[HN Gopher] Ryujinx (Nintendo Switch emulator) has been removed ...
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       Ryujinx (Nintendo Switch emulator) has been removed from GitHub
        
       Author : jsheard
       Score  : 368 points
       Date   : 2024-10-01 17:46 UTC (5 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (github.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
        
       | jsheard wrote:
       | For clarity, Ryujinx has no connection to the Yuzu Switch
       | emulator which Nintendo unleashed their wrath on earlier this
       | year. They were developed independently of each other, by
       | different people, in parallel until Yuzus demise.
        
       | notamy wrote:
       | https://gbatemp.net/threads/ryujinx-emulator-github-reposito...
       | 
       | > UPDATE #3: According to an official statement on Ryujinx's
       | Discord server, developer gdkchan was contacted by Nintendo and
       | they were offered an agreement to stop working on the emulator
       | project, and while the agreement wasn't confirmed yet, the
       | organization has been entirely removed.
        
         | duxup wrote:
         | I get the message but this is one of those things where you
         | should have YOUR explanation ready before you pause
         | everything...
         | 
         | Granted that's understandable if they didn't choose the
         | timeline.
        
           | SpicyLemonZest wrote:
           | It's hard to blame a hobby group for not having a perfect
           | comms strategy.
        
             | the_gorilla wrote:
             | It's still true, though. If they really don't want people
             | to speculate on why they did something, they can provide a
             | reason. It doesn't require an entire PR team to figure that
             | out.
        
               | borski wrote:
               | If and only if this was their intent and timeline. May be
               | external.
        
               | Xylakant wrote:
               | They may have been hit by something entirely unexpected
               | and may still need to get their bearings. "It's not
               | github, it's not a DCMA takedown." may very well be the
               | only thing they can communicate with a modicum of
               | certainty at this moment.
        
               | klyrs wrote:
               | There are a million reasons not to say something, and a
               | blush of legal anything should deter you from opening
               | your mouth in public before you're straight with a
               | lawyer.
        
               | nine_k wrote:
               | If what you say may have legal implications, it might be
               | wiser to just say "no comments" for some time, while
               | seeking proper counseling.
               | 
               | "Not DMCA" and "not GitHub" is plenty already. But maybe
               | it's a possible malware infiltration, or having something
               | unbecoming committed to the repo by mistake, or anything
               | else that might warrant denying public access for some
               | time to prevent damage.
        
               | squeaky-clean wrote:
               | I think protecting themselves from being sued into
               | oblivion is more important than getting a message out to
               | users an hour earlier. We don't have any form of SLA
               | agreement with Ryujinx
               | 
               | Also the project is being shut down. Why should they care
               | about community reaction?
        
               | the_gorilla wrote:
               | Why do I get so many inane responses every time I post
               | here? Does it really take 5 people? It's impossible to
               | respond even if I wanted to.
        
             | klyrs wrote:
             | This, a hundred times over. It turns out that communication
             | isn't entirely a bullshit field of study* and it requires
             | significant planning and effort to keep people happy.
             | 
             | * note: all fields have bullshit; this is a recent learning
             | of mine -- unlearning, rather, of a single day of a
             | communications class which left me with the impression that
             | many of us here seem to have of soft sciences: all bullshit
             | by default.
        
         | ls612 wrote:
         | I mean it's hard to imagine this being anything other than the
         | worst.
        
         | boltzmann-brain wrote:
         | What ever exactly happened, ultimately this is just another
         | corporation trying to disturb people in their ownership of
         | their purchased property, in specific video games. Anyone who
         | really thinks about this topic will start questioning why some
         | company located on an island on the other side of the world
         | should be dictating what I do or don't do with a cartridge or
         | disc I paid for with my own money and which is in my
         | possession. It's just ludicrous behavior from a group of power-
         | hungry megalomaniacs. This is why it's important to claw back
         | as much ownership in that space as possible. If you want things
         | to move in the right direction, you should sign
         | https://www.stopkillinggames.com/eci if you're an EU citizen,
         | or support them in any other way if you're not. This stuff is
         | important and will ultimately decide whether we own things in
         | our life or not, as increasingly more items have critical
         | features that are anchored in the digital world. Without stuff
         | like that we will become digital paupers.
        
           | wilsonnb3 wrote:
           | > Anyone who really thinks about this topic will start
           | questioning why some company located on an island on the
           | other side of the world
           | 
           | Why does the location of the company matter? They have
           | branches in america and Europe even if it does somehow
           | matter.
           | 
           | > should be dictating what I do or don't do with a cartridge
           | or disc I paid for with my own money and which is in my
           | possession
           | 
           | You can't ignore the entire idea of intellectual property
           | just because you have a physical disc or cartridge in your
           | possession. There are arguments to be made against IP but
           | this is just lazy.
        
             | EMIRELADERO wrote:
             | > You can't ignore the entire idea of intellectual property
             | just because you have a physical disc or cartridge in your
             | possession. There are arguments to be made against IP but
             | this is just lazy.
             | 
             | But IP law says nothing about interaction with already-
             | existing copies. This just isn't about copyright at all.
        
               | jachee wrote:
               | Okay, so how do you plug a proprietary Switch cart into a
               | PC to play your "already-existing copy" on an emulator?
        
               | devmor wrote:
               | There have been tools built to do this, which Nintendo
               | abused IP law to shut down.
        
               | sim7c00 wrote:
               | isnt this basically piracy enabling technology? its good
               | n all that people take the stance they will only use it
               | for their legitimately owned copies but thats not the
               | reality. people dump stuff and spread it around, and
               | others play illegal copies. its much more rare for people
               | to use such tech legitimately than the other clearly
               | illegal case...
        
               | DrillShopper wrote:
               | Ope, we'd better ban CD burners, Xerox machines, 3D
               | printers, EPROM burners, VCRs, and DAT tape decks because
               | they're pIrAcY eNaBlInG tEcHnOlOgY!!!!!!
               | 
               | That's not how any of this works.
        
               | roywiggins wrote:
               | It's how the DMCA works though, if the media has any DRM
               | on it.
        
               | DrillShopper wrote:
               | No it's not. You can't just say "SOME PEOPLE ARE USING
               | THIS FOR PIRACY SO NOBODY SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO USE THIS
               | LEGALLY". That's _not_ how it works and there are many
               | court cases on point here.
               | 
               | The legal uses as well as the plausible fair uses need to
               | be evaluated before you can say "nope, this has gotta
               | go".
        
               | roywiggins wrote:
               | Well maybe, if you have the time and the money to make a
               | fair use defense in court...
        
               | stzsch wrote:
               | Nintendo's latest legal argument against emulators does
               | rest on the DMCA's anti-circumvention provision. The
               | letter from Nintendo to Valve in the Dolphin case makes
               | it pretty clear.
        
               | bitwize wrote:
               | > That's _not_ how it works and there are many court
               | cases on point here.
               | 
               | Those court cases were overridden by Congress... when
               | they passed the DMCA.
               | 
               | Under the DMCA, IT IS A CRIME to:
               | 
               | 1) circumvent an "effective" copyright measure for any
               | purpose, except specific, delineated purposes and cases
               | which must be approved and reapproved by the Librarian of
               | Congress every 3 years;
               | 
               | 2) traffic in the means or technology to so circumvent a
               | copy protection measure, with no exceptions.
               | 
               | The definition of "effective" is so weak that it applies
               | to anything, even a bit of JavaScript that intercepts
               | right click so you can't "Save Image As". It basically
               | means, would the copy protection measure prevent copying
               | "during the normal course of its operation". I.e., if
               | it's buggy, employs weak crypto, or is otherwise
               | trivially defeated, too bad. You can still catch federal
               | time for breaking it.
               | 
               | In order for a Switch emulator to work properly, the copy
               | protection on the game must be defeated. So even if you
               | dump it yourself and a court somehow rules that copy to
               | be fair use, YOU ARE STILL COMMITTING A CRIME by the very
               | act of dumping it. Therefore, it is illegal to run a
               | Switch emulator to play legitimate Switch games,
               | irrespective of whether those games are "legal" copies or
               | not. And a court may rule that Switch emulators are
               | illegal to distribute as well, since they only have
               | illegal uses.
               | 
               | I am not a lawyer, so I recommend you find yourself a
               | good one if you want to mess around with Switch
               | emulation. Best bet is to not get involved with it at
               | all. Forget about preservation. The Switch and its games
               | are not yours to preserve.
        
               | roywiggins wrote:
               | If an emulator isn't actually enabling the circumvention
               | (the DRM has _already_ been circumvented) it does seem a
               | serious stretch to apply it to them.
               | 
               | I wouldn't want to have to pay lawyers to litigate that,
               | mind you...
        
               | Space5000 wrote:
               | How does an after fact of someone's supposed illegal
               | activity become itself illegal in a case like this?
               | Especially in Brazil if I'm assuming correctly.
               | 
               | I never heard of a case declaring a non-circumvent tool
               | to be illegal just because it may indirectly rely on
               | people dumping it first. If so, then even project64 would
               | be illegal too as bypassing a physical cartridge was
               | ruled to also bypass copy protection.
               | 
               | Also the tool was in another specific country, which I
               | heard doesn't have copy protection laws so the idea that
               | it itself becomes illegal because of the actions in
               | another country sounds even more silly.
               | 
               | I am not a lawyer by the way.
        
               | johnnyanmac wrote:
               | > You can't just say "SOME PEOPLE ARE USING THIS FOR
               | PIRACY SO NOBODY SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO USE THIS LEGALLY"
               | 
               | That is in fact how many court cases are resolved.
               | 
               | >The legal uses as well as the plausible fair uses need
               | to be evaluated before you can say "nope, this has gotta
               | go".
               | 
               | what "fair uses" do we really have to stand on? "I can
               | play Nintendo games better on my PC"? Are you a
               | university or organization trying to preserve software?
               | 
               | At the end of the day, video games as a whole are not a
               | societal need. So it becomes hard to make some argument
               | against having IP owners not clamp down on entertainment
               | intended to make money.
        
               | roywiggins wrote:
               | The LoC can issue exemptions, sort of, but it has to be
               | renewed every three years, and they don't actually apply
               | to circumvention devices themselves, only to users.
               | 
               | https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/10/victory-users-
               | libraria...
               | 
               | https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/11/new-dmca-
               | ss1201-exempt...
        
