6 ms·

I wonder why Nintendo hasn't attempted to take it down. It seems that the only use of such a "Nintendo Switch Emulator" is to play pirated games?

by nalzok 3y ago

HideousKojima 3y ago
While I'm sure it's the primary use by far, it's not the only one. Homebrew games, for example, are a legal use. And depending on your jurisdiction, ripping your own legally purchased games and playing them in an emulator is legal.
teeray 3y ago
There has traditionally been a pretty vibrant homebrew community with Nintendo consoles.
pdntspa 3y ago
Sigh... they have perfectly legitimate uses too. You can't play Zelda in 4K @ 60fps on a switch... I really wish this angle of thought would die. Stop parroting what the business fucks tell you.
- Freire_Herval 3y ago
  [dead]
- nalzok 3y ago
  Maybe make a pull request to the repo with what you said in the comment so that people like me don't have to ask this question in the first place? I assume this is a very frequently asked question.
  - pdntspa 3y ago
    For what? To ask them to add a disclaimer to pretty please not use it for piracy? Emulation is completely legal in the US. Its legality has been challenged in court and it won.
  - rowanG077 3y ago
    This is so common it's basically ask for the sake of asking. It's just weird.
    - nalzok 3y ago
      Seriously? I guess it's common sense among people living in the U.S, but as an international student I honestly didn't know it's legal to emulate a proprietary system.
      - rowanG077 3y ago
        I'm not from the US either. Is it illegal in your home country? I haven't heard of any country where it's illegal, so I'm surprised this is your default stance.
      - scheeseman486 3y ago
        You've used PCs? That entire ecosystem is built upon IBM-PC clones running a reverse engineered version of IBM's proprietary BIOS. Not quite emulation, but many of the same principles at work. Sony v Bleem! solidified the status of game console emulators, though Bleem! declared bankruptcy they won. At the moment, there's a game compilation being sold on the Switch and other platforms called Disney Classic Games Collection. It contains emulators and ROMs stripped of the trademarks of their host systems, with the emulators created without the involvement of them too. Nintendo can't do anything about third parties emulating their hardware without also threatening the legal status of software released by their partners, which include Disney, but that's just one example. Suffice to say that even if you argue that Yuzu/Ryujinx step over the line, the foundations for all this are fragile enough that no one wants to rock the boat.
      - johnny22 3y ago
        if we didn't have that, we wouldn't have wine or anything else that emulates ANY api and google wouldn't have been able to build dalvik for android. Potentially not even the free unices like freebsd or linux.
  - emodendroket 3y ago
    Might as well add a definition of "emulator" at that rate.
  - johnny22 3y ago
    the docs exactly start by telling you how to dump your switch and absolutely do not tell you how to pirate games.
- cubefox 3y ago
  > Sigh... they have perfectly legitimate uses too. The existence of those is a fig leaf for what Switch emulators are used in the vast majority of cases: piracy. There are much better ways to run homebrew than the Switch. If you think piracy of currently sold games is in fact ethical, or if you simply don't care about copyright, than please say so explicitly!
  - animuchan 3y ago
    I think that there's no suitable ethics system to apply to large game developers / publishers, responsible for the predatory tactics such as - Microtransactions - Pay to win, punishing players for not having ample disposable income - Lootboxes and the like ("baby's first casino") - Blatant false advertising, especially coupled with preorders Some of these predatory practices are actually illegal in some countries, but aren't prosecuted universally enough (or harshly enough) to be considered an issue by large corpos. If openly preying on your customers, — in no small part, children and teenagers, — for huge profits is considered ethical, then merely copying some files is downright angelic behavior, is it not?
