4 ms·

Nintendo’s disdain for historical preservation is frustrating and problematic. But this is an emulator for their current console, I’m not sure this is boycott-w

Nintendo’s disdain for historical preservation is frustrating and problematic. But this is an emulator for their current console, I’m not sure this is boycott-worthy. This is more, they’ve got a business to run, and Yuzu impacts their bottom line in a way that Dolphin doesn’t.

ejj28 3y ago
While that's a fair point, I also have to wonder how much of that is actually lost sales, vs. people who wouldn't have bought the games otherwise, or didn't have a Switch to play on, or etc. Personally, I paid for a copy of Tears of the Kingdom when it came out, but only because I had a Switch I could borrow from someone to play it on - if I hadn't had that option, I wouldn't have bought a Switch just to play one game, and I just wouldn't have bought the game at all. Had they released the game on PC as well as Switch, I would have bought it for PC, but that's not an option. As it stands, either you have to own an overpriced and underpowered console, even if you only want to play one Nintendo game, or you can pirate the game and play it on PC, and have a much better experience than on a real Switch. Nintendo is somewhat bringing this upon itself in my opinion and I don't feel much sympathy for their lost profits, real or imagined.
- gamblor956 3y ago
  Valve used the Yuzu emulator in some of its Steam Deck initial marketing, and emulating the Switch is one of the most popular uses for the Steam Deck, so there is definitely a measurable impact. Considering that the Steam Deck is more expensive than the Switch, arguably every SD player using Yuzu is several lost sales for Nintendo. Nintendo is somewhat bringing this upon itself in my opinion and I don't feel much sympathy for their lost profits, real or imagined. This is why they are going after Yuzu in the first place...Because Yuzu makes it easy to pirate Switch games and the pirates feel entitled to play those games on a more expensive device than the device they claim is too expensive.
  - cheeseomlit 3y ago
    Yes but the more expensive device is better in every conceivable way, it's a PC instead of a locked down walled garden that only exists as a platform for nintendo products. Just because someone owns a Deck doesn't mean they would otherwise own a switch, I own a Deck and haven't remotely considered buying any nintendo hardware since gamecube. If I couldn't emulate switch games I just wouldn't play them.
    - prophesi 3y ago
      Anecdotally, the friends that I know who have a gaming PC own a Switch as well. The one guy running TotK @ 4K/60FPS on their rig was also the first to preorder the game. But we're all in our 30's with decent salaries.
    - gamblor956 3y ago
      If I couldn't emulate switch games I just wouldn't play them. And Nintendo is okay with that. If you're never going to be a paying customer, they don't care what you think.
      - Dylan16807 3y ago
        They didn't say they wouldn't be a paying customer. Regardless of that particular commenter, many paying customers of Nintendo have the same attitude that they will only emulate switch games.
        mcphage 3y ago
        > many paying customers of Nintendo have the same attitude that they will only emulate switch games I think “many” is probably a bit much.
    - mcphage 3y ago
      > If I couldn't emulate switch games I just wouldn't play them. Given this discussion started around whether to boycott Nintendo or not, it seems that you're not a Nintendo customer at all. So I'm not really sure what you would be boycotting?
- SmallDeadGuy 3y ago