               | wilsonnb3 wrote:
               | It is not the entirety of how it works but determining
               | the primary intended use case of a technology is part of
               | how it works.
        
               | repelsteeltje wrote:
               | Sure, but _primary intent_ is open to interpretation too.
               | 
               | Dig down deep enough and you'll find the very core of
               | computers is about making copies. Colloquially we speak
               | about moving data across memory or transferring it over a
               | network swap a buffer to disk, but that's not what
               | happens. We make copies and often, but not always,
               | abandon the original.
               | 
               | So it's always been kind of hair splitting to discern
               | between different kinds of copying. Piracy and fair use,
               | owning a software vs having a license to use it - it's a
               | gray area.
        
               | johnnyanmac wrote:
               | >primary intent is open to interpretation too.
               | 
               | and I wager about a million kids, people who can't afford
               | games, or just self-righteous pirates are the ones who
               | engage in copying data. Primary intent can be warped by
               | consumer usage, even if the original ideals were noble
               | (see: Bitcoin).
               | 
               | That's probably why some philantropist doesn't want to
               | try and challenge matters like DMCA. It may only make
               | things worse.
        
               | deknos wrote:
               | with scanner and printer i printed material for my school
               | colleagues in the german version of highschool, because
               | they could not afford some of the specialized books.
               | 
               | i do not say, piracy is always okay, but the intended use
               | is VERY MUCH open to debate, depending on the view point
               | and the money.
               | 
               | and even more volatile, if much money can influence the
               | societal debate and the law system.
               | 
               | many people are very much we-trust-authority-and-
               | companies-to-do-nothing-wrong.
        
               | johnnyanmac wrote:
               | >i do not say, piracy is always okay, but the intended
               | use is VERY MUCH open to debate, depending on the view
               | point and the money.
               | 
               | I completely agree with this POV. But it also seems like
               | we always get an influx of users who want to unironically
               | destroy (not simply readjust) the idea of IP and
               | copyright everytime topics like this occur. So it can be
               | hard to navigate a discussion like this where some people
               | have such radical mindsests to begin with (and usually
               | not anything resembling a model for their plan)
               | 
               | >many people are very much we-trust-authority-and-
               | companies-to-do-nothing-wrong.
               | 
               | yes, I get that a lot just because I want to simply limit
               | copyright terms down to its original 14/14 terms instead
               | of the absurd 95 years or soemthing, or remove it
               | entirely. 28 years happens to be most of a traditional
               | career, so it seems fair for creators to benefit from
               | their creation for assumedly the rest of their career and
               | a bit into retirement before throwing it out for the
               | public for others to iterate on.
               | 
               | The general idea of "well companies can pay to license it
               | out" hasn't worked out to well in hindsight. Lots of
               | companies will happily sit on projects for years,
               | decades, because sometimes denying others of a project is
               | better than giving it out. I'd also be interested in some
               | sort of "use it or lose it" clause of maybe 10 years or
               | so to prove you have an actual proudct in production
               | before an IP goes into the public domain. It'd also solve
               | those weird licensing hells we run into as companies shut
               | down, but I also see a few obvious loopholes to close.
        
               | pjmlp wrote:
               | That is exactly why on some countries there is an
               | additional copy tax on that stuff.
        
               | anthk wrote:
               | Spain and Portugal. We hate the Spanish RIAA a lot (SGAE,
               | sociedad general de autores y editores, I think it
               | doesn't need a translation).
        
               | pjmlp wrote:
               | And France, Germany, and a couple of others.
        
               | calgoo wrote:
               | In a way, to me, this makes it "more legal" to rip
               | copyright material as I'm forced to pay for it on every
               | HD, usb, etc. i understand it's not, but if you are going
               | to force me to pay a tax on any storage device, then I
               | might as well get my value out of it.
        
               | johnnyanmac wrote:
               | Is it a coincidence every one of those pieces of tech
               | have been under controversy? Yes, companies have been
               | against easily copying their works for decades, and the
               | laws are wishy washy until someone angry enough to
               | challenge it rises up.
               | 
               | But odds are, if you have that kind of money you benefit
               | from keeping it vauge.
        
               | naikrovek wrote:
               | If people used emulators for homebrew there wouldn't be
               | much of a fuss about it. But they don't, they use
               | emulators for piracy.
               | 
               | It doesn't matter if it has legitimate uses if 50%+ of
               | the information online is about piracy and game dumping.
               | 
               | Nintendo is gonna care and they're gonna try to stop
               | these things, so long as their primary use is piracy. It
               | doesn't matter that there are legitimate and legal use
               | cases. There are zero people writing homebrew of any real
               | value for any console platform newer than the SNES as far
               | as I'm aware. There are lots and lots of toy applications
               | in homebrew stores but nothing serious. LOTS of detailed
               | and useful info about how to pirate games, though.
        
               | boolemancer wrote:
               | > and game dumping.
               | 
               | Your argument is that legally purchasing a game and
               | playing that in an emulator is piracy?
        
               | naikrovek wrote:
               | No, my argument is that the information on the web is
               | about how to pirate games, no matter how it is couched in
               | the tool documentation.
               | 
               | The case for homebrew is in the homebrew software that is
               | available, and all of the homebrew software that I have
               | ever seen is absolute shite. Toy programs and simple SDK
               | test tools, nothing of value other than the 3rd party
               | SDKs themselves.
               | 
               | It does not matter if you make a legitimate backup copy
               | of a cart you own for safekeeping, emulation of
               | legitimately owned copies of retail games is not an
               | exemption of the DMCA.
               | 
               | It doesn't matter if you own a copy of the game, making a
               | copy for any reason is not in accordance with the DMCA,
               | as far as I'm aware. Exemptions to the DMCA are granted
               | every few years, and some exemptions are rescinded at the
               | same time. Copying game cartridges has never been an
               | exemption.
               | 
               | And even if it was, you can't put your copy back onto a
               | legitimate blank cartridge to regain playability if the
               | original is destroyed.
               | 
               | It's a shitty situation to be sure, and it is wholly
               | unfair. Blame gamers who are "morally opposed" to paying
               | for games that they play. There are a lot of them, and
               | they play a lot of games, and are often popular streamers
               | on YouTube and Twitch.
               | 
               | If people stopped pirating games so much, the homebrew
               | and legitimate use people would have a solid defense and
               | maybe even support in government, but the amount of
               | piracy that goes on absolutely dwarfs legitimate uses of
               | unlocked hardware.
               | 
               | I personally am fascinated with Nintendo hardware and the
               | choices made when they design their systems, and despite
               | repeated efforts to get a Switch dev kit, I have been
               | denied approval time and time again. I have no interest
               | in piracy, I have interest in hardware platforms. But I
               | am in the _extremely small_ minority with that focus.
               | 
               | If piracy slows somewhat dramatically, Nintendo won't be
               | able to do this with impunity like they do today. They
               | will simply not have a leg to stand on when they say
               | emulators are purely piracy mechanisms. But today, they
               | really are.
               | 
               | How many new games come out for the SNES every year? How
               | many SNES emulators are there under active development?
               | Are you going to say that all of those emulators and all
               | of that time spent making them and perfecting them,
               | making them cycle-perfect is done so that 1-2 games can
               | come out every 1-2 years? EMULATORS ARE PRIMARILY USED
               | FOR PIRACY.
               | 
               | Until that changes, Nintendo will keep doing this.
        
               | roywiggins wrote:
               | Selling a tool designed to circumvent DRM, even to make
               | backups, seems straightforwardly illegal under the DMCA?
               | I'm not sure that counts as an abuse of the law...
               | 
               | Using it to shut down emulators that don't help you
               | circumvent DRM does seem like an abuse, though.
        
               | chewmieser wrote:
               | MIG Flash Dumper
        
               | jachee wrote:
               | That doesn't fit the bill, as it seems to only be for
               | "making backup copies", not interfacing directly with an
               | emulator.
        
               | choo-t wrote:
               | You can play your backup on the emulator, and you can
               | even make these backup through a modded Switch.
        
               | jachee wrote:
               | But that doesn't allow for this, the original assertion:
               | 
               | > But IP law says nothing about interaction with already-
               | existing copies.
               | 
               | ...because it requires a separate copy.
        
               | naikrovek wrote:
               | You mean the one that Nintendo crushed and now has
               | details on everyone who bought (or at least ordered) one?
               | 
               | Sure those are just flying around where anyone can grab
               | one.
               | 
               | If you have a 1st hardware generation Switch you have all
               | the dumping hardware you require anyway.
        
               | 76SlashDolphin wrote:
               | Huh? Last I checked you can still order them off
               | AliExpress without an issue. And I highly doubt that
               | Nintendo would go after the thousands of people who
               | bought one after the big MIG Switch announcements.
        
               | wilsonnb3 wrote:
               | Thanks to the DMCA's anti circumvention provisions, it is
               | sort of about copyright
        
               | ls612 wrote:
               | IP law more or less "worked" in the 20th century because
               | of the first sale doctrine. Removing that is what led to
               | the dystopian situation today.
        
             | necovek wrote:
             | "Intellectual property" is a meaningless term: GP is
             | specifically referring to rules dictated by copyright laws,
             | which generally allow one to do whatever they please with
             | their "copy" for the most part (as long as they don't hurt
             | the copyright holder's business through a couple of well
             | defined "protections").
             | 
             | Copyright laws were established when it became cheap to
             | "copy" creative works, so creativity would continue to be
             | stimulated by guaranteeing rewards for a set time (idea was
             | not to guarantee getting filthy rich, just to make sure
             | creation happens by keeping the authors fairly
             | compensated).
             | 
             | Digital "sales" are attempts to trick customers into
             | thinking they are buying a copy when they are only getting
             | a license, but this is unrelated to Nintendo killing
             | emulators with an army of lawyers.
        
               | johnnyanmac wrote:
               | >"Intellectual property" is a meaningless term: GP is
               | specifically referring to rules dictated by copyright
               | laws, which generally allow one to do whatever they
               | please with their "copy" for the most part (as long as
               | they don't hurt the copyright holder's business through a
               | couple of well defined "protections").
               | 
               | And Nintendo isnt going after you if you make a copy.
               | Only if you try to package it and sell it en masse. Which
               | seems to be a reasonable protection of copyright.
               | 
               | Regardles, it's not like any of us created a Nintendo
               | Switch emulator, so we don't have much grounds here.
               | Someone else distributed a tool that can be argued as
               | used to bypass copyright and they are taking the heat for
               | it.
        
