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I love Nintendo for their products, habing grown up with them. I have a really hard time understanding this hardball stance against emulators. How is this a thr

I love Nintendo for their products, habing grown up with them. I have a really hard time understanding this hardball stance against emulators. How is this a threat to their business? Feels more like they’re alienating a lot of people that might harbor good will towards them.

Hamuko 3y ago
I imagine that they're against Switch emulators when the Switch is still their primary business. I also don't imagine their hardline stance against Switch emulators will change anytime soon if the Switch 2 is backwards compatible.
- alex_suzuki 3y ago
  It just seems to me that having a great Switch emulator present would deter only a tiny fraction of Nintendo‘s customer base from buying the real thing. Still more than the cost of legal action, probably.
  - rincebrain 3y ago
    Well, if you have a reputation for suing anyone who even breathes funny, suing one group or two high-profile groups every so often is cheaper than suing hundreds of smaller things that might be more prevalent if you didn't have a reputation of landing on people.
StressedDev 3y ago
They are against emulators because they know the vast majority of emulator users are pirates.
- alex_suzuki 3y ago
  Yes, sure, but it’s hard to imagine that they’ll suddenly turn into willing buyers when they can’t pirate.
  - allan_s 3y ago
    To play the devil's advocate: On the other one can argue that people pirating does not improve their economics either so why risk it ?
    - alex_suzuki 3y ago
      Don‘t they say that imitation is the greatest form of flattery? :-) I get your point – I just feel like there’s not a lot of potential economic improvement to be had here, but apparently there is.
    - littlestymaar 3y ago
      Except it could, actually: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3308905 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3308905 But it's not as if corporations acted rationally anyway, they are led by humans and as such they are mostly driven by emotions.
  - thrdbndndn 3y ago
    From my experience, a lot people actually do. And in case of game consoles, that also means they have to buy the hardware even if they only want to play one game. This is very significant potential income for Nintendo. All my friends that are into games have a PS4/5 just to play exclusives, even if they play games on PC 99% of the time. And non-trivial number of them play XB3 in emulators so they don't need to buy a Switch just for that. If there is no emulators, they probably would.
  - lrvick 3y ago
    As if taking down a couple of the thousands of copies of an FOSS repo will slow anyone down. All Nintendo did is make it easier for people on the fence to decide if they want to financially support them or pirate.
- akira2501 3y ago
  Hardware developers should not care and that's what the emulator is attempting to actually emulate. They're using their position to benefit their licensing operation, which has strict controls about distribution, which ironically are probably most responsible for the type of piracy that actually eats into their bottom line.
  - CalRobert 3y ago
    Nintendo is a bit unusual in that their first-party games are a big deal, and there aren't a ton of interesting non-Nintendo games on Switch. Obviously it will vary but plenty of people have one for Zelda and Mario Kart primarily.
- makeitdouble 3y ago
  They probably have no ways of _knowing_ that. They might assume. But Nintendo also has absolutely no incentive to care if it's used for pirating. Users want to put in term of morality, when it probably doesn't matter much. Even if there was no pirating angle, emulation is a revenue drain from old title they could bundle in the Nintendo Online subscription and remix as remake games (what we saw with the old Zelda games remade for the Switch for instance). Even if people were using the emulator after buying the Switch and the actual games, that's still a stream they don't control (can't check if the game is played on multiple consoles for instance, etc) and there's nothing positive for them coming out of it.
thrdbndndn 3y ago
> How is this a threat to their business How is it not? By having a good emulator, one can easily play Switch games without paying. I'm aware emulator devs don't provide game ROMs and usually have certain mechanisms to ensure you have a "legal copy", but these are all very trivial to bypass historically. (I'm also aware there are claims that piracy does not hurt revenue of copyright holder. I can get behind some points in these claims, but not entirely.)
- littlestymaar 3y ago
  > I'm also aware there are claims that piracy does not hurt revenue of copyright holder. I can get behind some points in these claims, but not entirely IIRC, a significant fraction of the studies of the subject tend to show that it even positively affects revenues of IP rights holders.
  - thrdbndndn 3y ago
    I can believe that, but revenue may not be the only thing the author cares (not saying it is the case for Nintendo or any large companies, but in general). I subscribe to Patreon artists frequently. Lots of them, especially Japanese artists, have expressed that they hate piracy (i.e. repost their paid rewards on interweb) simply because it's (in their opinion) wrong. They're fully aware people who pirate is unlikely to pay a single penny regardless, or that piracy actually increases their "exposure". At the end of the day, in my opinion it's right holder's call, regardless if their decision is based on emotion or rationale.
    - littlestymaar 3y ago
      > Lots of them, especially Japanese artists, have expressed that they hate piracy (i.e. repost their paid rewards on interweb) simply because it's (in their opinion) wrong. That's exactly what I mean. At the end of the day, what they believe is what drives their behavior. > At the end of the day, in my opinion it's right holder's call, regardless if their decision is based on emotion or rationale. I'm not disputing that here. Edit: oh, this isn't a response to the comment I though it was. The comment when I'm saying roughly the same as you are and I though was misinterpreted is this one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39788265 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39788265
