Nintendo has been actively taking down YouTube videos that feature its games being emulated or modded, which has sparked significant discussion and concern within the gaming community.
So you’re saying I should never buy anything from Nintendo?
Cool cool cool, cool, cool.
I have a hard time defending the YouTubers on this one. I mean, Nintendo has been pretty good about allowing older games to be played on its modern consoles. See VGC, the NES/SNES/N64 pass, and the multiple re-releases put out for the Switch. At some point just pony up the money or play the older games on a physical older console.
It’s not the same thing? Emulation of older consoles improve and mod the experience. Upscaling, custom textured, etc
See: Kaizo Mario directly inspiring Mario Maker.
See: LttP Randomizer, along with literally any other randomizer.
See: speedrunning streams literally making the market that Nintendo then sold the Nintendo World Championships cart into.
Nintendo absolutely benefits from this. They just want to crack the whip and take over. Fuck them.
Also, still can’t buy Mother 3. Double fuck them. Tons of titles play better on emulation. I shouldn’t have to justify it.
I wouldn’t be surprised if this backfires a bit. The reason most publishers/IP holders don’t go after videos on youtube and twitch is because it’s basically free advertisement for your game.
If this behavior leads to people holding back on making nintendo based content, it could fuck them over in the long run. If you were a streamer or youtuber, would you feel particularly comfortable making videos and streaming nintendo games?
I know I wouldn’t. There is no guarantee that nintendo actually puts effort into determining whether you are using an emulator or not. And even for the people who do use emulators, they may not be looking to continue making nintendo content.
They’ve been doing this for a long time, and it definitely has a depressive effect. Even a big gaming youtubers like Videogamedunkey has commented on how every single time he does a video about a Nintendo game it gets demonetized, and while he can afford to take the financial hit every now and then there are plenty of mid-tier creators who can’t.
If someone has bought a Switch game legally, then it’s legal to dump that game to a PC and play it on a Switch emulator, right?
Sure you could say that very few people dump their own games, but those that do are doing everything legally I think?
it’s legal to dump that game to a PC and play it on a Switch emulator, right?
Depends on where you live. Copyright law varies significantly from country to country.
In the USA, section 117 of the copyright act lets you create a copy for archival/backup purposes only. What I’m unsure about (and don’t know if there’s any relevant caselaw) is whether bypassing copy protection to create the copy violates the DMCA.
The equivalent Australian copyright law explicitly states that you can use the backup copy instead of the original one. The US law doesn’t (all it says is that you can make an archival copy, not how you can use the archival copy), so it’s a grey area.
Both laws are for “computer software”, but you could easily argue that a video game is computer software.
I don’t see any way you could argue a video game isn’t computer software. It literally just is.
IIRC this is what is currently protected in American law, but the problem is that in the time between now and the Sony/Bleem lawsuit Congress passed the DMCA, which has a provision making it illegal to bypass copyright protection. When emulating any modern console, you are naturally required to bypass the copyright protection on the game, which Nintendo would argue makes it illegal to do.
Maybe you could get around this with some kind of emulation scheme that requires the console to be plugged into your PC, like the emulator uses the console’s official hardware for the copyright check and then just takes over rendering the game.
Nah. From Nintendo’s position, you don’t “own” the game. They do. All you bought is a license to play the game on a Nintendo approved console. By ripping the game from the switch dump, you are violating the license you bought by copying their software without permission.
From a practical perspective, fuckem. Your paid money to play the game and if you decide to play it on something else you own, go nuts.
Nintendo is doing everything in it’s power to screw over gamers, yet people will still consistently be like “omg pokemon, hiiiiii 🥺” and buy their slop even when the games get worse every time.
Like could you imagine if Microsoft did shit like this, the backlash would be huge.
They’re clearing out the scene before the switch 2 releases because they perceive the current emulators as a major threat somehow.
Which I assume means that the new switch is similar enough in architecture that it would be relatively trivial to ship a fully functional emulator on hardware release.
Pretty insane because at least in the USA, emulation is protected by law, except if someone can successfully argue that you are bypassing DRM which is illegal.
In a working system, this wouldn’t be an issue but I imagine neither Yuzu nor Ryjunix would want to deal with Nintendo’s insane law team that could wreck them financially in a matter of days before even entering a court room.
I hope someone either makes an anonymous dev team for a future project, or gets assistance from a consumer justice firm/group to properly argue in court to shut Nintendo down. They really should not be able to do this because it was already a thing 24 years ago:
Sony Computer Entertainment v. Connectix Corporation, 203 F.3d 596 (2000), commonly referred to as simply Sony v. Connectix, is a decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals which ruled that the copying of a copyrighted BIOS software during the development of an emulator software does not constitute copyright infringement, but is covered by fair use. The court also ruled that Sony’s PlayStation trademark had not been tarnished by Connectix Corp.'s sale of its emulator software, the Virtual Game Station.
Wow! Way to tell the world to never buy your products because you’re petty sniveling greedy and absolutely hate your fans.
They just killed Ryujinx too, proving it wasn’t the fact that Yuzu was making money.
I missed this - what happened? (Searching now)
Nintendo visited the main developers home in brazil and came to an agreement to end Ryujinx, a former dev has confirmed this over on reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Ryujinx/comments/1ftvi13/posted_via_ryujinx_discord_server/lpuz6pt/
Visited his HOME
Further proof that anyone who wants anything to do with Nintendo modding should do so completely anonymously. Treat it like you’re hacking a government system or something damn.