  How is the Switch overpriced and underpowered? I picked up a switch lite with a game as a bundle for my wife for £180 brand new. If you want detachable controllers and the ability to dock the Switch to a TV, you can spend more. But those features and the built-in screen are ones that literally no other games console had at the time and is only just starting to gain popularity in the handheld PC market recently. It may be underpowered now, but the Switch has been out for 7 years. And it still has enough power to play games like TOTK, The Witcher 3, Xenoblade Chronicles, etc. As for releasing games on PC, I don't see any reason why they would? Developing for PC is much more difficult than a single console, when it comes to handling the variety of hardware, anti-cheat, etc. TOTK and their Mario games are system sellers, with the former even releasing alongside a special edition console and pro controller. Delaying the release of these games to add dev time for a PC port is never going to be worth it.
skyyler 3y ago
>this is an emulator for their current console >Yuzu impacts their bottom line in a way that Dolphin doesn’t. Dolphin could emulate nearly all commercial Wii games by April 2009. That was sooner into the console's lifespan than where we are now with the switch. (29 months since the Wii's release vs 83 months since the Switch's release) Maybe more people have gaming-grade computers sitting around now than they did 15 years ago?
- fmj 3y ago
  >Maybe more people have gaming-grade computers sitting around now than they did 15 years ago? You don't need a very powerful computer to emulate a Switch. My M1 Mac Mini w/ 8GB of RAM (~$400) has been able to play every Switch game I've been interested in with equal or slightly better performance than the actual console.
  - 1317 3y ago
    an M1 is a very powerful computer
- mcphage 3y ago
  > Dolphin could emulate nearly all commercial Wii games by April 2009. > That was sooner into the console's lifespan than where we are now with the switch. I don't have any insight into why they didn't go after Dolphin in 2009, but I do think it explains why they're going after Yuzu now.
  - bombcar 3y ago
    Dolphin has always been very precise about doing everything "on this side of the line"
- SmallDeadGuy 3y ago
  Most popular Wii games had significantly different control schemes than what is available on a standard PC. Afaik, dolphin was primarily used for things like Smash Bros but other system sellers like Wii Sports, Wii fit, and LoZ: Skyward Sword just wouldn't work at all. Even Mario Kart was typically played with motion controls, because that was new and exciting for home consoles at the time. Contrast that to the Switch where most system sellers can be played on a standard controller without a gyroscope, the threat to their bottom line is much higher.
kevingadd 3y ago
Preservation isn't a matter of flipping a light switch on the moment a console isn't "current" anymore. The Switch came out in 2017 - that's a long time ago. If not for people preserving firmware updates and 1.0 builds of games, emulator developers and users would have nothing to start from when they start development on an emulator from scratch in ~2025 like you suggest doing.
- SmallDeadGuy 3y ago
  The emulator could have been developed and released open source without the ability to decrypt Nintendo games, which (I believe) is a copyright violation and one side of the lawsuit. And also not put the latest emulator builds and private discord encouraging piracy behind a patreon paywall. I have nothing against a Switch emulator existing at all, but making it conveniently easy for the masses to pirate games, condoning it in private spaces you manage, and profiting off the demand for the emulator due to that piracy are all against the ideas of preservation.
  - kevingadd 3y ago
    The pirates would just decrypt their games. That doesn't meaningfully change whether the emulator is used for piracy.
    - SmallDeadGuy 3y ago
      No it doesn't necessarily change what the emulator is used for, but it changes the optics on what it's developed for. If you develop an emulator without any methods of DRM circumvention built-in, then out-of-the-box it can only be used for homebrew stuff like making your own games/apps for that platform. If you include DRM circumvention with the emulator, then there's an argument that it's developed specifically with piracy in mind.
charcircuit 3y ago
>Nintendo’s disdain for historical preservation is frustrating and problematic. Nintendo themselves don't disdain historical preservation. They preserve their code, assets, games, etc themselves.