               | kibwen wrote:
               | _> Only if you try to package it and sell it en masse._
               | 
               | Ryujinx wasn't being sold, it was being given away for
               | free.
               | 
               |  _> Someone else distributed a tool that can be argued as
               | used to bypass copyright_
               | 
               | By this logic your entire computer is a tool to bypass
               | copyright. An emulator is just a virtual machine, it
               | doesn't contain any games or other copyrighted material.
               | They are legal, despite Nintendo's mafioso scare tactics.
        
               | johnnyanmac wrote:
               | "packaged and distributed en masses" is you want to be
               | nitpicky. I don't get to get away with dealing illegal
               | substances just because I give it away for free. Money
               | simply puts a target on my back.
               | 
               | >your entire computer is a tool to bypass copyright
               | 
               | Reducto ad absurdum doesn't really work here. There are
               | specific scopes and use cases taken into consideration
               | when considering what tools or works are bypassing
               | copyright. I cant claim Yuzu is the same as VMware in
               | their use cases (especially when VMware had to work with
               | Microsoft to have that be allowed. And why it can't
               | legally distribute Mac OS Tom's freely).
        
               | kibwen wrote:
               | I must ask you to please stop commenting all over this
               | thread if you have such demonstrably little idea what
               | you're talking about.
        
             | altruios wrote:
             | I can run legally an mp3 through a calculator. No one can
             | dictate otherwise - it's my machine, and purchased media to
             | do with as I (privately) please. This does not interfere
             | with copyright. To legislate otherwise would be insane - as
             | that would effectively legislate your ability to calculate.
             | 
             | This argument extends to any purchased media, to any
             | program.
        
               | wilsonnb3 wrote:
               | If your mp3 is copy protected and your calculator
               | bypasses that copy protection, it is in fact illegal (in
               | the US)
        
               | altruios wrote:
               | Such a translation would be "format shifting" which is
               | protected under US/UK law (IANAL).
        
               | wilsonnb3 wrote:
               | I think you are correct in the case of an actual MP3 file
               | and calculator.
               | 
               | I was thinking they were metaphorical.
        
               | altruios wrote:
               | Not just a mp3 file. any media you have purchased can be
               | format shifted by you for archive/personal purposes.
               | regardless of DRM/copy protections. What is illegal is
               | redistribution (thus the copyright).
               | 
               | Again: ianal. But this is kind of a fundamental right. If
               | you own something, it's yours to do with privately as you
               | wish. If you don't own the copyright, then you can't
               | redistribute.
        
               | zerocrates wrote:
               | The DMCA makes breaking DRM illegal, even when done for
               | fair use purposes, if it doesn't fall into a small number
               | of tightly-defined exceptions. And they can go after
               | tools that enable people to do this, as well (think of
               | DeCSS for example).
        
               | kevin_thibedeau wrote:
               | The US AHRA requires serial copy management (SCMS or an
               | equivalent) when using format shifting to digital media.
               | Nobody bothers to follow that part of the law and it
               | seems to have never been enforced.
        
               | textadventure wrote:
               | There is no such thing as an mp3 being copy protected. A
               | game on a cartridge is not "copy protected" either.
        
               | karmajunkie wrote:
               | unless i'm mistaken, nobody is telling you what to do
               | with your media.
               | 
               | the issue at play here would be whether the emulator
               | publishers/developers have the right to publish what is
               | almost certainly an infringing piece of software, which
               | courts have repeatedly determined they do not.
        
               | eptcyka wrote:
               | How is an emulator infringing on the copyrights of
               | Nintendo?
        
               | wilsonnb3 wrote:
               | While an emulator does not infringe on copyright and is
               | illegal per US court precedence, an emulator being
               | available is a large part of what makes copyright
               | infringement popular and as such it is related.
               | 
               | Adding in the DMCAs anti-circumvention provisions and the
               | fact that you have to violate them to emulate a modern
               | console, the whole thing becomes very nuanced and tightly
               | linked to copyright infringement despite not directly
               | infringing.
        
               | FMecha wrote:
               | >While an emulator does not infringe on copyright and is
               | illegal per US court precedence
               | 
               | At least until Nintendo manages to overturn Sony v.
               | Connectix, given recent SCOTUS trends.
        
               | Brian_K_White wrote:
               | Explaining that emulators can be used in concert with
               | copyright infringement does not explain what right a
               | copyright holder has over emulators.
               | 
               | That merely explains why Nintendo doesn't like them, not
               | why anyone should care that they don't like them.
               | 
               | Cars may be used to commit bank robberies, yet banks have
               | no rights over cars.
        
               | wilsonnb3 wrote:
               | > That merely explains why Nintendo doesn't like them,
               | not why anyone should care that they don't like them
               | 
               | I don't think it has been tested in courts yet but the
               | general idea is that you _have_ to violate the DMCA to
               | use a switch emulator, so people making switch emulators
               | are making tools to help people circumvent the switch 's
               | copy protection.
               | 
               | Which is also a violation of the DMCA.
               | 
               | Like I said, it is nuanced.
        
             | ysofunny wrote:
             | IP is an obsolete idea of a bygone century
             | 
             | it arose from a legitimate answer to material scarcity, but
             | it's nonesense in the digital space
             | 
             | people who advocate for IP and DRM and all such thing are
             | in the end advocating for scarcity.
        
               | MaxBarraclough wrote:
               | What do you say to people who want to stop using Open
               | Source software licences and instead use 'Fair Source'
               | licences intended to prevent cloud companies monetising
               | the works of others?
               | 
               | For instance, here's discussion about a blog post titled
               | _So you want to compete with or replace open source_
               | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40993787
               | 
               | With no copyright, it would be akin to using permissive
               | BSD-style licensing, which is by no means everyone's
               | preference.
        
               | snapcaster wrote:
               | I don't agree with them, but i haven't seen the argument
               | being pro scarcity. To steelman it, the argument is that
               | without these protections the incentive to create is
               | lower so we actually will have more scarcity
        
               | Wytwwww wrote:
               | So your position is that almost nobody who sells their
               | content should be able to make a living doing that?
               | 
               | You either must be able to fund it through ads, host it
               | on platform which make piracy effectively impossible
               | and/or impractical like Apple's App Store, YouTube etc.
               | or be independently wealthy and just do it as a hobby?
               | 
               | e.g. screw all the authors who are writing books, Amazon
               | should just be able to distribute (or sell for some
               | "convenience" fee) books to everyone who has a Kindle
               | without paying anything to them? That (which would be the
               | logical outcome of nothing having no IP protection)
               | certainly sounds like a reasonable opinion..
        
               | toolz wrote:
               | In practice I agree with your points, but it's also
               | important to consider that the open source model is
               | alive, well and is directly and indirectly at the heart
               | of employing many people. I won't make the argument that
               | society is willing or could switch to that model
               | successfully, but I also wouldn't be willing to say it
               | couldn't work, either.
        
               | Wytwwww wrote:
               | > consider that the open source model is alive
               | 
               | Not everything revolves around software.
               | 
               | Also even then OSS generally seems to only be universally
               | successful in areas where software is a "cost centre"
               | i.e. companies are willing to invest into it when it
               | makes it cheaper for them run their business than
               | building/buying proprietary stuff or they build their
               | products on top of it (A but almost never when it's the
               | actual end product targeted at consumers.
               | 
               | And if we extend the definition of software to video
               | games, OS is not even a thing there (besides middleware
               | of course which falls into the previous category).
        
               | choo-t wrote:
               | other sources of revenue exist, lot of creators get their
               | revenue through donation, either one time or recurring
               | (monthly, yearly, by release).
               | 
               | On another level, we could pivot to UBI instead of
               | dedicating ressource to enforce fake scarcity.
        
               | Wytwwww wrote:
               | > other sources of revenue exist > revenue through
               | donation
               | 
               | So what? Not everyone wants to engage in all of the
               | PR/marketing stuff that's necessary to make any money
               | from that and it would still generally result in
               | significantly lower revenue.
               | 
               | > On another level, we could pivot to UBI instead of
               | dedicating
               | 
               | And fund it how exactly? Even if that were sustainable
               | why do you think that content creators should be fully
               | content living of UBI + a few pennies in donations while
               | people working in most other industries should be able to
               | money the same way they previously did?
               | 
               | IP protection (even if often implemented in a suboptimal
               | way which of course should be improved) have been one of
               | the primaries force behind human progress over that last
               | 300+ years.
        
               | choo-t wrote:
               | > Not everyone wants to engage in all of the PR/marketing
               | stuff that's necessary to make any money from that
               | 
               | That's not a difference, PR/Marketing is already used to
               | profit over IP work.
               | 
               | > Even if that were sustainable why do you think that
               | content creators should be fully content living of UBI +
               | a few pennies in donations while people working in most
               | other industries should be able to money the same way
               | they previously did?
               | 
               | This is assuming creators are fully content on how stuff
               | work now, and I'm betting that's not the case for the
               | vast majority, most of them cannot make end meets with
               | the current system, regardless of how hard they work on
               | their book/song/game/etc, and they have to have a side
               | job just to put food on the table.
               | 
               | > IP protection (even if often implemented in a
               | suboptimal way which of course should be improved) have
               | been one of the primaries force behind human progress
               | over that last 300+ years.
               | 
               | That's a bold claim. Most of, if not all, human progress
               | on this period is directly attributable to the use of
               | fossil fuel, from the steam engine to the modern use of
               | it, and how it empowered us to do so much more with less
               | human-hour.
        
               | neuralRiot wrote:
               | Piracy is product of artificial scarcity, people pirate
               | mostly because it is easier and more convenient than the
               | legitimate counterpart, music piracy almost disappeared
               | when convenient streaming services appeared, same for
               | movies until studios decided that they wanted "cable tv
               | 2.0" Make something as easy as pirating and people will
               | pay for it.
        
               | adamc wrote:
               | Convenient streaming services do not pay musicians a
               | living wage for their work. It's basically still ripping
               | them off.
        