matsemann 3y ago
How is it not a threat to their business? People don't use these emulators to play 20 year old abandonware, but to play Switch games even before they've been officially released through leaks. I've sailed the sea a lot myself, but I don't believe the meme "pirates wouldn't have bought it anyways". It's not a 1:1 loss, but it's not zero either. And for me, piracy used to be an accessibility issue. Living in the mountains I could wait for a week to get something by mail, or click download illegally and play immediately. With today's online stores that's no longer an excuse.
- Retr0id 3y ago
  PC game publishers don't seem to mind that their games are playable on PC. Yes, PC games usually have DRM, but Denuvo offers their services for the Switch platform too. In fact, they specifically claim that they can resist emulation of protected titles: https://irdeto.com/denuvo/nintendo-switch-emulator-protection/ https://irdeto.com/denuvo/nintendo-switch-emulator-protectio... And yet, no commercial games have been released with this protection yet, probably because it isn't worth it for their bottom line.
jakkos 3y ago
> How is this a threat to their business? One reason is that playing the emulated version is a better experience. Why would you play Breath of the Wild at 900p/30fps, when you can play it at 4k/60fps AND have all the customizability of running it on a PC. Emulators illustrate that Nintendo forces you to buy an outdated tablet to play an intentionally hamstrung version of their game, so that once you are bought in to the hardware, you are more likely to buy more of their games.
Daz1 3y ago
I have personally pirated $500+ worth of Switch games plus the $300 console I would have otherwise bought since I own a Steam Deck. This is a very common use-case.
- realusername 3y ago
  Would you really have bought both consoles together? I have a hard time to believe that. That's not really the same budget.
  - Daz1 3y ago
    Yes if I didn’t have yuzu on my steam deck I 100% would have bought a switch just for the two Zelda games.
- jrflowers 3y ago
  This makes sense because you would not have bought a steam deck if you owned a switch
  - genewitch 3y ago
    I have bought 3 switch consoles and i still want something like a steam deck because steam EOL'd their remote play box. I want something i can play PC games on on a TV that i can also take with me to boring things like waiting rooms. The switch screen (i have the original switch) is too tiny, and it's a very heavy console. Switch lites have even smaller screens, but they weigh much less - it is possible the controllers i use undocked are just heavier, but either way. The steam deck has a higher resolution screen, and i'm sure some devices have greater than FHD resolution with greater than 60FPS "refresh". That's kind of a big deal to my crappy eyes. Right now i have a laptop connected to my TV to play steam games that support controllers. I'd much rather just have another USB-C to HDMI converter plugged in to a device designed nearly completely to play games. A huge use case for me would be using wemod/cheatengine and in general steam workshop. The second biggest reason is shovelware. On the switch if i buy a game because it looks good, AFAIK i can't refund it if it's actually a garbage game. On steam, i've requested refunds after playing (some*) games for several days. * mostly incremental/clicker/idle games, because they're designed to be crappy to start out, so 2 hours isn't even enough time to expose 1% of the content or gameplay.
CalRobert 3y ago
It was one thing when enthusiasts were emulating systems near or past EOL, but at this point a Nintendo system is often not the best way to enjoy a Nintendo game.
- account42 3y ago
  > but at this point a Nintendo system is often not the best way to enjoy a Nintendo game. Perhaps Nintendo should provide a better way to play their games themselves then?
  - CalRobert 3y ago
    I agree, but my point is still that an emulator could reduce Nintendo hardware sales. (And realistically speaking who's going to buy Tears of The Kingdom when they're running it on an emulator?) Of course, my other view is that emulators should be perfectly fine and a great exercise in reverse-engineering, but Nintendo won't see it that way. It would be an interesting experiment to release a high-performance emulator console that only worked with the physical (presumably legally-purchased) game. Perhaps it would fill a similar legal niche to DeCSS - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS
INTPenis 3y ago
This is the Switch, not the GBA or SNES, it's their current product lineup. I really have a hard time understanding why you have a hard time understanding this. And I also love Nintendo, but I mostly play GBA and SNES games from my childhood.
- 6865 3y ago
  I don't see the problem with it being the current product lineup, archiving happens during the lifetime of a product, not just after.
  - INTPenis 3y ago
    You're delusional if you think it's for archiving. I don't even know what you mean by that, as in archiving ROMs online for posterity? It's clearly for emulating their games with pirated ROMs. I completely understand it too because I've been pirating since games were on tapes. But, surprisingly perhaps, I have the ability to view things from multiple perspectives. And clearly Nintendo don't want their titles to be pirated while they're still making sales. At some point in the future, just like with GBA and SNES emulators, I'm sure we'll see the same for Switch emulators.
lawn 3y ago
> Feels more like they’re alienating a lot of people that might harbor good will towards them. These actions ensure that I'll never buy a Nintendo console or games anymore, even though I'd be their target audience (both myself and my three kids).
