Nintendo isn't just attacking emulators [video]
youtube.com
youtube.com
The whole thing seems silly as I don't see it's costing them money. But it's their product they can do what they want.
To the extent that we let them. There's no natural rights going on here, so theoretically (if you believe in democracy) we still get to decide how much power foreign companies have.
And the US currently has an extremely long copyright period, life of the author + 70 years. Some (Larry Lessig and others) have argued that this violates the constitution's establishment clause for copyright, but so far the supreme court disagrees, and copyright reform also seems dead in the legislative branch. (And on the executive side, the copyright office is not sympathetic, and international treaties also impede copyright reform.)
But your thought experiment is interesting - suppose the US decides that Nintendo's copyrights no longer hold, and suppose that Japan decides that Microsoft's copyrights no longer hold? If it were only for old games and obsolete software, perhaps little would change. If it were for recent games/software, then I think it might change the incentives to localize games/software for other markets.
They could, however, shorten the terms to much more reasonable lengths. It wouldn't hurt the US economy to shorten copyright terms to 50 years, for instance. If they shortened them to 30 years, it would have no real effect on the software industry, though Nintendo would be pissed. I don't think Microsoft would care much about people passing around copies of MS-DOS 3.3.
Well Windows 95 is coming up soon on its 30th... (and come to think of it MS already open sourced MS-DOS "4.0" for any retro-masochists who might want it.[1])
I'm sure MS Word and Excel must have improved slightly in 30 years, but by how much? They don't seem much more responsive than they were 10 years ago, and most of the shiny new Windows/Office features seem to be things I hate like annoying autocorrect, pointless UI redesigns, new advertisements and telemetry, and worthless and intrusive AI nonsense. Maybe with some incompatible save formats and clunky "cloud" features added in for good measure.
Office's largest enhancement seems to be Office 365, which offers an inferior and sluggish imitation of the desktop apps running in a web browser. This is possibly useful for people stuck with crappy Chromebooks, ARM-based tablets/phones, or Linux.
Surely that's a gaping hole in the market waiting to be filled?
I thought Office used OO-XML, which they released as an open standard (mostly) back in the 2000s. I use it at work (unfortunately) and that seems to be what it still uses, and LibreOffice seems to work fine with it too. I don't think anything's changed here in a long time, but I could be missing something.
>new advertisements
I see nothing wrong here at all. Advertisements in Windows and Office are good things, for MS shareholders: they increase profits. Sure, they make the user experience worse, but who cares about them? If you don't like it, use LibreOffice.
>Office's largest enhancement seems to be Office 365, which offers an inferior and sluggish imitation of the desktop apps running in a web browser.
I'd say this is the biggest enhancement by far. Yeah, it's slower than running in a native app, but it was obviously a direct challenge to Google Docs, which I think came out earlier and popularized the idea of a browser-based office suite. The main advantage of it is not being tied to a single PC (or worse, a Windows PC), and probably more importantly, being able to easily share documents with others, even editing them simultaneously. That really is a killer feature for many.
That would cause foreign countries to also ignore copyright held by US companies. Copyright laws only work as well as they do because all countries that matter sort of play by the same rules.
The NES was discontinued in 95, that was nearly 3 decades ago. I don't think they should have the right to prevent hackers to emulate it and share their findings.
Current consoles, yeah maybe, but even then the question would be why they should get a monopoly on the games developed for their platform..
They do not. Emulation is legal. However it is worth considering that:
0) NES Classic was sold as recently as 2018
1) Nintendo currently rent out NES games as part of Switch online
2) Copyright law ("lifetime" + 70 years) is on Nintendo's side for games themselves
3) Fair use can be a defense against infringement in some cases
4) Although it might or might not be fair use, I feel no guilt downloading Super Mario Bros 3 for an emulator since I've purchased it at least ten times by now, own multiple copies of the game on physical media, and am currently renting it through Switch online.
On the Sony/PlayStation side, I own a PS Classic, which actually runs a version of an open source PS1 emulator PCSX, amusingly enough. (I'm a bit disappointed that it's not a descendant of Connectix's emulator though.[1])
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Computer_Entertainment,_I....
If Nintendo really cared about this they should create their own version of Spotify for legacy video games and charge a monthly subscription fee for the entire library that’s cross platform and mobile friendly. The strength of Nintendo really is their games, not the hardware. I don’t understand why Nintendo is so attached to their hardware in 2024, especially in the age of the Steam Deck.
Yes, you do not.
Nintendo makes a lot of money selling hardware. Switch is the third most successful game console of all time, behind the PS2 and Nintendo's own DS. Switch was always profitable vs. component and manufacturing cost, and this has largely gotten better over time with the exception of covid-related supply chain disruptions. Nintendo has no need or desire to follow in Sega's footsteps.
Switch consoles mean Nintendo can sell physical game cards. Physical media are important in Japan, and important elsewhere since they allow fully offline operation.