               | hirako2000 wrote:
               | Throwing away these abused IP laws wouldn't prevent
               | creators from making a living off their art.
               | 
               | Plenty of ways for artist to monetize. Selling a copy of
               | the art is one way, very cherished by publishers.
               | Creators for the most part don't make money off copy
               | distribution of their art. That was the case with
               | physical copies, still the case with online distribution.
               | 
               | The good old "let's protect the artists" is a fallacy.
               | It's only to protect publishers and distributors. These
               | IP laws, at least their interpretation acts against the
               | public interest, creators included.
               | 
               | Other forms of monetisation of art? Performance, training
               | and teaching, patronage, custom requests, etc.
               | 
               | Ask Taylor Swift where most of her money is coming from,
               | that's not from Spotify.
        
             | ApolloFortyNine wrote:
             | Emulating consoles that are no longer sold makes some
             | sense.
             | 
             | Emulating a console that already exists just feels wrong.
             | Even if technically in the right.
             | 
             | And it's hard to ignore, even when the emulator is in the
             | right, 100% legal, 99.99% of people will simply be pirating
             | their roms.
        
               | craftkiller wrote:
               | Well if we're going to dive into morality, requiring me
               | to produce additional pollution and e-waste to run your
               | program when I have a perfectly capable turing machine
               | already is unconscionable.
               | 
               | Nintendo: Put your games on steam. Let me buy them
               | without killing the planet.
               | 
               | Apple: License your damn operating system for running on
               | non-apple hardware. Hell, just let me legally run it in
               | an virtual machine so I can test my scripts on your OS
               | without killing the planet.
        
               | mightyham wrote:
               | Nintendo's primary competitive advantage in the gaming
               | space is it's expertise in hardware and tight integration
               | of self-published games. Nintendo would have to
               | fundamentally change it's business model and alter the
               | design of their games (and consequently the unique appeal
               | of them) in order to fit your demand.
               | 
               | You are right about Apple though, simply allowing people
               | to install their OS on other hardware for personal use
               | would not impact their market strategy in any significant
               | way.
        
               | craftkiller wrote:
               | I'd argue the success of the switch emulators proves
               | their games can be successful without changes in the PC
               | space. I'd certainly agree with you when it came to Wii-
               | era games since that had the unusual controller[0] but
               | the switch is a pretty standard controller.
               | 
               | [0] Which they could have sold as first-party PC
               | accessories, further capitalizing on the PC market
        
               | wilsonnb3 wrote:
               | > Well if we're going to dive into morality, requiring me
               | to produce additional pollution and e-waste to run your
               | program when I have a perfectly capable turing machine
               | already is unconscionable.
               | 
               | This is not obvious to me - I would be interested in
               | reading more about the ethical considerations here, if
               | you or anyone else has any good links.
        
               | craftkiller wrote:
               | Links for what? The environmental damage of producing
               | electronics?
               | 
               | - Apple has a report for the environmental impact of an
               | iphone, 81% of the carbon emissions is from the
               | production of the device [0]
               | 
               | - In addition to the whole global warming thing, there's
               | the health impact [1].
               | 
               | So here I am, typing this message out on a perfectly
               | capable universal turing machine. But in order to run
               | <nintendo game> I have to incur that 81% carbon emissions
               | again to buy a different universal turing machine from
               | Nintendo. One that will, after a few years, get thrown
               | into the back of a closet where it will accumulate dust
               | until one day I haul it down to electronics recycling
               | where it can continue its journey poisoning the children.
               | 
               | Its a simple matter of 1 device is less bad than 2.
               | [0] https://www.apple.com/environment/pdf/products/iphone
               | /iPhone_13_PER_Sept2021.pdf         [1]
               | https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-
               | sheets/detail/electronic-waste-(e-waste)
        
               | wilsonnb3 wrote:
               | I was hoping for a more holistic analysis about nintendos
               | business model, the environmental impact, and how the
               | purchasers choice to not buy Nintendos hardware and
               | software fits in. But it is interesting food for thought
               | nonetheless.
        
               | DCH3416 wrote:
               | I disagree. In my case I want to play some of my legally
               | acquired games in ways that were not possible on the
               | original hardware. High FPS, widescreen support, VR,
               | mods. I also want to play my games in a way that's
               | convenient for me, like not having to hook up my console
               | over its own dedicated HDMI. There's more to emulation
               | than just piracy, it opens up a whole field of
               | possibilities for the software.
        
               | NotPractical wrote:
               | Even so, there is no difference between games from the
               | 80s and games released last week from the perspective of
               | copyright law, which usually works in Nintendo's favor.
        
           | cubefox wrote:
           | > ultimately this is just another corporation trying to
           | disturb people in their ownership of their purchased
           | property, in specific video games.
           | 
           | Is it reasonable to assume the majority of Ryujinx users
           | merely emulate Switch games they legally own? That only a
           | minority uses the emulator to play pirated Switch games?
        
             | doctorpangloss wrote:
             | I don't know why you are being downvoted. Of course
             | emulators are being used to play pirated games.
        
               | cheeze wrote:
               | Yeah. It's a bummer because I actually own the games and
               | just want to play them at 4k60 rather than on the weak HW
               | of the Switch. But I understand why Nintendo would target
               | emulators of a _current gen console_.
               | 
               | To say that this is solely an attack on law abiding folks
               | who own the game is... being willfully ignorant because
               | you don't want to accept that a large percentage of
               | installs are doing so for piracy.
        
               | Ajedi32 wrote:
               | Of course it's not _solely_ an attack on law abiding
               | folks who own the game. But is _is_ an attack on them
               | nonetheless. Its also an attack on open source, software
               | freedom, and digital preservation. Further, assuming
               | there were legal threats involved, its an abuse of the
               | legal system to harass open source developers working on
               | perfectly legal software. Emulators are also direct
               | competition to Nintendo 's hardware, so you could see
               | this as an anti-competitive move as well. There are
               | _lots_ of problems with this, and they 're only _mostly_
               | Nintendo 's fault.
        
               | ethbr1 wrote:
               | It's also important to remember that emulators exist
               | without ROMs.
               | 
               |  _All_ the code that 's in an emulator isn't infringing
               | on any Nintendo's IP -- it's re-implementing Nintendo's
               | hardware interface.
               | 
               | That it can be used to make piracy easier is
               | unfortunately, but isn't really the emulator developers'
               | concern, given...
               | 
               | There are substantial, legal, non-infringing uses.
               | 
               | In most legal jurisdictions, thankfully you can't ban
               | something useful just because it _might_ be used to
               | commit a crime.
        
               | cubefox wrote:
               | But what if it is mainly used to commit a crime?
        
               | wilsonnb3 wrote:
               | I feel like the blame mostly lies on people who pirate
               | games. It's a sort of tragedy of the commons. We could
               | have a better world (Nintendo not caring if we play
               | switch games we bought at 4k60 on a PC) but people who
               | pirate games mucked it up.
        
           | doctorpangloss wrote:
           | Apple doesn't need any laws to enforce the following:
           | 
           | - you can't pirate App Store IAP
           | 
           | - you can't pirate Apple News
           | 
           | - you can't pirate Apple Arcade
           | 
           | - you can't pirate iCloud storage and you can't upgrade phone
           | storage space from anyone but Apple, and therefore the amount
           | of data you can practicably store in the iOS ecosystem
           | 
           | - it's impracticable to pirate App Store apps
           | 
           | Okay, that's like 90% of Apple services revenue.
           | 
           | Is Apple the only company allowed to make money? That's kind
           | of what your position is: "the only permissible limitations
           | are the ones that cannot be surmounted technologically." Why
           | should the law be toothless in copyright protections, but not
           | in other things? Because that is a Pro Apple position in
           | disguise.
        
             | Brian_K_White wrote:
             | The law should have teeth and should say that DRM is
             | actually illegal, or at the very least that circumventing
             | it is legal.
             | 
             | No matter how ludicrously long Disney manages to get
             | copyright terms extended to, copyright does still expire,
             | and there are even other exceptions such accessibility and
             | military and emergency usage that trump copyright.
             | 
             | But encryption never expires and does not care if it would
             | save someones life to use some product in some unusual
             | situation, so, it should either be illegal to sell an
             | encrypted audiobook that can never be decrypted even 100
             | years later when it is public domain, or at the very least,
             | if it is to be legal to produce such a thing, then the
             | trade-off is it is at least legal for anyone else to try to
             | overcome it.
             | 
             | How could drm risk anyone's life? I don't know but it isn't
             | just protecting a movie from playing, it's baked into the
             | hardware of devices and makes the entire device non-
             | functional, like HDCP making a display not-display.
             | 
             | Maybe a pdf has critical emergency information like how to
             | sanitize water during an natural disater or war, or
             | identify if a berry is safe or poisonous, but the only pdf
             | you have happened to come from an expensive college course
             | so you can't read it. Contrived examples will always sound
             | contrived and dismissable but no particular example
             | matters. The principle holds even without any examples. If
             | a tv can fail to tv, then forget about if tvs are
             | important, what matters is a tool can be arbitrarily and
             | artificially rendered non-functional.
             | 
             | The law should absolutely have teeth, but it should say
             | something other than what it currently does, and have the
             | teeth to enforce _that_.
        
           | Narhem wrote:
           | Could be an organization issue, when I think of a Nintendo
           | Switch it should be organized under Bh not Gh. Especially
           | with an emulator which doesn't get updates from Nintendo.
        
           | johnnyanmac wrote:
           | >disturb people in their ownership of their purchased
           | property
           | 
           | It's a nice utopic view, but I'd be surprised if more than
           | 10% of the games emulated are also owned by the user. I'd be
           | surprised if more than half the people using emulators ever
           | owned a Switch to begin with.
           | 
           | >Anyone who really thinks about this topic will start
           | questioning why some company located on an island on the
           | other side of the world should be dictating what I do or
           | don't do with a cartridge or disc I paid for with my own
           | money and which is in my possession.
           | 
           | They don't really. If you made Ryujinx or Yuzu and kept it to
           | yourself and maybe a few close friends, they'd never know nor
           | care. But things get complicated when you post it on the
           | public internet.
           | 
           | >This is why it's important to claw back as much ownership in
           | that space as possible. If you want things to move in the
           | right direction, you should sign
           | https://www.stopkillinggames.com/eci if you're an EU citizen,
           | or support them in any other way if you're not.
           | 
           | I dont think even the EU wants to touch the matter of
           | emulation. Precisely because they may discover many emulator
           | users are pirates.
        