    - cubefox 3y ago
      No, you have the right to boycott a service if you don't like it, not take it for free. Apart from that, I doubt Nintendo engages in the practices you mention.
      - animuchan 3y ago
        The parent comment talked about ethics, which is largely unrelated to rights (you might have the right to a thing that's entirely unethical, such as owning slaves in the American history). Given the current laws you are correct, sure. (Whether to follow each and every law is a quite a personal choice...) The majority of games for Switch aren't worked on by Nintendo, so that point seems tangential.
        cubefox 3y ago
kevingadd 3y ago
You can dump your own games from your Switch and play them at 4K60 on PC. I've done so myself.
- austinprete 3y ago
  Not really sure what this means. There certainly aren’t 4K assets included in Switch games, which run at max 1080p resolution normally. I know many games do drop frame rate at 1080p docked vs the 720p built-in display… so is this just getting back up to 60fps while running in 1080p on a 4K monitor?
  - insin 3y ago
    If you have enough power on hand you can render games at up to 8K [0], and downsample to your monitor's resolution if you're exceeding it. The textures are the original 1080p assets, but it's still a huge boost in visual fidelity, especially if you're downsampling (there are also usually mods to disable a game's native antialiasing if you're doing this). If a game wasn't even attempting 60fps on the Switch in the first place, there are usually mods to unlock the framerate. [0] https://blog.ryujinx.org/introducing-resolution-scaling/ https://blog.ryujinx.org/introducing-resolution-scaling/
  - kevingadd 3y ago
    Most console games end up having textures high res enough to look better than the original hardware if you render them at a higher internal resolution. There are some Wii and Wii U games that look spectacular if rendered at higher res, and the same applies to Switch. If you emulate on fast enough hardware, for games that emulate well you will hit whatever the game's framerate cap is (sometimes 30, sometimes 60) flawlessly where the native hardware struggles.
  - Am4TIfIsER0ppos 3y ago
    Civ4 doesn't have 1080p assets but that doesn't stop me from rendering it in that resolution. I don't understand the argument. Without "good enough" textures I should render it lower and upscale after the fact?
brobinson 3y ago
Sony vs. Bleem. Emulation is not illegal in the US.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
astrange 3y ago
Emulators are legal. Nintendo would have the authors assassinated if they weren't. They're about as harsh as you can get on homebrew devs.
- logistark 3y ago
  This is very true, the Sony vs Bleem and Virtual Game Station lawsuit set precedent and made Emulators legal. Roms in the other hand are not legal, but for what I have heard Game companies are too afraid that the case of Bleem and Virtual Game Station to be repeated that they prefer to not file lawsuit and make copyright claims to websites that upload roms.
- cubefox 3y ago
  Homebrew devs? The thing they are worried about is software piracy. Emulators are usually not used for homebrew.
  - LocalH 3y ago
    The Wii proved that they care equally about piracy and homebrew, at most. I remember when Bushing tried to report a bug to Nintendo that was mostly only useful for piracy, as he put it. Their response? Not to patch the bug, but to continue updating IOS to find and delete the HBC title ID.
  - WastingMyTime89 3y ago
    No, Nintendo is generally harsh with homebrew dev. They don't like people running software on their hardware withouth going through them. It's unrelated to piracy. Emulators are emulators. What they are mainly used for as absolutely no impact on their legality.
