Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not that they didn't care, it's that they did care in the wrong way. A non-replacable battery means people will be more likely to buy a whole new device if (when) the battery fails.
I don't think that's it for console manufacturers. They make the majority of their money on game sales, so they want the console itself to be used for as long as possible.
Controllers have been using USB and an almost identical layout since the Xbox1 days 25 years ago, yet most game controller remain incompatible with each other, even within the same company. PS3 won't work on PS4 and PS4 won't work on PS5. Ironically, PS4 and PS5 controller will work on PS3, since that was the first and last console that supported plain old USB HID. Meanwhile Xbox360 had a lock-out chip to prevent third party controller and the Xbox360 controller don't work on XboxOne/Series either. XboxOne and XboxSeries at least are compatible. Meanwhile on PC pretty much everything works.
And then you have the whole stick drift problem, that has been solved since Dreamcast and PS3 SIXAXIS with Hall effect joysticks, but even decades later we still have controllers going in the bin due for easily avoidable reasons.
Rubber coating is another very common way to add an expiry date to devices that wouldn't have one otherwise.
If we wanted to get serious with the whole "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle", there are a lot more low hanging fruit than just the batteries.