         | Liquix wrote:
         | > it's not a DMCA, it's not an issue with GitHub.
         | 
         | glaring omission of the statement "it's not an issue with
         | Nintendo". they have a reputation for relentlessly pursuing the
         | creators of homebrew/emu projects like this. sometimes even
         | going as far as contracting operatives to stalk hobby devs
         | living outside of Japan. look up "nintendo ninjas"...
        
           | devmor wrote:
           | It was indeed Nintendo. They released a statement about 50
           | minutes ago that the lead developer "agreed to stop working
           | on the project" after speaking with Nintendo.
        
             | tomcam wrote:
             | Nice career you have there. Be a shame if something
             | happened to it.
        
         | jsheard wrote:
         | RE: Update 3 (gdkchan being "encouraged" to step down)
         | 
         | I'm mostly just surprised it took Nintendo this long to make a
         | move - the Switch is on its last legs, its successor is less
         | than a year away and almost certainly won't be hacked for a
         | good while. Acting in a way that's bound to piss everyone off
         | but doing it so late that the upside to them is minimal (there
         | won't be that many more new Switch games to pirate at this
         | point) is a weird unforced error. Lawyers move in mysterious
         | ways I guess.
        
           | textadventure wrote:
           | Do you think the average joe who owns a Switch or is a
           | potential client for their next console, is even aware of any
           | of this happening? This is the tiniest of stories. The only
           | way the public at large can become aware of emulators is if
           | they hit a big app store.
           | 
           | So as far as timing of this move goes, it's as good a time as
           | any to "protect what's theirs".
        
           | Lan wrote:
           | I would assume the launch of the Switch successor is why they
           | are clamping down. It's likely very similar architecturally
           | to the Switch. Nobody knows how long it would take to hack
           | it, someone could be silently sitting on an exploit that
           | they've been saving to see if it'll work on the successor. In
           | the event it's hacked quickly and there are still actively
           | developed Switch emulators, it wouldn't be a stretch to
           | believe support would quickly be added to those emulators for
           | the successor.
        
           | sundarurfriend wrote:
           | > Acting in a way that's bound to piss everyone off but doing
           | it so late that the upside to them is minimal ... is a weird
           | unforced error.
           | 
           | This describes their response to Palworld (the
           | Pokemon-"inspired" game that they're suing now) too. When
           | Palworld came out, everyone was talking about how it
           | blatantly copied things and how surprised they are that
           | Nintendo is doing nothing. Now, after several months of
           | people playing Palworld and many of them enjoying it,
           | Nintendo is suddenly choosing to sue them. And predictably,
           | the general response is a lot more negative now, with people
           | having a lot more positive associations with Palworld and
           | having gotten used to assuming that it's here-to-stay.
           | 
           | > Lawyers move in mysterious ways I guess.
           | 
           | Indeed. The timeline to build a case doesn't necessarily
           | align with the business profit goals (like in the Switch
           | case) nor with the public relations goals (like in the
           | Palworld case).
        
             | foobazgt wrote:
             | Sadly, sometimes there's a perverse incentive for lawyers
             | to intentionally delay lawsuits so that they can reap
             | increased damages/penalties.
        
         | nurettin wrote:
         | Interesting, I wonder if this means that they got paid.
        
         | ndiddy wrote:
         | In case anyone's curious about Nintendo's general MO (not sure
         | how similar this case is) around 10 years ago they successfully
         | prevented someone from publishing a method to run arbitrary
         | code on the 3DS using an NDA and the threat of legal action.
         | Here's some documents detailing their approach:
         | https://archive.org/details/Knock_And_Talk_directcontact/Kno...
        
         | alfalfasprout wrote:
         | Given that Ryujinx is open source, I wonder what rights other
         | OSS contributors have? Surely there's nothing stopping another
         | fork from continued development provided nothing illegal is
         | happening.
        
           | zamadatix wrote:
           | Even if you think/"know" the project to be 100% legit do you
           | want to be the OSS contributor that spends the next year or
           | two in court fighting Nintendo about it or did you just like
           | writing some emulator code once in a while in your spare
           | time?
        
         | koolala wrote:
         | A threat is not a natural 'agreement'.
        
       | giancarlostoro wrote:
       | Doesn't look to be DMCA'd see here for GitHub DMCA takedowns:
       | 
       | https://github.com/github/dmca
       | 
       | I wonder if they went after the maintainer directly.
        
         | CryZe wrote:
         | I wouldn't be surprised if they showed up at the maintainer's
         | house even.
        
           | ntqvm wrote:
           | According to the Discord, that's exactly what they did.
        
       | mrfinn wrote:
       | Yet another chapter of Nintendo's wrath against the people? How
       | long the world is going to be dominated by absurd copy(made
       | up)right laws?
       | 
       | PS. Even if that wouldn't be the case here, my POV stands.
       | Current copy(made up)right laws don't even make tiny-little sense
       | nowadays. FREEDOM NOW FOR HUMAN KNOWLEDGE once for all FGS.
        
         | Sakos wrote:
         | This is absolutely the case considering their insane lawsuit on
         | Palworld, which is a _patent_ dispute. Nintendo has clearly
         | turned evil and this is only going to cause great harm and
         | strife in the gaming industry long-term if they win. We 've
         | been largely free of patent trolling in gaming aside from the
         | lawsuits against hardware technologies like vibration (which is
         | itself insanity and harmful), but this would open the flood
         | gates.
        
           | gs17 wrote:
           | > Nintendo has clearly turned evil
           | 
           | They've been roughly like this for a long time. They're very
           | protective of their IP.
        
           | numpad0 wrote:
           | Updating a software patent application and then suing a
           | competitor to strip profits is Nintendo's _modus operandi_.
           | There was one settled for $30m(then) as recent as 2021, just
           | not known outside the country.
           | 
           | 1: https://kotaku.com/nintendo-s-lawsuit-forces-japanese-dev-
           | to...
        
           | bitwize wrote:
           | > Nintendo has clearly turned evil
           | 
           | Astronaut 2: Always has been.
           | 
           | See: Nintendo v. Galoob, Atari and Tengen v. Nintendo, their
           | predatory in general business practices throughout the NES
           | era.
           | 
           | Just because Shigeru Miyamoto flashes his friendly Austin
           | Powers grin and opens up another world of wonder playable on
           | your Switch doesn't mean that the company doesn't or never
           | had a dark side. Hell, the man himself cancelled StarFox 2 to
           | pillage its 3D transform code for use in Super Mario 64.
        
           | 7734128 wrote:
           | Nintendo have been absolute monsters for a long time. The
           | only thing preventing people from realizing this is the
           | cognitive dissonance between their cute games and their evil
           | behavior.
        
         | numpad0 wrote:
         | I think:
         | 
         | - Nintendo was probably _always_ like that, since 80s or 40s or
         | however long ago: they were merely dormant outside the home
         | country due to the famously enormous language barrier.
         | 
         | - Hypothetical defanged Nintendo that isn't like that probably
         | holds little value: even Microsoft with -1 hardcoded as budget
         | ceiling had been successful at forcing Nintendo into
         | obsolescence. This suggests that Nintendo "being like that" is
         | an advantage in itself.
        
           | dfxm12 wrote:
           | Not sure about the 80s, but off the top of my head, there is
           | clear evidence in the early 90s with lawsuits against both
           | Galoob (game genie) and Atari (Tengen games without the 10NES
           | chip).
        
       | givinguflac wrote:
       | Darn. I finally got pop os working the way I like and was about
       | to set up my emulation stuff this weekend. Now Nintendo has
       | successfully stopped me forever! /s
        
         | giancarlostoro wrote:
         | The only thing they've guaranteed is that I'll never buy
         | another one of their consoles or games again. For context I
         | only buy PC and Nintendo.
        
       | mikae1 wrote:
       | Doesn't matter what the reason is this time.
       | 
       | Next time it will undoubtedly be DMCA considering what happened
       | to Yuzu. This is the perfect case for some sort of decentralized
       | Git[1] or a Git repo via Tor.
       | 
       | [1] https://radicle.xyz
        
         | square_usual wrote:
         | What happened to Yuzu was that they took money to help people
         | pirate a brand new game. I don't think that's a reasonable
         | take.
        
           | squigz wrote:
           | I'm a big advocate of emulation (and piracy, frankly) but
           | yeah, honestly, painting the Yuzu developers as the victims
           | is insane. How much were they pulling in via Patreon? $30,000
           | a month?
        
             | gjsman-1000 wrote:
             | Mandatory reminder as well, to the emulation community,
             | that $30K a month is probably enough to fund a legal
             | defense...
        
               | squigz wrote:
               | Perhaps not against Nintendo, but yes.
        
             | EMIRELADERO wrote:
             | What's wrong with getting money out of a product? The fact
             | that it was an emulator changes nothing. They would have
             | been sued, Patreon or no Patreon. Making an emulator is not
             | illegal. And I don't mean gray-area not illegal, I mean
             | _court-precedent not illegal._
        
               | gjsman-1000 wrote:
               | > court-precedent not illegal
               | 
               | Under precedents established before the DMCA was law, and
               | under lawsuits filed before the DMCA was applicable, on
               | consoles which did not have encryption on which the DMCA
               | would have applied.
        
               | EMIRELADERO wrote:
               | Correct, but the DMCA has an explicit exception for this
               | kind of thing.
        
               | gjsman-1000 wrote:
               | > Correct, but the DMCA has an explicit exception for
               | this kind of thing.
               | 
               | That has never been examined or declared, as the DMCA
               | exemptions are much narrower than they appear. The
               | reverse engineering exemption, for example, does not
               | cover the right to make a product that interfaces with
               | the original - only to examine the technology to build
               | your own product.
               | 
               | An obvious example of this is DVDs, which have the same
               | exemptions. The US PTO, and the US Librarian of Congress
               | (who has the power to make DMCA exemptions) are
               | unequivocally clear that a private copying exemption does
               | not exist in their view. This is also why the EFF has
               | been begging every 3 years for the last... two decades...
               | to make such an exemption, and has failed.
        