- lrvick 3y ago
  Nintendo evaporating community goodwill by using our money to take aggressive action against supposed piracy enablers makes it easy to justify actual piracy.
  - lawn 3y ago
    I'm very content with my choice of a Steam Deck at this point.
  - vsnf 3y ago
    What amount of goodwill Nintendo burns away is more than made up for by them continuing to make good games. I am confident that there is quite literally nothing they can do as a company to hurt their reputation enough to be fiscally damaging, save from actually making bad games. And even that doesn't seem to be an impediment to them (see also: the Pokemon mainline games). They'd have to have a string of probably 10 consecutive years putting out absolute dogshit before they'd get even close to feeling the pain.
- matsemann 3y ago
  So because you can't pirate you won't buy? Why should Nintendo care? Not like they would've made money on you anyways. I'm sure your kids appreciate your moral stronghold when you explain to them why they can't play Mario with their friends.
  - lawn 3y ago
    No, I won't buy because I find their current (and past) actions morally reprehensible. If they didn't do shit like this I would already have (more) of their games and consoles. I can still emulate the games even if they don't do this you know? It doesn't stop a motivated actor actor after all.
hooby 3y ago
It's not just emulators. People have gotten cease-and-desists from their lawyers for drawing fan-art of their characters. Streamers will get strikes/takedowns for playing their games. And similar stuff... If you don't want to get legal threats, I recommend to never mention their name, any of their trademarks, or even ever publicly acknowledge their existence. They have become the-company-which-may-not-be-named.
- lrvick 3y ago
  Or we educate them on the Streisand Effect.
  - account42 3y ago
    So essentially reward them with our patronage for being dicks? No thanks.
    - PawgerZ 3y ago
      Reward them with our patronage? Do you know what the Streisand Effect is?
      - hooby 3y ago
        The Streisand effect is named after when Barbara Streisand's attempts to get a picture of her private house and garden removed from the internet, instead causing it to go viral. Nintendo as a company does greatly benefit from people talking about it and it's products. That's publicity, word of mouth, free advertising basically. When they abuse takedowns, strikes and other measures, they do not want to stop that free publicity and word of mouth advertising. They are attempting to control it, manipulate it, and limit it to company approved screenshots, videos and information only. If those attempts generate more publicity - including making the taken down screenshots go viral (Streisand effect style) - that's beneficial publicity and word-of-mouth for them and their products. And it also amplifies the message sent to others: use only approved materials, or face our wrath! Therefore providing them with improved visibility and publicity - more word of mouth - and helping them spread their "fall in line!" message, can be seen as "rewarding" what they are doing. If instead most people were to completely ignore them and stop talking about them (out of fear)... THAT would hurt their publicity.
pdpi 3y ago
> How is this a threat to their business? If you download Higan and play pirated SNES games, not much of a threat. If you download Yuzu/Ryujinx and play pirated Switch games, that's an altogether different picture.
andy_ppp 3y ago
Yup, I won’t give Nintendo any more of my money if they are playing this game.
numpad0 3y ago
Nintendo corporate has always been like that. It values their face and continuity over growth and profit, listens to complaints but refuses demands. Being a family-owned Kyoto company the behaviors are slightly different to standard Tokyo entity thinking.
- numpad0 3y ago
  self replying: specifically, Nintendo triggers a brittle "I'm not gonna let you have it" behavior when someone tries to take advantage of situation and makes demands. The response switches to denying accesses and terminating communications. It tend not to repeat nonpologies while talking down demands and accepting new businesses like most B2C companies do.
subjectsigma 3y ago
These videos talk about it a little: https://youtu.be/zvPkAYT6B1Q?si=99J7GUo3l_ggQCjM https://youtu.be/zvPkAYT6B1Q?si=99J7GUo3l_ggQCjM https://youtu.be/xgKY9hmbfgo?si=GzBOx9p-sLPchKL1 https://youtu.be/xgKY9hmbfgo?si=GzBOx9p-sLPchKL1 https://youtu.be/yj9Gk84jRiE?si=FmhiSO9Qd8WIsVzS https://youtu.be/yj9Gk84jRiE?si=FmhiSO9Qd8WIsVzS TL;DR: forming a hydra-summary of the three: Nintendo’s strategy has been to position themselves as a premium video game brand since the 1980’s. They use high pricing, exclusivity, and close integration with hardware to distance themselves from other companies. Because they want to position themselves as the one and only Nintendo, knockoffs and copycats represent an existential threat to their brand. They also want parents to have absolute trust in the family friendliness of their games and knockoffs could diminish that as well. Because of this they do literally every scummy thing in their power to aggressively pursue and litigate anything from piracy to fan projects. Control of their image is their biggest asset. As someone who didn’t really grow up playing Nintendo games I have a slight fascination with how people worship this company and continually make excuses for them, so I really like these videos, even if they’re probably not 100% accurate.
Shawnj2 3y ago
It was trivially easy to set up Yuzu or Ryujinx to play switch games that haven’t even launched yet without even owning a switch. That definitely has some sort of impact on Nintendo’s business. More importantly Yuzu was known to essentially have a culture of not caring about the DMCA themselves. I don’t think they did anything illegal in the emulator code but they did totally have a private pirated game stash and were selling TOTK compatible builds via Patreon before the game released which violates basically every rule of clean room disassembly.

