4 ms·

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

by StressedDev 3y ago

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.

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.