various other non-mousepad surfaces?

The mouse worked on my corduroy pants no problem, both while aiming during Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, and when using both Joy-Cons during the strange Drag x Drive game. I had to drag both hands across my legs at once to drive the robot wheelchair, but it did work!

But I couldn’t just stop there. Urged on by coworkers back home, I tried the mouse on basically any surface I had access to. Does the mouse work on the bare skin of my arm? Yup. The aluminum back of my Macbook Air? Yup. A leather wallet? The only limiting factor there was the surface being small, but the mouse worked.

I asked my friend and former Polygon staffer Megan Farohkmanesh, who confirmed it also worked on her tights. Finally, I tried to use the mouse on the top of my head, for a stunt nobody would actually repeat while gaming. Did it work? Yes. I’m sure TikTok loves this footage.

So generally, will it mouse? Yes. Should it? Probably not, but you can’t doubt my commitment to the bit.