Hamuko 3y ago

I imagine that they're against Switch emulators when the Switch is still their primary business. I also don't imagine their hardline stance against Switch emulators will change anytime soon if the Switch 2 is backwards compatible.

alex_suzuki 3y ago
It just seems to me that having a great Switch emulator present would deter only a tiny fraction of Nintendo‘s customer base from buying the real thing. Still more than the cost of legal action, probably.
- rincebrain 3y ago
  Well, if you have a reputation for suing anyone who even breathes funny, suing one group or two high-profile groups every so often is cheaper than suing hundreds of smaller things that might be more prevalent if you didn't have a reputation of landing on people.

StressedDev 3y ago

They are against emulators because they know the vast majority of emulator users are pirates.

alex_suzuki 3y ago
Yes, sure, but it’s hard to imagine that they’ll suddenly turn into willing buyers when they can’t pirate.
- allan_s 3y ago
  To play the devil's advocate: On the other one can argue that people pirating does not improve their economics either so why risk it ?
  - alex_suzuki 3y ago
    Don‘t they say that imitation is the greatest form of flattery? :-) I get your point – I just feel like there’s not a lot of potential economic improvement to be had here, but apparently there is.
  - littlestymaar 3y ago
    Except it could, actually: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3308905 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3308905 But it's not as if corporations acted rationally anyway, they are led by humans and as such they are mostly driven by emotions.
- thrdbndndn 3y ago
  From my experience, a lot people actually do. And in case of game consoles, that also means they have to buy the hardware even if they only want to play one game. This is very significant potential income for Nintendo. All my friends that are into games have a PS4/5 just to play exclusives, even if they play games on PC 99% of the time. And non-trivial number of them play XB3 in emulators so they don't need to buy a Switch just for that. If there is no emulators, they probably would.
- lrvick 3y ago
  As if taking down a couple of the thousands of copies of an FOSS repo will slow anyone down. All Nintendo did is make it easier for people on the fence to decide if they want to financially support them or pirate.
akira2501 3y ago
Hardware developers should not care and that's what the emulator is attempting to actually emulate. They're using their position to benefit their licensing operation, which has strict controls about distribution, which ironically are probably most responsible for the type of piracy that actually eats into their bottom line.
- CalRobert 3y ago
  Nintendo is a bit unusual in that their first-party games are a big deal, and there aren't a ton of interesting non-Nintendo games on Switch. Obviously it will vary but plenty of people have one for Zelda and Mario Kart primarily.
makeitdouble 3y ago
They probably have no ways of _knowing_ that. They might assume. But Nintendo also has absolutely no incentive to care if it's used for pirating. Users want to put in term of morality, when it probably doesn't matter much. Even if there was no pirating angle, emulation is a revenue drain from old title they could bundle in the Nintendo Online subscription and remix as remake games (what we saw with the old Zelda games remade for the Switch for instance). Even if people were using the emulator after buying the Switch and the actual games, that's still a stream they don't control (can't check if the game is played on multiple consoles for instance, etc) and there's nothing positive for them coming out of it.