Moreover, Nintendo doesn't want to sacrifice its platform fees to the likes of Valve, Apple, or Google.
Genuinely curious: why is that?
https://www.theverge.com/24055863/akihabara-japan-retro-vide...
They do, but the majority of their library is not available on current hardware. I think not understanding this as a business decision is a valid opinion.
Disney did the same thing with their classic movies during the VHS/DVD era. If they were all available all the time then nobody would even think to watch them. But by creating scarcity and then periodically releasing them in a time limited special edition they can eke out more money.
So Nintendo do not want everyone to be blasse about their back catalogue. They want the nostalgia to build and then release some of these titles every so often so you buy them over and over again.
One would think so, but there are incredible games in their portfolio that have never seen a single re-release - on any platform. The old Pokemon games are among it, as is A link to the past.
Maybe you're using a different definition of re-release than I am, but I recently played A Link to the Past on the Switch virtual console. I also played the Game Boy Advance re-release of it in the early 2000s. Apparently it's also been released for the Wii, Wii U, New 3DS, and Super NES Classic Edition.
A quick check of Wikipedia shows that in addition to their remakes, Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow were also released on the 3DS virtual console.
If you can legally play Pokemon GBA or DS games under emulation for a subscription, would that have an effect on demand for buying new Pokemon games, especially for the adult market that has nostalgia for the earlier titles? I honestly think it would, especially given that there seems to be a fairly reasonable consensus online that the franchise peaked in the past for a lot of players - some people say the GBA titles, some say the DS ones, etc. I know personally that I play the old DS, GBA and GameCube titles for a lot of Nintendo franchises more than their current Switch releases.
And with regard to making it cross-platform & available on mobile, Nintendo has always controlled their platforms aggressively. They've never released games on other console platforms other than their own, and their mobile push has been deliberately very conservative (even moreso than other companies with retro libraries like Square Enix, Sega, etc). Plus especially with their handheld lineup, the DS and the 3DS are tricky to do emulated releases for - with the combination of built in touch screens, dual displays, etc.
But I also think that mobile gaming is a poor fit for most of Nintendo's library - unless you're expecting players to buy physical controls for their phones, I can't imagine playing eg Super Mario World is going to be very fun with touch screen button overlays.
Selling their own hardware still works for Nintendo, it's still profitable and it gives them control they'd cede if they released elsewhere. They'd have to pay platform fees, go through someone else's certification processes, etc. They have some of the most recognisable IP in gaming (and with Pokemon etc, one of the most recognisable bits of IP in the world), so they have the market power to pull people to buy their hardware too.
I haven’t picked up my Switch since I bought my Steam Deck. That’s not “market power” that’s losing a gamer instead.
Nonetheless, Switch has been incredibly successful and I expect Switch 2 will be a hit as well.
For now.
This is just baby steps to Nintendo weaseling themselves into Supreme Court to get Sony v. Connectix overturned. MGM v. Grokster attempted to overturn Sony v. Universal (VCR lawsuit), but while the movie studios did win, it was not an overturn of the VCR lawsuit.
And in that case, would it make a difference where the development is done, and if the website is "geofenced"?
It's just because of IP-law that they get to do this. If there were no IP-laws, it would be:
"I bought their product, now it's mine, and I get tot do what I want."
This is just overstretching of IP-laws if you ask me. This madness has to stop.
IP laws aren't a natural concept that exists by itself in nature, they're a construct manufactured and enforced by the governments. So if governments made them, then governments can easily rewrite them if they wish so.
But for that there needs public support and presure form voters to the politicians, but IP laws aren't something the average person cares or even ever thinks about, not when their core worries are inflation, CoL, housing, healthcare, education, etc, so the issue of IP laws is played exclusively on the battlefield of corporations and who has the most money for lobbying.
And corporations don't want laxer IP laws since that gives smaller players more leverage, versus the current status quo the favors the large plyers with the biggest litigation warchests to create large moats for them.
Same for Nintendo: Newer games might be nicer to look at, but old games are just as much fun. So working older copies of their games do cost them money, and they'd rather see them disappear.
https://web.archive.org/web/20060515021332/http://www.1up.co...
Remember that Apple had to be forced to even think about allowing emulators on their platforms by the EU and even then they aggressively block Americans from being able to access them.
Right but laws are only as good as their capability to enforce.
If I were to start an emulation project today I would mask my identity and try to do a better job of it than the silk road guy.
It's a shame ryujinx and yuzu were functionality killed when Nintendo got to the founding developers. There's contributions from other devs but I guess like with a lot of FOSS there's often just one person upon which the entire stack survives. Maybe the biggest projects like Linux and python can survive without their BDL's, but these emulators certainly haven't been able to, and that makes me sad.
I would love to take up the mantle of one of these but I don't know the first thing about emulation programming.