    - cubefox 3y ago
      No, Nintendo is obviously mainly worried about piracy, not homebrew.
      - 3y ago
mattigames 3y ago
What about people trying to archive games for historic value? What about people that want custom tools to develop games for the switch? (E.g. automating inputs for QA's sake) What about people that want to create mods for existing Nintendo games? I know most people will use them for piracy but it's really shortsighted and I'm glad emulation is still legal.
- emodendroket 3y ago
  > What about people trying to archive games for historic value? Well, from a purely legal perspective that's not any different than "regular" piracy.
  - LocalH 3y ago
    Today's pirates are tomorrow's preservationists. Without today's pirates, works risk being lost to time
  - kevingadd 3y ago
    Archival isn't piracy. archive place or store (something) in [a collection of historical documents or records providing information about a place, institution, or group of people] If you were downloading roms in order to build your archive, that would be piracy, but the downloading roms is the issue there. One could argue that downloading roms is fine if you own the games in question as well, but I doubt anyone wants to test that in court.
    - emodendroket 3y ago
      Even if you’re talking about just ripping your own games, you are on uncertain legal footing if there is any DRM you have to circumvent to do it.
jokowueu 3y ago
There is legal precedent, emulation is legal
emodendroket 3y ago
As much as they'd like to, legal precedent suggests emulators themselves are legal if not distributed with any games, BIOS, or other IP of the console maker.
birracerveza 3y ago
>It seems that the only use of such a "Nintendo Switch Emulator" is to play pirated games? No, it's not the only use, it's also used play Nintendo Switch games without using a Nintendo Switch, which is a 2017 console with 2012 hardware but otherwise really, really good games. I already prepurchased Zelda Tears of the Kingdom physical but I am debating whether I should just play it on my deck, as it will probably run better than on a Switch with all the features that come with an emulator.
- kevincox 3y ago
  Honestly I love Nintendo games but couldn't care less about the console. If I could buy their games for desktop I would have bought a ton. But they have no interest. They would rather that you also buy their hardware and rebuy their old game ports every generation. So I use an emulator. It is such a good experience. Better quality, save states, I can backup and transfer save files. I can record and screenshots are easy to manage unlike the manual SD card shuffling required on the Switch.
  - birracerveza 3y ago
    I like the Switch... conceptually at least. But it's old, it's weak, and the joycons are badly built. A new version is long overdue. Nintendo doesn't want to release a new one? Then don't mind me using Ryujinx instead. Hopefully the Nintendo ninjas will not kill me in my sleep because of th
    - kevincox 3y ago
      I should have made it clear that I have no problem with the Switch in general! It's a fine console but it's not for me. I don't have much if any mobile gaming needs and for at home a higher power device suits me better. For me personally the only reason to get a Switch would be for exclusive games, which IMHO is a bad reason to buy some specific hardware. I would much rather that people buy the hardware that suits their needs best (which may be a Switch for people who want mobile gaming) and games were largely available cross-device (resource requirements being the rare exception). I do understand the economic reason for exclusive contracts, but it is so consumer hostile.
kwanbix 3y ago
I have two Switches. An old glitched one, and the new LED One. I still love to play some games (that I own) on the PC.