thrdbndndn 3y ago

> How is this a threat to their business How is it not? By having a good emulator, one can easily play Switch games without paying. I'm aware emulator devs don't provide game ROMs and usually have certain mechanisms to ensure you have a "legal copy", but these are all very trivial to bypass historically. (I'm also aware there are claims that piracy does not hurt revenue of copyright holder. I can get behind some points in these claims, but not entirely.)

littlestymaar 3y ago
> I'm also aware there are claims that piracy does not hurt revenue of copyright holder. I can get behind some points in these claims, but not entirely IIRC, a significant fraction of the studies of the subject tend to show that it even positively affects revenues of IP rights holders.
- thrdbndndn 3y ago
  I can believe that, but revenue may not be the only thing the author cares (not saying it is the case for Nintendo or any large companies, but in general). I subscribe to Patreon artists frequently. Lots of them, especially Japanese artists, have expressed that they hate piracy (i.e. repost their paid rewards on interweb) simply because it's (in their opinion) wrong. They're fully aware people who pirate is unlikely to pay a single penny regardless, or that piracy actually increases their "exposure". At the end of the day, in my opinion it's right holder's call, regardless if their decision is based on emotion or rationale.
  - littlestymaar 3y ago
    > Lots of them, especially Japanese artists, have expressed that they hate piracy (i.e. repost their paid rewards on interweb) simply because it's (in their opinion) wrong. That's exactly what I mean. At the end of the day, what they believe is what drives their behavior. > At the end of the day, in my opinion it's right holder's call, regardless if their decision is based on emotion or rationale. I'm not disputing that here. Edit: oh, this isn't a response to the comment I though it was. The comment when I'm saying roughly the same as you are and I though was misinterpreted is this one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39788265 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39788265

matsemann 3y ago

How is it not a threat to their business? People don't use these emulators to play 20 year old abandonware, but to play Switch games even before they've been officially released through leaks. I've sailed the sea a lot myself, but I don't believe the meme "pirates wouldn't have bought it anyways". It's not a 1:1 loss, but it's not zero either. And for me, piracy used to be an accessibility issue. Living in the mountains I could wait for a week to get something by mail, or click download illegally and play immediately. With today's online stores that's no longer an excuse.

Retr0id 3y ago
PC game publishers don't seem to mind that their games are playable on PC. Yes, PC games usually have DRM, but Denuvo offers their services for the Switch platform too. In fact, they specifically claim that they can resist emulation of protected titles: https://irdeto.com/denuvo/nintendo-switch-emulator-protection/ https://irdeto.com/denuvo/nintendo-switch-emulator-protectio... And yet, no commercial games have been released with this protection yet, probably because it isn't worth it for their bottom line.

jakkos 3y ago

> How is this a threat to their business? One reason is that playing the emulated version is a better experience. Why would you play Breath of the Wild at 900p/30fps, when you can play it at 4k/60fps AND have all the customizability of running it on a PC. Emulators illustrate that Nintendo forces you to buy an outdated tablet to play an intentionally hamstrung version of their game, so that once you are bought in to the hardware, you are more likely to buy more of their games.