               | EMIRELADERO wrote:
               | The reversing clause doesn't, but the law does.
               | 
               | It's "declared" specifically in the Act, here:
               | 
               |  _(1)Notwithstanding the provisions of subsection
               | (a)(1)(A), a person who has lawfully obtained the right
               | to use a copy of a computer program may circumvent a
               | technological measure that effectively controls access to
               | a particular portion of that program for the sole purpose
               | of identifying and analyzing those elements of the
               | program that are necessary to achieve interoperability of
               | an independently created computer program with other
               | programs, and that have not previously been readily
               | available to the person engaging in the circumvention, to
               | the extent any such acts of identification and analysis
               | do not constitute infringement under this title.
               | 
               | (2)Notwithstanding the provisions of subsections (a)(2)
               | and (b), a person may develop and employ technological
               | means to circumvent a technological measure, or to
               | circumvent protection afforded by a technological
               | measure, in order to enable the identification and
               | analysis under paragraph (1), or for the purpose of
               | enabling interoperability of an independently created
               | computer program with other programs, if such means are
               | necessary to achieve such interoperability, to the extent
               | that doing so does not constitute infringement under this
               | title.
               | 
               | (3)The information acquired through the acts permitted
               | under paragraph (1), and the means permitted under
               | paragraph (2), may be made available to others if the
               | person referred to in paragraph (1) or (2), as the case
               | may be, provides such information or means solely for the
               | purpose of enabling interoperability of an independently
               | created computer program with other programs, and to the
               | extent that doing so does not constitute infringement
               | under this title or violate applicable law other than
               | this section._
        
               | gjsman-1000 wrote:
               | Let's say your interpretation holds water even though I,
               | and the EFF in their handbook
               | [https://www.eff.org/pages/unintended-consequences-
               | fifteen-ye...], and the US legal system just a few months
               | ago [https://www.pearlcohen.com/court-upholds-dmcas-anti-
               | circumve...], do not believe is correct. (It's easy to be
               | an armchair lawyer - if you read the first amendment out
               | of context, threatening to kill someone seems protected.)
               | 
               | Nintendo may potentially argue that yes, you are
               | completely right. You have the right to interoperability,
               | in the sense that you are allowed to make a device which
               | physically takes Switch cards, decrypts them, plays them,
               | from the original card, does not copy it to storage media
               | of any kind, and does not allow the user any semblance of
               | a DRM bypass, or any way to resell the original card
               | while maintaining a copy. Interoperability is for
               | building CD players, not CD rippers.
               | 
               | EDIT TO REPLY FOR "POSTING TOO FAST": Section 117 is very
               | clever, except there's one problem: It was created in
               | 1980, before the DMCA. Thus, if there is a conflict
               | between the DMCA and Section 117, the DMCA is likely to
               | receive the benefit of the doubt. As such, Section 117 is
               | only effective for demonstrating the legality of copying
               | non encrypted programs, or (as an actual lawyer put it),
               | copying a program with the DRM remaining intact, as
               | useless as that is.
               | 
               | Combine my point about interoperability in the courtroom
               | + Section 117 likely being overruled by Section 1201 of
               | the later DMCA which is extremely restrictive on
               | bypassing "technological protection measures" copied or
               | not, and it's not a clear win.
        
               | EMIRELADERO wrote:
               | > Let's say your interpretation holds water even though
               | I, and the EFF in their handbook
               | [https://www.eff.org/pages/unintended-consequences-
               | fifteen-ye...], and the US legal system just a few months
               | ago [https://www.pearlcohen.com/court-upholds-dmcas-anti-
               | circumve...], do not believe is correct.
               | 
               | The case you linked to has nothing to do with the
               | interoperability exception. I don't know how they could
               | reject my view if they never touched it.
               | 
               | Also
               | 
               | > Nintendo may potentially argue that yes, you are
               | completely right. You have the right to interoperability,
               | in the sense that you are allowed to make a device which
               | physically takes Switch cards, decrypts them, plays them,
               | from the original card, does not copy it to storage media
               | of any kind, and does not allow the user any semblance of
               | a DRM bypass, or any way to resell the original card
               | while maintaining a copy.
               | 
               | And they would be right, if copyright law didn't have an
               | additional exception...
               | 
               |  _17 U.S.C SS 117 - Limitations on exclusive rights:
               | Computer programs (a)Making of Additional Copy or
               | Adaptation by Owner of Copy.--
               | 
               | Notwithstanding the provisions of section 106, it is not
               | an infringement for the owner of a copy of a computer
               | program to make or authorize the making of another copy
               | or adaptation of that computer program provided:
               | 
               | (1)that such a new copy or adaptation is created as an
               | essential step in the utilization of the computer program
               | in conjunction with a machine and that it is used in no
               | other manner, or
               | 
               | (2)that such new copy or adaptation is for archival
               | purposes only and that all archival copies are destroyed
               | in the event that continued possession of the computer
               | program should cease to be rightful._
        
               | EMIRELADERO wrote:
               | Reply to your edit:
               | 
               | That's what the first exception in the DMCA itself is
               | for. It provides that:
               | 
               | 1. You can manually decrypt DRM'd content if it's
               | software you own a legal copy of and you need to run it.
               | 
               | 2. You can make an automated tool that does step 1.
               | 
               | 3. You can share that tool with anyone as long as they
               | respect 1.
               | 
               | The DMCA DRM clauses only care about that, the DRM
               | itself. Not whether you make a new copy of the content.
        
               | ferbivore wrote:
               | Does the Nintendo-Tropic Haze settlement not count as
               | court precedent? It was signed off by a judge after all.
        
               | NotPractical wrote:
               | A settlement does not imply guilt or create legal
               | precedent (AFAIK IAMNAL LOL).
        
               | croes wrote:
               | >they took money to help people pirate a brand new game
               | 
               | That is where they went wrong
        
             | Dylan16807 wrote:
             | There's nothing wrong with a team of people getting that
             | much money to code an emulator.
        
               | croes wrote:
               | >they took money to help people pirate a brand new game
               | 
               | That was the wrong part
        
               | Dylan16807 wrote:
               | Yeah, but that's not the comment I was responding to.
               | 
               | I understand the issue of making money drawing attention
               | to the piracy they (supposedly?) participated in. But
               | there is nothing wrong with the money they got for their
               | development efforts. That money is not a counterpoint to
               | them being victims, regardless of whether they actually
               | are victims or not.
               | 
               | I doubt any meaningful amount of it went to piracy, if
               | any. If that's wrong, then okay I'll change my mind.
               | 
               | And big citation needed that they had a money collection
               | specifically for some instance of piracy.
        
               | croes wrote:
               | But the comments you were replying too agreed with the
               | point I quoted.
               | 
               | There is most likely a correlation between their Patreon
               | donations and their helpfulness regarding games
        
             | mikae1 wrote:
             | _> painting the Yuzu developers as the victims is insane._
             | 
             | Hope you're not thinking I'm the painter here... I know
             | they turned the thing into big business and I don't have a
             | lot of understanding for that.
             | 
             | Realistically though, I expect Nintendo to find ways to
             | wipe Ryujinx from Github and sue these developers too,
             | considering people have turned to it now that Yuzu is gone.
             | 
             | The only way to escape that fate would be to maintain
             | proper opsec, stay in the right jurisdiction and not rely
             | on (DMCA sensitive) big tech platforms for the development.
             | 
             | EDIT: guess I was kind of right... Seems Nintendo succeeded
             | with their goal:
             | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41712399
        
             | tombert wrote:
             | The lawsuits that effectively legalized console emulation
             | in the 90s were commercial products, enabling you to play
             | PlayStation games on your PC or DreamCast
             | 
             | There's even a video of Steve Jobs showing off Connectix on
             | the Ma..
             | 
             | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleem!
             | 
             | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sony_Computer_
             | E...
        
           | lcouturi wrote:
           | The popular narrative seems to be that Yuzu had something to
           | do and/or profited in some way from the Zelda Tears of the
           | Kingdom leak, which isn't true. The Patreon-only Early Access
           | builds could not play the game any more than the public
           | Nightly builds could. Both versions needed an unofficial game
           | patch for the game to launch, a patch which the Yuzu
           | developers had nothing to do with. Yuzu developers also did
           | not implement or work on any bug fixes involving the game
           | before its official release. Perhaps you were alluding to
           | something else, though.
        
             | tombert wrote:
             | I thought that there was also speculation of people sharing
             | ROMs directly on Discord, with the Yuzu admins being pretty
             | ambivalent about the whole thing?
             | 
             | I only followed the story peripherally, so it's possible
             | I'm wrong.
        
               | CryZe wrote:
               | The Yuzu devs banned anyone even mentioning TotK in the
               | Discord. However, they apparently had some private
               | Discord or something where the Yuzu devs shared ROMs
               | between themselves.
        
             | theturtletalks wrote:
             | I thought they were sharing Nintendo encryption keys that
             | are "technically" supposed to be from the Switch you're
             | emulating. People were using Yuzu to turn their Steamdeck
             | into a Switch and using Yuzu's private discord to get the
             | keys needed to do that.
             | 
             | It's the same reason other emulators ask you to bring your
             | own BIOS file because that is proprietary.
        
               | thomastjeffery wrote:
               | AFAIK, they were explicitly _not_ sharing those keys. You
               | had to get your own. They provided instructions on how to
               | copy them from your own hardware.
        
             | 0xDEADFED5 wrote:
             | I was there, this is true.
        
         | asveikau wrote:
         | > is the perfect case for some sort of decentralized Git
         | 
         | This is exactly what git is made to be without any extra
         | tooling on top.
        
           | tshaddox wrote:
           | AFAIK git doesn't concern itself with discoverability, which
           | is presumably what OP means. Sure, if you already know the IP
           | address of someone hosting a git repo you can pull it. But
           | that's not really a decentralized service (or not any more
           | decentralized than downloading stuff from a known host via
           | HTTPS).
        
         | woodrowbarlow wrote:
         | git is decentralized and can be served across anything,
         | including tor.
        
           | grzracz wrote:
           | i think you don't know what decentralized means
        
             | trufas wrote:
             | You're conflating git with git forges. Most popular forges
             | use a centralized model. Git was built as distributed from
             | the start and it's original mode of collaboration was
             | through a federated protocol.
        
         | 1propionyl wrote:
         | Some sort of decentralized Git.
         | 
         | You mean Git?
        
           | tombert wrote:
           | I mean, nominally, but honestly how many of us _actually_ use
           | Git in a distributed fashion? I think most of us treat Git
           | more or less like Subversion with local committing and much
           | better merging.
           | 
           | I think what the person was referring to was something more
           | along the lines of a DHT (e.g. Pastry or Kademlia), IPFS, or
           | (as they mentioned) Tor, where it can be truly leaderless and
           | owned by everyone and no one at the same time.
        