ejj28 3y ago

While that's a fair point, I also have to wonder how much of that is actually lost sales, vs. people who wouldn't have bought the games otherwise, or didn't have a Switch to play on, or etc. Personally, I paid for a copy of Tears of the Kingdom when it came out, but only because I had a Switch I could borrow from someone to play it on - if I hadn't had that option, I wouldn't have bought a Switch just to play one game, and I just wouldn't have bought the game at all. Had they released the game on PC as well as Switch, I would have bought it for PC, but that's not an option. As it stands, either you have to own an overpriced and underpowered console, even if you only want to play one Nintendo game, or you can pirate the game and play it on PC, and have a much better experience than on a real Switch. Nintendo is somewhat bringing this upon itself in my opinion and I don't feel much sympathy for their lost profits, real or imagined.

gamblor956 3y ago
Valve used the Yuzu emulator in some of its Steam Deck initial marketing, and emulating the Switch is one of the most popular uses for the Steam Deck, so there is definitely a measurable impact. Considering that the Steam Deck is more expensive than the Switch, arguably every SD player using Yuzu is several lost sales for Nintendo. Nintendo is somewhat bringing this upon itself in my opinion and I don't feel much sympathy for their lost profits, real or imagined. This is why they are going after Yuzu in the first place...Because Yuzu makes it easy to pirate Switch games and the pirates feel entitled to play those games on a more expensive device than the device they claim is too expensive.
- cheeseomlit 3y ago
  Yes but the more expensive device is better in every conceivable way, it's a PC instead of a locked down walled garden that only exists as a platform for nintendo products. Just because someone owns a Deck doesn't mean they would otherwise own a switch, I own a Deck and haven't remotely considered buying any nintendo hardware since gamecube. If I couldn't emulate switch games I just wouldn't play them.
  - prophesi 3y ago
    Anecdotally, the friends that I know who have a gaming PC own a Switch as well. The one guy running TotK @ 4K/60FPS on their rig was also the first to preorder the game. But we're all in our 30's with decent salaries.
  - gamblor956 3y ago
    If I couldn't emulate switch games I just wouldn't play them. And Nintendo is okay with that. If you're never going to be a paying customer, they don't care what you think.
    - Dylan16807 3y ago
      They didn't say they wouldn't be a paying customer. Regardless of that particular commenter, many paying customers of Nintendo have the same attitude that they will only emulate switch games.
      - mcphage 3y ago
        > many paying customers of Nintendo have the same attitude that they will only emulate switch games I think “many” is probably a bit much.
  - mcphage 3y ago
    > If I couldn't emulate switch games I just wouldn't play them. Given this discussion started around whether to boycott Nintendo or not, it seems that you're not a Nintendo customer at all. So I'm not really sure what you would be boycotting?
SmallDeadGuy 3y ago
How is the Switch overpriced and underpowered? I picked up a switch lite with a game as a bundle for my wife for £180 brand new. If you want detachable controllers and the ability to dock the Switch to a TV, you can spend more. But those features and the built-in screen are ones that literally no other games console had at the time and is only just starting to gain popularity in the handheld PC market recently. It may be underpowered now, but the Switch has been out for 7 years. And it still has enough power to play games like TOTK, The Witcher 3, Xenoblade Chronicles, etc. As for releasing games on PC, I don't see any reason why they would? Developing for PC is much more difficult than a single console, when it comes to handling the variety of hardware, anti-cheat, etc. TOTK and their Mario games are system sellers, with the former even releasing alongside a special edition console and pro controller. Delaying the release of these games to add dev time for a PC port is never going to be worth it.

skyyler 3y ago

>this is an emulator for their current console >Yuzu impacts their bottom line in a way that Dolphin doesn’t. Dolphin could emulate nearly all commercial Wii games by April 2009. That was sooner into the console's lifespan than where we are now with the switch. (29 months since the Wii's release vs 83 months since the Switch's release) Maybe more people have gaming-grade computers sitting around now than they did 15 years ago?

fmj 3y ago
>Maybe more people have gaming-grade computers sitting around now than they did 15 years ago? You don't need a very powerful computer to emulate a Switch. My M1 Mac Mini w/ 8GB of RAM (~$400) has been able to play every Switch game I've been interested in with equal or slightly better performance than the actual console.
- 1317 3y ago
  an M1 is a very powerful computer
mcphage 3y ago
> Dolphin could emulate nearly all commercial Wii games by April 2009. > That was sooner into the console's lifespan than where we are now with the switch. I don't have any insight into why they didn't go after Dolphin in 2009, but I do think it explains why they're going after Yuzu now.
- bombcar 3y ago
  Dolphin has always been very precise about doing everything "on this side of the line"
SmallDeadGuy 3y ago
Most popular Wii games had significantly different control schemes than what is available on a standard PC. Afaik, dolphin was primarily used for things like Smash Bros but other system sellers like Wii Sports, Wii fit, and LoZ: Skyward Sword just wouldn't work at all. Even Mario Kart was typically played with motion controls, because that was new and exciting for home consoles at the time. Contrast that to the Switch where most system sellers can be played on a standard controller without a gyroscope, the threat to their bottom line is much higher.

kevingadd 3y ago

Preservation isn't a matter of flipping a light switch on the moment a console isn't "current" anymore. The Switch came out in 2017 - that's a long time ago. If not for people preserving firmware updates and 1.0 builds of games, emulator developers and users would have nothing to start from when they start development on an emulator from scratch in ~2025 like you suggest doing.

SmallDeadGuy 3y ago
The emulator could have been developed and released open source without the ability to decrypt Nintendo games, which (I believe) is a copyright violation and one side of the lawsuit. And also not put the latest emulator builds and private discord encouraging piracy behind a patreon paywall. I have nothing against a Switch emulator existing at all, but making it conveniently easy for the masses to pirate games, condoning it in private spaces you manage, and profiting off the demand for the emulator due to that piracy are all against the ideas of preservation.
- kevingadd 3y ago
  The pirates would just decrypt their games. That doesn't meaningfully change whether the emulator is used for piracy.
  - SmallDeadGuy 3y ago
    No it doesn't necessarily change what the emulator is used for, but it changes the optics on what it's developed for. If you develop an emulator without any methods of DRM circumvention built-in, then out-of-the-box it can only be used for homebrew stuff like making your own games/apps for that platform. If you include DRM circumvention with the emulator, then there's an argument that it's developed specifically with piracy in mind.

charcircuit 3y ago

>Nintendo’s disdain for historical preservation is frustrating and problematic. Nintendo themselves don't disdain historical preservation. They preserve their code, assets, games, etc themselves.