Daz1 3y ago

I have personally pirated $500+ worth of Switch games plus the $300 console I would have otherwise bought since I own a Steam Deck. This is a very common use-case.

realusername 3y ago
Would you really have bought both consoles together? I have a hard time to believe that. That's not really the same budget.
- Daz1 3y ago
  Yes if I didn’t have yuzu on my steam deck I 100% would have bought a switch just for the two Zelda games.
jrflowers 3y ago
This makes sense because you would not have bought a steam deck if you owned a switch
- genewitch 3y ago
  I have bought 3 switch consoles and i still want something like a steam deck because steam EOL'd their remote play box. I want something i can play PC games on on a TV that i can also take with me to boring things like waiting rooms. The switch screen (i have the original switch) is too tiny, and it's a very heavy console. Switch lites have even smaller screens, but they weigh much less - it is possible the controllers i use undocked are just heavier, but either way. The steam deck has a higher resolution screen, and i'm sure some devices have greater than FHD resolution with greater than 60FPS "refresh". That's kind of a big deal to my crappy eyes. Right now i have a laptop connected to my TV to play steam games that support controllers. I'd much rather just have another USB-C to HDMI converter plugged in to a device designed nearly completely to play games. A huge use case for me would be using wemod/cheatengine and in general steam workshop. The second biggest reason is shovelware. On the switch if i buy a game because it looks good, AFAIK i can't refund it if it's actually a garbage game. On steam, i've requested refunds after playing (some*) games for several days. * mostly incremental/clicker/idle games, because they're designed to be crappy to start out, so 2 hours isn't even enough time to expose 1% of the content or gameplay.

CalRobert 3y ago

It was one thing when enthusiasts were emulating systems near or past EOL, but at this point a Nintendo system is often not the best way to enjoy a Nintendo game.

account42 3y ago
> but at this point a Nintendo system is often not the best way to enjoy a Nintendo game. Perhaps Nintendo should provide a better way to play their games themselves then?
- CalRobert 3y ago
  I agree, but my point is still that an emulator could reduce Nintendo hardware sales. (And realistically speaking who's going to buy Tears of The Kingdom when they're running it on an emulator?) Of course, my other view is that emulators should be perfectly fine and a great exercise in reverse-engineering, but Nintendo won't see it that way. It would be an interesting experiment to release a high-performance emulator console that only worked with the physical (presumably legally-purchased) game. Perhaps it would fill a similar legal niche to DeCSS - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS

INTPenis 3y ago

This is the Switch, not the GBA or SNES, it's their current product lineup. I really have a hard time understanding why you have a hard time understanding this. And I also love Nintendo, but I mostly play GBA and SNES games from my childhood.

6865 3y ago
I don't see the problem with it being the current product lineup, archiving happens during the lifetime of a product, not just after.
- INTPenis 3y ago
  You're delusional if you think it's for archiving. I don't even know what you mean by that, as in archiving ROMs online for posterity? It's clearly for emulating their games with pirated ROMs. I completely understand it too because I've been pirating since games were on tapes. But, surprisingly perhaps, I have the ability to view things from multiple perspectives. And clearly Nintendo don't want their titles to be pirated while they're still making sales. At some point in the future, just like with GBA and SNES emulators, I'm sure we'll see the same for Switch emulators.

lawn 3y ago

> Feels more like they’re alienating a lot of people that might harbor good will towards them. These actions ensure that I'll never buy a Nintendo console or games anymore, even though I'd be their target audience (both myself and my three kids).

lrvick 3y ago
Nintendo evaporating community goodwill by using our money to take aggressive action against supposed piracy enablers makes it easy to justify actual piracy.
- lawn 3y ago
  I'm very content with my choice of a Steam Deck at this point.
- vsnf 3y ago
  What amount of goodwill Nintendo burns away is more than made up for by them continuing to make good games. I am confident that there is quite literally nothing they can do as a company to hurt their reputation enough to be fiscally damaging, save from actually making bad games. And even that doesn't seem to be an impediment to them (see also: the Pokemon mainline games). They'd have to have a string of probably 10 consecutive years putting out absolute dogshit before they'd get even close to feeling the pain.
matsemann 3y ago
So because you can't pirate you won't buy? Why should Nintendo care? Not like they would've made money on you anyways. I'm sure your kids appreciate your moral stronghold when you explain to them why they can't play Mario with their friends.
- lawn 3y ago
  No, I won't buy because I find their current (and past) actions morally reprehensible. If they didn't do shit like this I would already have (more) of their games and consoles. I can still emulate the games even if they don't do this you know? It doesn't stop a motivated actor actor after all.

