Man, regardless of who is in the right legally, I wish these big corporations had a better sense of humor and would understand and appreciate that the people who go to these lengths to understand and recreate the original code aren't their enemies, but their biggest fans.
They make money from having lots of customers, not from having a few obsessed fans. I’ve heard this argument before but the kind of people who are obsessed enough to reverse-engineer old games don’t necessarily even play new games. They’re often fans of the old games and don’t play new games, or they’re people who are interested in reverse engineering. You can release a remaster of an old game, but any reverse-engine…
Nintendo released Super Mario 3D All Stars for a limited purchase window between Sept 2020 and March 2021. Super Mario 64 was included in its original 1996 glory, included a low frame rate, 4:3 aspect ratio, low res textures (iirc they were slightly improved). In fact, Nintendo’s bundle was literally a N64 emulator running on the switch.
At the same time, a group of reverse engineers had decompiled the original ROM, converted it to readable C, and added many improvements: 60FPS, widescreen support, high res textures, etc. Most notably, the project allowed them to compile the source code to native Switch architecture, which greatly improved performance and power consumption.
Most enthusiasts would agree that the “fan project” is objectively a better experience.