And just checked most Switch 1 emulator is still available too because they are not hosted on Github but rather on self hosted repos with their own domains.
Not that it matters because they will be back next week either way.
The only surprising thing is the PicoFly firmware but that's such a niche. Most peope who have a chipmodded Switch never touch that.
It is already happening at record pace. Just look at all the new ports, recomps and decomps coming out lately: https://www.youtube.com/@VideoGameEsoterica/videos
Almost all of these are native cross-platform PC versions of specific console games.
Everything even up to Switch 2, Xbox One and PS5 are now getting working static recompilations.
The business world is slow but it will eventually see that an open system will sell better.
Nintendo's business is not just games, they need HW sales as well for the whole thing to make sense. Since I have both the game and the console, I can feel justified, but it's not their TOS and that's enough for me. Game/book/music preservation is another story I guess.
Tangent, but the new Zelda Ocarina of Time runs butterfly smooth in insane melees on an S2. Got it on day 1 and we are both over 40, pathetic. Sucks for me, she usurped it and I don't watch next to her so that I can go through the story on my own. Just watched a few encounters to get the tasted. Great game so far, 1-2AM isn't unusual.
[1]: https://www.ft.com/content/a781c853-3fed-4dfc-b940-413754618...
There is also a very juicy accessory ecosystem. A Pro Controller is $90 these days. I've tried clones, but Nintendo paywalls a few things, like powering up from the controller.
An emulator is a piece of software and can't make assumptions. I'm not sure who you're referring to doing the assuming in your sentence.
> You bought the game but "stole" the console sale.
Not buying something and then not getting it isn't stealing or piracy.
> they need HW sales as well for the whole thing to make sense.
Nintendo has no legal entitlement for their business plan to work financially.
Ok, fellow pedant! By dumping and decrypting the ROM, one is breaking the license agreement. And these ROMs slip into the wild. You've read the EULA? It's DRM circumvention. You don't need to like it. No skin off of my nose, but this isn't a John Deer right to repair situation.
1. License Grant/Restrictions; Third-Party Content. Subject to the terms of this Agreement, Nintendo grants you a non-exclusive, revocable license to use the Software solely on the Console for your personal, non-commercial use. For clarity, the Software is licensed, not sold, to you, and you may not make use of the Software except as expressly authorized by this Agreement. Without limitation, you agree that you may not ( a) publish, copy, modify, reverse engineer, lease, rent, decompile, disassemble, distribute, offer for sale, or create derivative works of any portion of the *Software;*
NA EULA, perhaps different in your country - https://en-americas-support.nintendo.com/app/legal/a_id/6858...
Nintendo has no legal entitlement for their business plan to work financially.
Their lawyers will craft it. See ya!
> Their lawyers will craft it. See ya!
The EFF actually coined a term for this in its analyses of the impact of the DMCA: "Felony Contempt of Business Model". Of course, when they wrote those words they expected the very phrase to constitute a kind of reductio ad absurdum.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/felony-contempt-busine...
Obviously privileging arbitrary business models over others isn't one of the legitimate purposes of the law. So what makes you think there's a public interest in supporting Nintendo's business model beyond what existing laws, which do not prohibit emulation or even the sale of compatible consoles, already do?
If lawyers could have, they would have.
This is a utterly empty response. What is it that you're arguing exactly, that a company can use the law to be a nuisance and that the actual letter of the law doesn't matter at all?
If so, then why even quote law in your arguments? Because by your own admission, none of it matters.
Let's stop assuming stuff.
I own a switch 1, I own Zelda Breath Of The Wild, yet I have been playing it on Yuzu on my computer. First when the switch stopped working and needed a new battery, then I realized I could run it at better resolution on my computer, in any room with larger screen on my laptop thanks to moonlight and I don't have to actually look for it and find it abandonned and discharged by my daughters or that the joycons started drifting again and in need of a repair.
Did Nintendo lose a sale? No.
No? Virtually every game I've ever played under emulation, not counting emulators ported to consoles for official re-releases/collections, is for a console I've bought. Many of them are games and consoles I still have working copies of both of right now, and I play under emulation because I want save states or FPS unlocking patches or a more convenient cheats system or whatever. At the same time it's not at all unusual to use other original hardware (e.g., a Wiimote) with your emulator. So it doesn't prevent hardware sales in that sense either.
And even if you do have the hardware, it's perfectly legitimate to buy it used, or pick it up out of a dumpster! "Piracy" is deliberately a loaded word and we should probably avoid using it altogether. But regardless of the choice of words, the world doesn't revolve around forcing people to buy new hardware from the likes of Nintendo. No angel is stripped of its wings every time someone buys an FPGA-based, cartridge-compatible emulation device instead of buying a used SNES at a garage sale.