             | 1propionyl wrote:
             | I think what they meant was GitHub, not Git.
             | 
             | A common conflation these days, and one GitHub works hard
             | to reinforce.
        
               | tombert wrote:
               | Sure, but a vast majority of people who use Git will
               | centralize it, with Gitlab, or Bitbucket, or SourceForge,
               | even barring Github.
               | 
               | While the git _program_ is allowed to be decentralized,
               | pretty much everyone 's workflow is decidedly not.
        
         | mtndew4brkfst wrote:
         | Probably worth reminding that this is the project where the
         | backing company is centered around crypto/blockchain, but they
         | pinkie promise it will never affect this work!
         | 
         | https://radicle.xyz/faq
         | 
         |  _Radworks, the organization that has been financing Radicle is
         | organized around the RAD token which is a governance token on
         | Ethereum._
         | 
         | It gives off the same odor as Tea did, for me personally.
        
         | hnlmorg wrote:
         | git already is decentralised. GitHub isn't. But you can clone
         | the git repository and mirror that as many places as you want.
        
           | j_maffe wrote:
           | git doesn't have discoverability or any kind of decentralized
           | CDN service AFAIK.
        
             | hnlmorg wrote:
             | None of that are requirements for a version control system,
             | let alone a distributed one.
             | 
             | What people are after is a decentralised GitHub. Which I
             | think is a good idea. But git itself is already built from
             | the ground up to work decentralised.
             | 
             | So if someone were to build a decentralised discovery
             | service for git, then you could take any existing git
             | repository, whether it's local copies on your laptop or
             | "centralised" versions in GitHub, and use them equally as a
             | seed.
        
         | RiverCrochet wrote:
         | My niece tells me that decentralized Git is, well Git.
         | 
         | As far as a web interface to Git, she was saying the basic
         | pieces are kinda already there with Gitea, and provided the
         | following points:
         | 
         | - Gitea is a single executable, fairly easy to install at least
         | on Linux (it does need a database), and while the configuration
         | requires some time it's worth it for all that Gitea does -
         | which is basically be a copy of Github.
         | 
         | - Gitea has a migration option which will literally pull in an
         | entire Git repo with one click.
         | 
         | So my niece was telling me zany things like "why doesn't
         | everyone run their own Gitea and simply cross migrate
         | everything?" I don't know, I feel like it's dangerous and
         | essentially providing easy tools and paraphernalia to potential
         | evil doers, such as those who may want to infringe copyright,
         | so this is an application I'll never host or run in my life.
        
       | k__ wrote:
       | If you want to avoid such a takedown, check out:
       | 
       | https://protocol.land/
       | 
       | https://radicle.xyz/
        
         | ezfe wrote:
         | It wasn't taken down by Github, it was seemingly taken down by
         | the maintainers. Git already provides protection against this
         | via local copies, so there's no benefit.
        
           | k__ wrote:
           | Data on protocol.land is permanent and can't be deleted.
        
             | squeaky-clean wrote:
             | That sounds much worse for projects like this unless the
             | authors go fully anonymous and always practice clean opsec.
             | 
             | Nintendo probably sent them a deal along the lines of
             | "Agree to take down the project or else we will sue you for
             | millions of dollars". Could you imagine if you were served
             | that and had to respond "it is impossible for me to take
             | down the project because of the hosting I used."
             | 
             | Even if it's a trial Ryujinx could win... Winning and trial
             | isn't free, and you can often can't recoup attorney fees.
        
             | ezfe wrote:
             | Okay and I'm not sure maintainers want that
        
         | mtndew4brkfst wrote:
         | Not familiar with the first but the second is funded by a
         | commercial company whose core focus is Ethereum-based, and
         | they're making another cryptocurrency and caused a bunch of PR
         | spammers the same way Tea did.
         | 
         | https://radicle.xyz/faq https://docs.radworks.org/#projects
         | https://www.drips.network/
        
           | k__ wrote:
           | Drips sounded like a reasonable idea to get builders funded.
        
       | adzm wrote:
       | YouTube accounts showing devices that emulate Nintendo games have
       | been targeted recently as well
       | 
       | https://www.timeextension.com/news/2024/10/nintendo-is-now-g...
        
         | onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
         | Ironically, this is the type of behavior that will make me STOP
         | buying a company's products.
         | 
         | They're obviously doing this because they think their losing
         | sales - which they probably are on net. But I wish more people
         | would stop buying products from companies that try to ruins
         | people's literal lives over - essentially - a rounding error to
         | the company's bottom line.
        
           | tourmalinetaco wrote:
           | I haven't bought a Nintendo product in almost a decade. My
           | life is better for it. Previously I avidly bought every MH,
           | every Pokemon, would have bought the Digimon releases on
           | Switch too. A fair portion of the recent Zeldas too. Nowadays
           | I play pirated games on my 3DS and am quite happy, far
           | happier than I had been paying Nintendo only to fuck over the
           | things I enjoy. My impact may be small, but that hardly
           | matters because at least I'm putting my (lack of) money where
           | my mouth is.
        
           | m3kw9 wrote:
           | I think this move hurts yourself more than the company. There
           | are more level headed ways to go about it but this one ain't
           | it
        
       | asddubs wrote:
       | for comparison, here's what a DMCAd repo looks like:
       | 
       | https://github.com/yuzu-mirror/yuzu
        
       | richard___ wrote:
       | This is a non issue to most human beings
        
         | tightbookkeeper wrote:
         | Hope nothing happens to anything you have an interest in.
        
         | textadventure wrote:
         | That probably applies to like 90% of posts here.
        
         | EasyMark wrote:
         | Why not scroll on past then? Most posts here are technical or
         | fairly specific, do you come to all the article comments and
         | say they are irrelevant?
        
       | alext54321 wrote:
       | If nintendo could come into your hoise and smash all your old
       | games consoles so you buy thr rerelease, they would do it.
        
         | MarioMan wrote:
         | I was shocked to learn there was a short period in the '90s
         | when even reselling your physical games was outlawed in Japan.
         | At the time, Nintendo put "no resale" icons on the back of all
         | their games.
        
           | favorited wrote:
           | We'll be back to that same state of affairs, once physical
           | game media is phased out. The PlayStation platform has gone
           | from the PS4 (universal optical media) to the PS5 (cheaper
           | model without optical media) to the PS5 Pro (no optical media
           | without a separate accessory). Hell, it's already happened
           | for PC games.
        
       | 1propionyl wrote:
       | > Yesterday, gdkchan was contacted by Nintendo and offered an
       | agreement to stop working on the project, remove the organization
       | and all related assets he's in control of. While awaiting
       | confirmation on whether he would take this agreement, the
       | organization has been removed, so I think it's safe to say what
       | the outcome is. Rather than leave you with only panic and
       | speculation, I decided to write this short message to give some
       | closure.
       | 
       | Taken from Discord announcement.
        
         | dmonitor wrote:
         | So they bribed him into taking down the project? That's
         | certainly one way to go about it.
        
           | moritzruth wrote:
           | I also thought that at first, but they could have just
           | threatened him with a lawsuit if he does not "agree".
        
             | wilsonnb3 wrote:
             | Indeed, i would be very surprised if Nintendos offer was
             | all carrot and no stick.
        
             | 1propionyl wrote:
             | It's probably a C&D.
        
               | EasyMark wrote:
               | More likely a verbal threat, take the $20k carrot or
               | we'll see you in court over the next few years.
        
       | gnarbarian wrote:
       | this is why centralized "free" services like discord and github
       | are a big risk to projects that exist in a legal gray area.
       | 
       | hard to beat a physical server you own in a data center you have
       | a contract with.
        
         | textadventure wrote:
         | Github didn't do anything here, it was the project owned who
         | did: https://twitter.com/RyujinxEmu/status/1841188744126480428
         | 
         | So the exact same thing would have happened with whomever owned
         | the physical server.
        
       | tester756 wrote:
       | One of the most impressive C# code bases :(
        
         | kcb wrote:
         | Microsoft themselves have highlighted Ryujinx as an example of
         | high performance modern .NET.
        
         | JamesSwift wrote:
         | I submitted a PR a couple months ago and was really pleasantly
         | surprised at how accessible it was to contribute. No funny
         | business, just `git clone` and open up Rider.
         | 
         | I was only touching the frontend client (i.e. game library
         | screen etc, not the actual emulation), but it took less than
         | two weeks to go from zero-to-PR-submitted on a fairly complex
         | refactor.
        
         | jsheard wrote:
         | The name Ryujinx is even a C# in-joke of sorts, early
         | iterations of the emulator translated the Switches ARM code
         | into .NET CIL bytecode and then used the standard .NET JIT,
         | which is called _RyuJIT,_ to translate that to native code. NX
         | was the Switches codename, so RyuJIT + NX, minus the T, makes
         | Ryujinx.
         | 
         | They eventually outgrew that approach and rolled their own JIT,
         | but the name had stuck at that point.
        
           | theragra wrote:
           | Thanks a lot, you clarified my confusion about these two
           | things
        
       | hypeatei wrote:
       | New update (from discord):
       | 
       | > Yesterday, gdkchan was contacted by Nintendo and offered an
       | agreement to stop working on the project, remove the organization
       | and all related assets he's in control of. While awaiting
       | confirmation on whether he would take this agreement, the
       | organization has been removed, so I think it's safe to say what
       | the outcome is. Rather than leave you with only panic and
       | speculation, I decided to write this short message to give some
       | closure.
       | 
       | ...
        
       | rcarmo wrote:
       | Wow. When yuzu was taken down I wrote a script to automatically
       | download the 5 latest releases of a few other emulators I use,
       | and that included Ryujinx (so I do have the binaries for those,
       | which will go into safekeeping).
       | 
       | Now I wish I had set up a Gitea mirror as well, even though I
       | would likely never build it myself.
       | 
       | Edit: here's the script -
       | https://gist.github.com/rcarmo/89afd64747fc909e80b29abc902c8...
       | 
       | It is designed to be very low impact (I had it on a daily cron).
       | 
       | Feel free to use it to ensure you can preserve the software you
       | rely on. As far as I'm concerned, I'm _very_ sad that Nintendo
       | has now made it impossible to enjoy my games on better hardware,
       | and will probably focus on PC gaming henceforth (there are lots
       | of nice indie games on Steam, like Dredge, which is my current
       | favorite).
        