And it isn’t the first time they’ve done this. Disgusting.
Ghoul behavior
I remember etika talking about the nintendo ninjas doing the exact thing
They’ve been on some kind of emulation crusade then, because it looks like they just killed Ryujinx:
Yep, they already removed the github and download pages from the website, last version was 1.1.1403
Was there a Linux version?
Yes, some people already posted here or on it’s own news comments that you can still download the AUR/flatpak/I don’t know.
Okay, so now ten people can upload it.
Sounds like someone got promoted to a high position. If I’m right it’s the typical “New Manager Must Make Waves To Prove They Belong” level of stupid unique to corporate.
I love a link to the past randomizer which is obviously not stock Zelda. Fuck Nintendo.
I’m glad I bought a switch second hand and immediately installed a modchip on it, 0 money went to Nintendo
Didnt you technically support the guy that supported Nintendo?
Technically, yes, but I know for a fact that he went on to buy a PS5
With all these news recently, you could think Nintendo wants to be hated. It’s truly shameful how the company has fallen since Iwata is gone.
They still did this stuff under Iwata. It’s actually more of a Japanese thing than a Nintendo thing. Although the quality of stuff was better under Iwata
Nintendo has gone after youtubers and content creators for 15+ years. They are infamous for it.
Recently?! Nintendo famously hates their fans for years now.
to be honest, 80% of their customers probably don’t even know what an emulator is and don’t follow news about nintendo
On the plus side, it makes me feel extra good when I load their games onto my hacked Switch! Echoes of Wisdom was fun, but felt really short. I would have felt cheated if I’d spent $60 on it.
I mean, its predecessor was a basic-ass remake of a ten hour, thirty year old Game Boy game that also cost $60.
True, but it felt longer, even if it wasn’t. It also wasn’t worth $60, though.
I love that game, but I fucking hate the remake’s artstyle. Its completely put me off from trying Echoes even though the premise and gameplay of that one seem right up my alley.
I don’t mind the art style, other than the ugly-ass blur filter applied to the bottom of the screen. Fortunately, you can remove it if you’re playing it emulated or on a hacked Switch.
All they have is their IP, they must protect it at all costs. Nintendo doesn’t even let Shingeru Myamoto wipe is own ass out of fear he will get hurt.
“So, those guys generate positive advertisement for our games. How do we stop it, and make sure that public opinion shifts to «Nintendo is cringe and you’re a loser if you play this shit»?”
Also, what the fuck is with Japanese law, criminalising modding?
I would assume a company such as sony or nintendo lobbied for that law.
Also, what the fuck is with Japanese law, criminalising modding?
My best guess would be that they’re trying to get ahead of the recompiler scene before it catches a bigger foothold. But also, that lumps in the entire rom hacking and fan translation community, which I’m sure they view as perpetuating the piracy of their games.
My best guess would be that they’re trying to get ahead of the recompiler scene before it catches a bigger foothold.
If AI-generating images from copyrighted training material is legal, then generating source code from copyrighted binary code is as well.
Nonetheless, the best thing would be to let those kinds of fans do what they do, because it is free advertising. But no, they’d rather be right than pragmatic, so they shoot themselves in the foot. Meanwhile, if they’re so worried that these guys have that kind of serious reach and influence - aren’t those the people they shouldn’t piss on??
I don’t care what bullshit justification they try to come up with for it; the bottom line is that it violates computer owners’ property rights.
It is absolutely unconscionable, ass-backwards, Bizarro-world bullshit to privilege temporary fake Imaginary Property (IP) over and above actual property!
It’s probably not about that but rather to destroy the secondary market of modchips and save-file editors in Japan.
I mean, if the decision were made today, I guarantee our current supreme court in the US would not have given us fair use.
the current U.S. Supreme Court wouldn’t give you democracy, even though the American military has killed tens of thousands of people around the world in its name.
Could I at least get a barrel of oil? No need to beat around the bush (heh), I’ll take what I can get.
Typical Japanese bullshittery. I watch sumo, and even when there was no official way to watch outside Japan the sumo association would get youtube accounts showing matches taken down. Tons of industries are still run by technological dinosaurs.
Japan was already living in the 2000’s back in the 80’s. The problem is that 40 years later, they’re still living and thinking in the exact same way.
I grew up with a Nintendo controller in hand.
There’s a very good reason I now game almost exclusively on PC. None of this is going to convince me to come back. Quite the opposite in fact.
Nintendo has been on my list of most hated companies for awhile now. Just can’t stand how they operate and design their games.
Well hang tight there, the games are dope. Just the legal dicks are the scumbags.
the games are dope
gestures broadly at the latest Pokémon titles
Grew up the same way. Some of my all time favorite games are still some of the classics. That being said, I wouldnt shed a tear if they go bankrupt.
I’ve been gradually building up my Switch digital and physical library and stuff like this makes me want to just switch back to Steam and spend my dollar elsewhere.
The strikes are absolutely frivolous and Russ sets a great anti piracy example for others. Backups of your own content are protected.
I’ll have to mod a switch purely out of spite.
I’m going to stand by what Retro Game Corps stated that they don’t want to advocate for piracy. Lawful backup of your own games is protected. The aggression against Russ and others is uncalled for.