I wonder why Nintendo hasn't attempted to take it down. It seems that the only use of such a "Nintendo Switch Emulator" is to play pirated games?

by nalzok 3y ago

I wonder why Nintendo hasn't attempted to take it down. It seems that the only use of such a "Nintendo Switch Emulator" is to play pirated games?

HideousKojima 3y ago

While I'm sure it's the primary use by far, it's not the only one. Homebrew games, for example, are a legal use. And depending on your jurisdiction, ripping your own legally purchased games and playing them in an emulator is legal.

teeray 3y ago

There has traditionally been a pretty vibrant homebrew community with Nintendo consoles.

pdntspa 3y ago

Sigh... they have perfectly legitimate uses too. You can't play Zelda in 4K @ 60fps on a switch... I really wish this angle of thought would die. Stop parroting what the business fucks tell you.

Freire_Herval 3y ago
[dead]
nalzok 3y ago
Maybe make a pull request to the repo with what you said in the comment so that people like me don't have to ask this question in the first place? I assume this is a very frequently asked question.
- pdntspa 3y ago
  For what? To ask them to add a disclaimer to pretty please not use it for piracy? Emulation is completely legal in the US. Its legality has been challenged in court and it won.
- rowanG077 3y ago
  This is so common it's basically ask for the sake of asking. It's just weird.
  - nalzok 3y ago
    Seriously? I guess it's common sense among people living in the U.S, but as an international student I honestly didn't know it's legal to emulate a proprietary system.
    - rowanG077 3y ago
      I'm not from the US either. Is it illegal in your home country? I haven't heard of any country where it's illegal, so I'm surprised this is your default stance.
    - scheeseman486 3y ago
      You've used PCs? That entire ecosystem is built upon IBM-PC clones running a reverse engineered version of IBM's proprietary BIOS. Not quite emulation, but many of the same principles at work. Sony v Bleem! solidified the status of game console emulators, though Bleem! declared bankruptcy they won. At the moment, there's a game compilation being sold on the Switch and other platforms called Disney Classic Games Collection. It contains emulators and ROMs stripped of the trademarks of their host systems, with the emulators created without the involvement of them too. Nintendo can't do anything about third parties emulating their hardware without also threatening the legal status of software released by their partners, which include Disney, but that's just one example. Suffice to say that even if you argue that Yuzu/Ryujinx step over the line, the foundations for all this are fragile enough that no one wants to rock the boat.
    - johnny22 3y ago
      if we didn't have that, we wouldn't have wine or anything else that emulates ANY api and google wouldn't have been able to build dalvik for android. Potentially not even the free unices like freebsd or linux.
- emodendroket 3y ago
  Might as well add a definition of "emulator" at that rate.
- johnny22 3y ago
  the docs exactly start by telling you how to dump your switch and absolutely do not tell you how to pirate games.
cubefox 3y ago
> Sigh... they have perfectly legitimate uses too. The existence of those is a fig leaf for what Switch emulators are used in the vast majority of cases: piracy. There are much better ways to run homebrew than the Switch. If you think piracy of currently sold games is in fact ethical, or if you simply don't care about copyright, than please say so explicitly!
- animuchan 3y ago
  I think that there's no suitable ethics system to apply to large game developers / publishers, responsible for the predatory tactics such as - Microtransactions - Pay to win, punishing players for not having ample disposable income - Lootboxes and the like ("baby's first casino") - Blatant false advertising, especially coupled with preorders Some of these predatory practices are actually illegal in some countries, but aren't prosecuted universally enough (or harshly enough) to be considered an issue by large corpos. If openly preying on your customers, — in no small part, children and teenagers, — for huge profits is considered ethical, then merely copying some files is downright angelic behavior, is it not?
  - cubefox 3y ago
    No, you have the right to boycott a service if you don't like it, not take it for free. Apart from that, I doubt Nintendo engages in the practices you mention.
    - animuchan 3y ago
      The parent comment talked about ethics, which is largely unrelated to rights (you might have the right to a thing that's entirely unethical, such as owning slaves in the American history). Given the current laws you are correct, sure. (Whether to follow each and every law is a quite a personal choice...) The majority of games for Switch aren't worked on by Nintendo, so that point seems tangential.
      - cubefox 3y ago

kevingadd 3y ago

You can dump your own games from your Switch and play them at 4K60 on PC. I've done so myself.

austinprete 3y ago
Not really sure what this means. There certainly aren’t 4K assets included in Switch games, which run at max 1080p resolution normally. I know many games do drop frame rate at 1080p docked vs the 720p built-in display… so is this just getting back up to 60fps while running in 1080p on a 4K monitor?
- insin 3y ago
  If you have enough power on hand you can render games at up to 8K [0], and downsample to your monitor's resolution if you're exceeding it. The textures are the original 1080p assets, but it's still a huge boost in visual fidelity, especially if you're downsampling (there are also usually mods to disable a game's native antialiasing if you're doing this). If a game wasn't even attempting 60fps on the Switch in the first place, there are usually mods to unlock the framerate. [0] https://blog.ryujinx.org/introducing-resolution-scaling/ https://blog.ryujinx.org/introducing-resolution-scaling/
- kevingadd 3y ago
  Most console games end up having textures high res enough to look better than the original hardware if you render them at a higher internal resolution. There are some Wii and Wii U games that look spectacular if rendered at higher res, and the same applies to Switch. If you emulate on fast enough hardware, for games that emulate well you will hit whatever the game's framerate cap is (sometimes 30, sometimes 60) flawlessly where the native hardware struggles.
- Am4TIfIsER0ppos 3y ago
  Civ4 doesn't have 1080p assets but that doesn't stop me from rendering it in that resolution. I don't understand the argument. Without "good enough" textures I should render it lower and upscale after the fact?

brobinson 3y ago

Sony vs. Bleem. Emulation is not illegal in the US.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

astrange 3y ago

Emulators are legal. Nintendo would have the authors assassinated if they weren't. They're about as harsh as you can get on homebrew devs.