         | rererereferred wrote:
         | Do forks go away together with the original repository when
         | it's removed from Github?
        
           | bityard wrote:
           | Edit: I guess I'm wrong, see reply
           | 
           | If a repository is removed by Github in response to a DMCA
           | request, yes.
           | 
           | (But it's not clear that that's what happened here.)
        
             | tjhorner wrote:
             | The forks aren't actually automatically taken down in most
             | cases. The claimant must list every individual fork in the
             | claim. Which I love, because it's kind of petty but still
             | following the DMCA to the letter.
             | 
             | Here is an example[1] of the form claimants must fill out.
             | 
             | > Each fork is a distinct repository and must be identified
             | separately if you believe it is infringing and wish to have
             | it taken down
             | 
             | [1]: https://github.com/github/dmca/blob/master/2024/05/202
             | 4-05-3...
        
               | 0xcde4c3db wrote:
               | IIRC it took them a couple months to get through all of
               | the Yuzu forks after the initial DMCA and lawsuit. I
               | doubt there were nearly as many forks of Ryujinx, though.
        
           | ZeWaka wrote:
           | Depends on which type of removal they do, but they can be
           | yes.
        
           | textadventure wrote:
           | In this case it seems so, someone just uploaded the codebase
           | again (archived): https://github.com/emmauss/Ryujinx
        
             | mikae1 wrote:
             | Codebase, but no releases...
        
             | loufe wrote:
             | 5 years out of date though, it would seem.
        
         | Macha wrote:
         | I actually do have a private gitea mirror setup after the yuzu
         | takedown.
        
       | maxglute wrote:
       | I'm surprised RU or PRC doesn't throw some state sponsored
       | program to break DRM to undermine Nintendo or Sony for shits and
       | giggles. NKR did the Sony hack years back, would be nice if they
       | put some team on playstation emulation.
        
       | radicalbyte wrote:
       | I am strongly reconsidering buying a Switch 2 now. This is
       | absolutely disgusting from Nintendo.
        
         | cooper_ganglia wrote:
         | Nintendo's behavior recently has guaranteed that I will never
         | purchase another Nintendo product ever again. I'm exclusively
         | pirating their games from now on, lol
        
           | Janicc wrote:
           | It's always morally correct to pirate Nintendo Games.
        
         | pezezin wrote:
         | Have you been living under a rock? Nintendo has been like this
         | since the NES days.
        
         | EasyMark wrote:
         | Don't buy it, put money towards a PC system or card. I'm done
         | with Nintendo after this. It takes a lot to make me skip out on
         | Mario, but in the end Nintendo burned through all of my
         | nostalgia for them from my childhood
        
       | ChrisArchitect wrote:
       | Related:
       | 
       |  _Nintendo Is Now Going After YouTube Accounts Which Show Its
       | Games Being Emulated_
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41708771
        
         | EasyMark wrote:
         | Well that seals the deal, never buying a Nintendo product
         | again. I'm sure I don't matter to them but I'll help friends
         | and family get more into PC and retro gaming if they want to
         | pick my brain.
        
       | sweeter wrote:
       | This just affirms the idea that Nintendo doesn't care about
       | legality, they are extremely litigious and will attack anything
       | and everything they perceive to be as harmful to them whether it
       | is actually harmful or not.
        
       | bittwiddle wrote:
       | So I understand wanting to build emulators so that people can
       | continue to play their old games after the hardware fails. But in
       | building an emulator for a current generation console, it seems
       | likely that much of the audience is just interested in pirating
       | the games.
        
         | cloogshicer wrote:
         | The Switch hardware is so underpowered that most games run a
         | lot better (no framedrops, higher resolution) on PC.
        
         | ThrowawayTestr wrote:
         | It doesn't matter what most people are doing, emulators are
         | legal.
        
           | m-p-3 wrote:
           | Legal or not, Nintendo will release its hounds and drown you
           | in court fees. Personally, I'd rather not have to deal with
           | this legal bullshit and stress in my life.
        
         | Janicc wrote:
         | Good. If there's one company that deserves to have their stuff
         | pirated, it's Nintendo.
        
       | textadventure wrote:
       | Someone else re-uploaded the repo (archived):
       | https://github.com/emmauss/Ryujinx
        
         | hypeatei wrote:
         | That doesn't look to be an up-to-date fork at all. Latest
         | commit is from 5 years ago.
        
           | sublimefire wrote:
           | Look at other branches, e.g. arm_delegate_native was active
           | yesterday
        
             | guax wrote:
             | Last master commit as of two days ago was very different: h
             | ttps://web.archive.org/web/20240929032514/https://github.co
             | ...
             | 
             | So not a good fork either way since the builds were made
             | out of master.
        
         | morserer wrote:
         | 5 years old :(
        
       | guax wrote:
       | I always though switch emulation got too good too fast. Switch
       | being such weak hardware you can emulate it on a potato. Nintendo
       | must've been eyeing an angle to close Ryujinx for a while now.
       | 
       | It would be very interesting if the main dev actually got paid to
       | delete everything. Although it looks like a "dick move" at first,
       | if you know the source will live on and you get retirement money.
       | I would be very pressed to accept if in that situation. Much more
       | likely they just offered to not sue him to oblivion.
       | 
       | I honestly don't blame Nintendo for angling emulators with
       | everything they have while the hardware is current. They have
       | much shittier behaviour when interacting with the community, like
       | suing tournaments that used mods and threatening others.
        
         | bluescrn wrote:
         | I'm wondering if the anticipated Switch 2 is going to be very
         | similar to the current device in terms of architecture and OS,
         | and the real concern of Nintendo isn't Switch 1 piracy right
         | now, it's that the current Switch emulators could evolve into
         | Switch 2 emulators in the early months/years of the new
         | hardware lifecycle, emulators able to play ripped Switch 2
         | games well before anyone figures out how to mod the new
         | hardware to enable piracy.
         | 
         | But they probably also want to re-sell us previous games, too,
         | particularly if they can run 'remastered' versions of the
         | Switch Zelda games at a better resolution/framerate on the new
         | hardware - which you can already to via emulation...
        
           | guax wrote:
           | I am sure the Switch 2 is just a more powerful switch. Still
           | massively underpowered compared to a PC so updating the
           | emulators to run switch 2 would be a fast affair considering
           | how easy people were able to dump the first one. Its likely
           | just a "switch pro" iteration that the OLED never was.
           | 
           | Its likely inevitable considering the hunger for pirated
           | nintendo games on markets like Brazil with a large supply of
           | competent hackers and not much chance of people being able to
           | afford legit games.
        
       | nephy wrote:
       | These projects really need to start standing up their own Gitea
       | or Gitlab instances and mirroring to GitHub.
       | 
       | It also cracks me up every time I see legalistic apologists on
       | this website backing up giant corporations.
       | 
       | A) Who cares about the law? It's rarely moral. B) Which laws
       | should we follow? The internet exists in every country.
        
       | haunter wrote:
       | Probably because of the backwards compability of Switch 2. Just
       | imagine emulators outperforming bc games, which of course will
       | happen lol
        
       | mikae1 wrote:
       | Here's a recent (unofficial) AppImage for future use...
       | 
       | https://web.archive.org/save/https://github.com/Samueru-sama...
       | 
       | EDIT: it's not the latest. 1.1.1403 is the latest.
        
         | rcarmo wrote:
         | Someone should mirror the flatpaks
        
           | mikae1 wrote:
           | Just upgraded the Flathub flatpak to the latest version on my
           | machine. Not sure what's the recommended way to keep two
           | stray Flatpak apps alive.
           | 
           | I have the latest Yuzu flatpak installed on one machine and
           | the latest Ryujinx flatpak on another. How do I save them for
           | the future and migrate them to a new machine?
           | 
           | https://docs.flatpak.org/en/latest/flatpak-command-
           | reference... ?
        
             | rcarmo wrote:
             | flatpak build-bundle /var/lib/flatpak/repo
             | org.ryujinx.Ryujinx.VERSION.flatpak org.ryujinx.Ryujinx
             | stable is what you need.
        
         | haunter wrote:
         | Windows latest is on Archive.org
         | 
         | https://archive.org/details/ryujinx-1.1.1403-win_x64
        
         | harislubisdev wrote:
         | Consolidated in https://rentry.co/ryujinx (Windows and macOS)
        
       | espinielli wrote:
       | The forks from the listed co-developers are still available...and
       | some of them pretty recent
        
       | squeaky-clean wrote:
       | I would bet serious money that this is because of the upcoming
       | Switch 2. If the rumors are true, it could very much be like how
       | the Dolphin emulator is able to run both Gamecube and Wii games
       | because the system architectures are so similar. Nintendo wants
       | to avoid a day-zero emulator for Switch 2.
        
         | zamadatix wrote:
         | And even if it wasn't a day-zero (or even several month in)
         | Switch 2 emulator it's seeming like one of the big selling
         | points of the new system is going to be "play your old Switch
         | games on the new system, now in higher resolution" but it's a
         | lot of bad press if that's still "play them in worse quality
         | than emulators were 3 years before this hardware came out".
        
       | neonsunset wrote:
       | This is absolutely terrible. It may be in the business interest
       | of Nintendo but the absolute anti-consumer way this is carried
       | out destroys all the good will that the customers still had
       | towards them.
       | 
       | It seems someone hosts a mirror:
       | https://git.naxdy.org/Mirror/Ryujinx/
       | 
       | I was able to build the project with a single command, so there's
       | hope that easy barrier for entry and a language more developers
       | are familiar with will ensure the survival.
        
       | jdright wrote:
       | Nintendo must be getting ready to launch the next generation,
       | which by targeting Switch emulators may signal that Switch 2 is
       | not that far from it.
        
       | ndesaulniers wrote:
       | Modern Vintage Gamer (MVG) has a video out already about this:
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9JZW7hDBK8.
        
       | tombert wrote:
       | I wonder how far this will go. Is Nintendo going to send a cease
       | and desist for the MiSTer project?
       | 
       | Probably not, pretty much all those cores would be for machines
       | where patents have fully expired, but who the hell knows?
        
       | m3kw9 wrote:
       | The emulator can play 99% of the games, talk about closing the
       | barn doors after..
        
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       (page generated 2024-10-01 23:01 UTC)