Enforcement of IP restrictions is built into hardware of all new computing platforms. It's easy to enforce them worldwide now - again, see Apple.
Ryujinx (Nintendo Switch emulator) has been removed from GitHub
---
It appears that my suspicions are true, and that I am being specifically targeted by Nintendo. My recent Wii U video was taken down and I received a second copyright strike, even though this showcase video was no different than all of the tech demos and reviews I have made on this channel previously. I am still considering a counter claim under fair use, as the video was for educational use, transformative in nature, and had no effect on the market -- it was a demonstration of a console no longer for sale (even the Wii U eShop is closed, so the company itself has no means of earning revenue from Wii U sales). However, I am reluctant to open that can of worms with a multi-billion dollar corporation, as their next step would be to file legal action.
At the very least this means I am going to change how I approach future videos. I will no longer show any Nintendo games on-screen, which is a shame because I love using those games for my hardware demonstrations. I don't know how that will play out when it comes to showing things like ESDE frontend themes that contain Nintendo characters, but for now I am going to focus on actual gameplay. I am also going through the videos I am working on and blurring out any Nintendo game content as a precaution, even innocuous content like NES games. Unfortunately this is going to delay some video releases -- my latest video should be up right now, but instead I have to re-edit and re-upload the video first.
I know this is disappointing news, but with now two strikes on my channel, I don't really have any other choice except to adjust accordingly. Thanks for your understanding.
I don't know what the fuck "safereddit.com" is, but it is an unnecessary layer of obfuscation when the literal source is right there.
https://github.com/redlib-org/redlib
Agree that we don’t need to add a layer of obfuscation but this seems to be a way to reduce telemetry captured by Reddit.
Nintendo's de facto method to do this is to simply re-release them on Switch - though this only matters for first-party titles.
Wow, the best way to get to know a game before buying is now illegal.
Which basically proves Nintendo has little to no moat apart from laws preventing their executables from being run elsewhere.
We're actually at a point where some Switch games will even run on smartphones.
They waged war against Famiclones in the past - see NTDEC (which had trademarks involved, since NTDEC stands for "Nintendo Electronic Company") and Power Player Super Joy III cases. However, they did lose the PocketFami case (in Japan, mind you) due to patents expiring and the fact it does not come with built-in games.
"They have little to no moat apart from copyright law protecting their IPs"
There, I rephrased it for you. It is actually one hell of a moat.
For something like 20,000 years we were all shared owners of our legends and stories, and recently that's changed. It doesn't make sense to me that the kids that grew up on pokemon are prevented by law from making their own stories, art, and games about this shared cultural history.
This idea that the corporation that spawned the thing "owns" the idea is absurd. The creation is borne of the input of our culture, the output belongs to the culture. If you wanna do a capitalism in there 20 years should be more than enough time to do so. 70 years or whatever the USA is at now is absurd, madness.
Public domain "IP" had lead to phenomenal art that's been capitalistically profitable. Sherlock Holmes, multiple profitable movies, tv shows, and videogames. Greek mythology, multiple award winning videogames and movies, same for Norse mythology.
Those laws still exist irrespective of how recent they are in relation to human existence however, and they are very much enforced by the powers that be, to the benefit of capital holders. Saying that it gives Nintendo "little to no moat" is a ridiculous statement.
Let's be real. I'm guessing only 1% will rip the ROM off their purchased cartridge and play on an emulator. The 99% will pirate games they never purchased.
The point is a good one though: can we preserve the games so that they'll be playable hundreds of years (or more?!) from now, much as we can still play tabletop games from antiquity (backgammon, 9 man morris, chess, mancala, go, senet, etc.?) Whether the cyborgs of the 25th century will still want to play Mario Kart is unknown however.
Are people really going to stop subscribing to Switch Online because NES ROMs are readily available for emulators?
What I think might (?) have some impact on Nintendo is downloading Switch games for execution on competing handhelds like the Steam Deck.
I agree that the big deal that Nintendo must be worried about is Switch emulation and piracy/leaks of new games before or close to release.
On the other hand (refuting my GP speculation perhaps), are Switch (and Switch game) sales really going to tank because pirates can run Zelda on Steam Decks? Regular Zelda fans who can afford one probably own a Switch already, are planning on buying a Switch 2 (or an OLED Switch after a price drop), and preordered the game.
This might be true, but only represents part of the sales — there are many potential buyers who are not “regular Zelda fans” and who may end up not buying the game if they can find a pirated copy.
There's very little reason to buy-into a proprietary handheld that will restrict your usage and repairability and compel you to pay the highest possible prices for games, if you can enjoy those games without that hardware.
I don't know how many consumers are savvy enough to make that comparison but Nintendo are in an extraordinary vulnerable position already - and the Switch 2 will have to contend with two future generations of the Steam Deck as well!
Do they ever find out which stores or developers are leaking the games? Maybe they should have better control over how they ship new games to stores if they insist on shipping physical media...