logistark 3y ago
This is very true, the Sony vs Bleem and Virtual Game Station lawsuit set precedent and made Emulators legal. Roms in the other hand are not legal, but for what I have heard Game companies are too afraid that the case of Bleem and Virtual Game Station to be repeated that they prefer to not file lawsuit and make copyright claims to websites that upload roms.
cubefox 3y ago
Homebrew devs? The thing they are worried about is software piracy. Emulators are usually not used for homebrew.
- LocalH 3y ago
  The Wii proved that they care equally about piracy and homebrew, at most. I remember when Bushing tried to report a bug to Nintendo that was mostly only useful for piracy, as he put it. Their response? Not to patch the bug, but to continue updating IOS to find and delete the HBC title ID.
- WastingMyTime89 3y ago
  No, Nintendo is generally harsh with homebrew dev. They don't like people running software on their hardware withouth going through them. It's unrelated to piracy. Emulators are emulators. What they are mainly used for as absolutely no impact on their legality.
  - cubefox 3y ago
    No, Nintendo is obviously mainly worried about piracy, not homebrew.
    - 3y ago

mattigames 3y ago

What about people trying to archive games for historic value? What about people that want custom tools to develop games for the switch? (E.g. automating inputs for QA's sake) What about people that want to create mods for existing Nintendo games? I know most people will use them for piracy but it's really shortsighted and I'm glad emulation is still legal.

emodendroket 3y ago
> What about people trying to archive games for historic value? Well, from a purely legal perspective that's not any different than "regular" piracy.
- LocalH 3y ago
  Today's pirates are tomorrow's preservationists. Without today's pirates, works risk being lost to time
- kevingadd 3y ago
  Archival isn't piracy. archive place or store (something) in [a collection of historical documents or records providing information about a place, institution, or group of people] If you were downloading roms in order to build your archive, that would be piracy, but the downloading roms is the issue there. One could argue that downloading roms is fine if you own the games in question as well, but I doubt anyone wants to test that in court.
  - emodendroket 3y ago
    Even if you’re talking about just ripping your own games, you are on uncertain legal footing if there is any DRM you have to circumvent to do it.

jokowueu 3y ago

There is legal precedent, emulation is legal

emodendroket 3y ago

As much as they'd like to, legal precedent suggests emulators themselves are legal if not distributed with any games, BIOS, or other IP of the console maker.

birracerveza 3y ago

>It seems that the only use of such a "Nintendo Switch Emulator" is to play pirated games? No, it's not the only use, it's also used play Nintendo Switch games without using a Nintendo Switch, which is a 2017 console with 2012 hardware but otherwise really, really good games. I already prepurchased Zelda Tears of the Kingdom physical but I am debating whether I should just play it on my deck, as it will probably run better than on a Switch with all the features that come with an emulator.

kevincox 3y ago
Honestly I love Nintendo games but couldn't care less about the console. If I could buy their games for desktop I would have bought a ton. But they have no interest. They would rather that you also buy their hardware and rebuy their old game ports every generation. So I use an emulator. It is such a good experience. Better quality, save states, I can backup and transfer save files. I can record and screenshots are easy to manage unlike the manual SD card shuffling required on the Switch.
- birracerveza 3y ago
  I like the Switch... conceptually at least. But it's old, it's weak, and the joycons are badly built. A new version is long overdue. Nintendo doesn't want to release a new one? Then don't mind me using Ryujinx instead. Hopefully the Nintendo ninjas will not kill me in my sleep because of th
  - kevincox 3y ago
    I should have made it clear that I have no problem with the Switch in general! It's a fine console but it's not for me. I don't have much if any mobile gaming needs and for at home a higher power device suits me better. For me personally the only reason to get a Switch would be for exclusive games, which IMHO is a bad reason to buy some specific hardware. I would much rather that people buy the hardware that suits their needs best (which may be a Switch for people who want mobile gaming) and games were largely available cross-device (resource requirements being the rare exception). I do understand the economic reason for exclusive contracts, but it is so consumer hostile.

kwanbix 3y ago

I have two Switches. An old glitched one, and the new LED One. I still love to play some games (that I own) on the PC.