hooby 3y ago

It's not just emulators. People have gotten cease-and-desists from their lawyers for drawing fan-art of their characters. Streamers will get strikes/takedowns for playing their games. And similar stuff... If you don't want to get legal threats, I recommend to never mention their name, any of their trademarks, or even ever publicly acknowledge their existence. They have become the-company-which-may-not-be-named.

lrvick 3y ago
Or we educate them on the Streisand Effect.
- account42 3y ago
  So essentially reward them with our patronage for being dicks? No thanks.
  - PawgerZ 3y ago
    Reward them with our patronage? Do you know what the Streisand Effect is?
    - hooby 3y ago
      The Streisand effect is named after when Barbara Streisand's attempts to get a picture of her private house and garden removed from the internet, instead causing it to go viral. Nintendo as a company does greatly benefit from people talking about it and it's products. That's publicity, word of mouth, free advertising basically. When they abuse takedowns, strikes and other measures, they do not want to stop that free publicity and word of mouth advertising. They are attempting to control it, manipulate it, and limit it to company approved screenshots, videos and information only. If those attempts generate more publicity - including making the taken down screenshots go viral (Streisand effect style) - that's beneficial publicity and word-of-mouth for them and their products. And it also amplifies the message sent to others: use only approved materials, or face our wrath! Therefore providing them with improved visibility and publicity - more word of mouth - and helping them spread their "fall in line!" message, can be seen as "rewarding" what they are doing. If instead most people were to completely ignore them and stop talking about them (out of fear)... THAT would hurt their publicity.

pdpi 3y ago

> How is this a threat to their business? If you download Higan and play pirated SNES games, not much of a threat. If you download Yuzu/Ryujinx and play pirated Switch games, that's an altogether different picture.

andy_ppp 3y ago

Yup, I won’t give Nintendo any more of my money if they are playing this game.

numpad0 3y ago

Nintendo corporate has always been like that. It values their face and continuity over growth and profit, listens to complaints but refuses demands. Being a family-owned Kyoto company the behaviors are slightly different to standard Tokyo entity thinking.

numpad0 3y ago
self replying: specifically, Nintendo triggers a brittle "I'm not gonna let you have it" behavior when someone tries to take advantage of situation and makes demands. The response switches to denying accesses and terminating communications. It tend not to repeat nonpologies while talking down demands and accepting new businesses like most B2C companies do.

subjectsigma 3y ago

These videos talk about it a little: https://youtu.be/zvPkAYT6B1Q?si=99J7GUo3l_ggQCjM https://youtu.be/zvPkAYT6B1Q?si=99J7GUo3l_ggQCjM https://youtu.be/xgKY9hmbfgo?si=GzBOx9p-sLPchKL1 https://youtu.be/xgKY9hmbfgo?si=GzBOx9p-sLPchKL1 https://youtu.be/yj9Gk84jRiE?si=FmhiSO9Qd8WIsVzS https://youtu.be/yj9Gk84jRiE?si=FmhiSO9Qd8WIsVzS TL;DR: forming a hydra-summary of the three: Nintendo’s strategy has been to position themselves as a premium video game brand since the 1980’s. They use high pricing, exclusivity, and close integration with hardware to distance themselves from other companies. Because they want to position themselves as the one and only Nintendo, knockoffs and copycats represent an existential threat to their brand. They also want parents to have absolute trust in the family friendliness of their games and knockoffs could diminish that as well. Because of this they do literally every scummy thing in their power to aggressively pursue and litigate anything from piracy to fan projects. Control of their image is their biggest asset. As someone who didn’t really grow up playing Nintendo games I have a slight fascination with how people worship this company and continually make excuses for them, so I really like these videos, even if they’re probably not 100% accurate.

Shawnj2 3y ago

It was trivially easy to set up Yuzu or Ryujinx to play switch games that haven’t even launched yet without even owning a switch. That definitely has some sort of impact on Nintendo’s business. More importantly Yuzu was known to essentially have a culture of not caring about the DMCA themselves. I don’t think they did anything illegal in the emulator code but they did totally have a private pirated game stash and were selling TOTK compatible builds via Patreon before the game released which violates basically every rule of clean room disassembly.