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Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

overkill.wtf

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Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#141
post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the time Zelda leaked, it didn't work correctly in the release version of Yuzu. The lawsuit claims that the Yuzu team released a patched version that fixed the issue before the game's official retail launch date, but they have some sort of exclusivity period (looks like one week as far as I can tell) where new releases are exclusive to their Patreon before they become freely available. Nintendo is arguing that the…

That's an interesting argument, but I'm not sure it'll hold water with the judge unless they can't show such arrangements are very common with donation-funded software and was in place well before this leak, e.g. yes, we made money off this leak, but not because we designed the model to profit off people wanting to pirate/cause loss of sales, it's just how this has always worked. We'll see. I'm not really sure there'…

Ouch, releasing patch before official launch sort of proves they pirated the game themselves, which somewhat undermines defense that they don't encourage piracy.

Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There might be a miscommunication. The litigants and defendants would not be compelled to contribute equal amounts. Just the disbursement would be equal.

Then why would the litigants contribute in the first place? If nothing compels them to, they won't, so effectively the status quo.

What I'm hearing is that it solves the problem of Nintendo being to outspend the defendant. If Nintendo brings a lawsuit and spends zero dollars on court cost, it should be rather easy for the defense to also contribute zero and the lawsuit is avoided. Problem solved.

Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The last time I tried to use Yuzu or Ryujinx it was still quite difficult. I had to get out my switch and physical game cartridges and manually dump a bunch of decryption keys and game files. It is absurd that Nintendo is trying to claim these emulators are piracy tools or intended for piracy when they don't seem to do anything to make it easy to play a pirated game copy.

Most people just google for a dumped copy and your up and playing in minutes (as long as it takes to download.) Switch piracy is massive. Almost everyone I know is doing it. I’m not, but I still emulate because switch performance is poo. So I buy the game, and then emulate it in 4K/60, it’s how I finally finished BOTW.

I stopped emulating when my game crashed and I lost weeks of BotW. I moved back to the switch after that lol.

Emulation was awesome. Until...

Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#144
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really wish our system had some kind of financial handicap when it came to access to the legal system. Weaponizing the legal system to bankrupt people that would be found Not Guilty shouldn't be possible.

Easy. The defendant and plaintiffs each hire and pay for lawyers they can or are willing to afford. But all of that money goes into a prize pot, which gets distributed based on who wins the case. This would ensure either Nintendo doesn't try to financially grind out a poor small company because the loss would not be worth it to them.

That doesn't solve grinding out the small company, though it does reverse the damage if they don't get ground out.

The problem is not the end payout, it's the base cost can't be afforded along the way.

One side can keep appealing and escalating, the other can't pay for the cases themselves.

They may not get far enough to win the pool.

You would have to have the lawyers work pro bono or some common legal fund pay for it until the case is won to get the pool.

As I pitched to another user, how about:

> for lawsuits, if you want to spend $5 on lawyer fees, you have to loan $5 to the other side.

> if the other side wins they don't have to pay back the loan.

Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#145
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's actually multiple arguments with zero proof there. - they didn't prove that Yuzu contributed to piracy (and since the amount of piracy tools on the Switch itself that's far from obvious that Yuzu is a first choice) - they didn't prove that the leak itself lead to a loss of revenue. And that's also very hard of an argument to make considering that this game was a huge commercial success.

Does loss of revenue matter at all? It feels like it should, but I had thought that it didn't matter in courts.

From my podcast law degree, in civil action like this yes. To get standing you must show you were harmed in some way and that the court can remedy that harm. That is just one of many parts of the standing test that a federal court will apply.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standing_(law)

Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#146
Yuzu is open source isn’t it?

Nintendo can’t be completely incompetent here; if they get Yuzu shut down someone will inevitably fork it, and they have to know this.

Presumably this is a play to try and establish precedent. They know that this lawsuit means nothing in itself, even if they win, but it can then be used to go after Retroarch or Higan or Mupen64 or Dolphin. This is bad.

Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#147

I would love to see OSS communities like Internet Archive or founders who are pro open source support them. Emulators are legal. Defending your hobby project in court is infeasible without patrons. Nintendo has no leg to stand on legally speaking, and there's a precedent waiting to happen. As for the emulator itself, I don't see any argument that the Yuzu team used "illegal means" (internal SDKs, whatever their equiv…

>precedent waiting to happen

no need, Sony already got us one. Bleem and VGS were a big business, Steve Jobs himself advertised VGS during Macworld 1999 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUfu-xOGr1U&t=9m0s

Sony sued Bleem and lost in court

Sony Computer Entertainment America v. Bleem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleem!#Sony_lawsuit

Sadly court case legal fees bankrupted Bleem, Sony later bought VGS from Connectix, and hired Bleem programmers.

Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#148

I would love to see OSS communities like Internet Archive or founders who are pro open source support them. Emulators are legal. Defending your hobby project in court is infeasible without patrons. Nintendo has no leg to stand on legally speaking, and there's a precedent waiting to happen. As for the emulator itself, I don't see any argument that the Yuzu team used "illegal means" (internal SDKs, whatever their equiv…

Agreed. A sensible enough judge could throw this out on summary judgement, circumventing the opportunity for Nintendo's lawfare. All of Nintendo's points have been tried, so there's really no need to bring this into argument. Even if all of their claims were true, they're not alleging anything illegal. Take it to court, ask for summary, and strengthen the legal defense for this kind of stuff. I really hope they don't roll over, even if nobody can blame them for doing so.

Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you start from the Yuzu documentation? I installed it and walked through their official quick start guide. I didn't type "mario kart free rom" into google or anything.

That's the "legal" way, dumping your own copy of horizon OS, your console's keys, your carts and their keys. Of course it's quicker and easier to just download someone else's keys and dumps, and you're not protecting yourself from Nintendo by using your own stuff, you just get the peace of mind knowing it's your stuff you're using. It's also very quick if you're already set up with atmosphere & homebrew. Longest part…

Is Yuzu providing or linking to those dumps?

Re: Nintendo is suing the creators of Switch emulator Yuzu

#150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people just google for a dumped copy and your up and playing in minutes (as long as it takes to download.) Switch piracy is massive. Almost everyone I know is doing it. I’m not, but I still emulate because switch performance is poo. So I buy the game, and then emulate it in 4K/60, it’s how I finally finished BOTW.

I stopped emulating when my game crashed and I lost weeks of BotW. I moved back to the switch after that lol. Emulation was awesome. Until...

That doesn't make sense. Botw keeps like five autosaves and they're all separate files which are never written to at the same time. You'd have to manually delete them to lose them.
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