Earlier this summer, Nintendo filed a lawsuit against Jacob Mathias, otherwise known as the owner of LoveROMS and LoveRETRO, sites that notoriously hosted ROM files of retro Nintendo games. Immediately following the legal suit, both of the aforementioned domains were shut down to prevent further issue. Nintendo's legal action also had effects on other websites that had illegal content hosted on their servers, such as Emuparadise, which removed all download links shortly after the lawsuit was made public. Mathias and his wife, who were both charged on mass copyright infringement, plead guilty to the actions of trademark infringement and damages to Nintendo. They then entered settlement talks in order to find an agreeable amount of money to pay as reparations. Today, the final judgement for the case came in, showing that both Jacob Mathias and Nintendo had agreed for the former to pay $12,230,000 to the latter, over 12 million dollars.

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All copyrighted material owned by the couple must also be forfeited, and ownership of LoveROMs.com and LoveRETRO.co has been signed over to Nintendo of Japan.

Source

 

[deinonychus71]

Pirating *old* games wouldn't be a problem if Nintendo would just sell all of 'em for like $0.05 or somewhere around that range. Who the hell these days pays $8 for a game on the SNES that came out on launch. Ninty Online only offers the NES stuff, a console that's very dated due to the fact that there's no saving and most of the games are short and simple. We need stuff like Gamecube and N64 to be sold (Yes, I know N64 was on Wii U but still limited). If they won't do that, make a mega collection like SEGA or start making old consoles again (Minis feel too digital).

ROMs are digital, too
I'm not saying Nintendo is doing everything they can to provide a proper legal offer, but it's not easy to provide said offer. A lot of old games would be a nightmare to license today. That's just how it is.

 

[FAST6191]

Another day, another ROM site. Been like that for as long as I can remember. Will likely be the same in the future as well. Nothing I can see feeling especially aggrieved over, indeed I find it quite bizarre that anybody would be more than "damn, quite liked them for downloading from". There are a million more sites, other methods and a million more waiting in the wings to upload and otherwise make available. Nintendo even acted well within the intent and spirit of the law in this case.

How many years is it?

Choice video

 

[Necron]

If they were to take action against anyone I am sure they will now be directing their attention to the Yuzu developers as it can now play a handful of retail games from start to finish (albeit buggy and slow). Since these emulators have been built from scratch they are (currently) legally fair game but considering how scummy Nintendo has become lately, who knows they might try and do?

The fight with emulators is a lost cause. Many have tried, but none have succeded. While it doesn't include any of Nintendo's code, then they're very legal.

 

[Song of storms]

I hoped there'd be a decent discussion about this, but it turned into a circlejerk pretty quickly. Sad. It's almost like, as a multi-billion dollar company, you're supposed to protect your assets. And when some random person think to be so untouchable that they hosts your copyrighted material in US servers, everyone bitches that someone who tried to turn thousands of monthly "quick bucks" in the easiest way possible should be freed instead.

Anyway, Nintendo is literally Hitler if he was a gamer and EA is bad too. Let that sink in.

 

[the_randomizer]

ROMs are digital, too
I'm not saying Nintendo is doing everything they can to provide a proper legal offer, but it's not easy to provide said offer. A lot of old games would be a nightmare to license today. That's just how it is.

What about first party games? Nintendo owns the rights to them, there is literally no excuse not to allow those to be digitally purchased.

Third party games are one thing, but their own IP, they have no excuse at all. There are no licensing issues with first party games. They're just being stingy.

 

[Rabbid4240]

Can't tell if you're serious or not

I'm serious, where do we get our roms now?

 

[Exaltys]

Game companies don't care about preservation.

 

[Captain_N]

Damn Nintendo did not even have to use a master ball to capture them sites. I dont think those sites made anything close to 12 mil..

If anyone here is truly mad at nintendo for taking down these sites then why are you still giving nintendo your time and money? Sell all your nintendo stuff and be done with it. Anyone actually have the will?

Im not mad at nintendo. They have the right to protect their property.
That said, having a site like that up is playing russian roulette. eventually your gonna loose. True pirates dont use those rom sites anyways. Even DC++ is a better place to get goodies from....
That eye site is amazing for roms.... I wonder why they are still kicking....

 

[Kioku]

Game companies don't care about preservation.

There's a half assed excuse for these sites if I've seen one.

 

[brickmii82]

Damn Nintendo did not even have to use a master ball to capture them sites. I dont think those sites made anything close to 12 mil..

If anyone here is truly mad at nintendo for taking down these sites then why are you still giving nintendo your time and money? Sell all your nintendo stuff and be done with it. Anyone actually have the will?

Im not mad at nintendo. They have the right to protect their property.
That said, having a site like that up is playing russian roulette. eventually your gonna loose. True pirates dont use those rom sites anyways. Even DC++ is a better place to get goodies from....
That eye site is amazing for roms.... I wonder why they are still kicking....

True pirates use blunderbuss’ and scimitars

 

[Exaltys]

There's a half assed excuse for these sites if I've seen one.

I never did weigh in on the morality of hosting roms. I just stated that companies don't care about preservation. Ideally, I'd say I'd want to see the hosting site just try to recoup hosting costs. The upkeep to provide the doorway for gamers to play older games.

For old games that have no rerelease, it isn't as if the original company can even get through the licensing to rerelease them or would they make money from someone buying a used copy.

 

[Carnelian]

Glad i destroyed my Wii U.

 

[Xzi]

Glad i destroyed my Wii U.

Lol you already paid for it, the only person that hurts is you.

 

[Garro]

I can only think the amount was calculated as "$X for every download count" for the debt to skyrocket like that. I hope that it's just a scare tactics though, a debt like that destroys life.

On an unrelated note, this thread did become a huge bait for entitled gamers.

 

[grossaffe]

I can't believe the amount of vitriol over Nintendo defending its IP from a very clear infringement committed for profit.

 

[Captain_N]

Lol you already paid for it, the only person that hurts is you.

Yeah you could have sold it.....

 

[th3joker]

i wonder how much the site owner actually made off the site from ads in its lifetime?

 

[kuwanger]

I just stated that companies don't care about preservation.

Yea, this is already known. It's why there's an archivist exception in copyright which is routinely extended in various ways (like the recent DMCA exemption for archivists). The calls for preservation is no reasonably basis to argue that people should be able to host copyrighted material they don't own/have rights to. If you care about copyright being too long, lobby to change the law in that area. If you care about preservation, push your local archivists (also known as a library) to do more to preserve games. Have "video game night" at the local library and share what games you have with like minded people. Violate copyright, and you suffer the legal consequences.

For old games that have no rerelease, it isn't as if the original company can even get through the licensing to rerelease them or would they make money from someone buying a used copy.

Like it or not, this is part of why copyright exists: to allow copyright holders to choose when and if they rerelease content to avoid too much competition in the market that may result in prices to drop. Since I'd readily argue that (1) games 14+ years old aren't much in the way of direct competition for most gamers and (2) for where they are competition, it's mostly in the "nostalgia" factor and companies rereleasing games with little effort or consideration--*cough*Sony*cough*--, we definitely should have much shorter copyright terms. As it stands, though, people don't have some right to just ignore copyright law because it's inconvenient.

 

[the_randomizer]

I can't believe the amount of vitriol over Nintendo defending its IP from a very clear infringement committed for profit.

Not so much that as it is their refusal to offer a more affordable, legal way, ie. the eShop. So much wasted potential. I'm even more shocked at the sycophancy at Nintendo and how they seem to accept the selection of NES games to be even remotely good. The selection sucks and you all know it.

Those poor old games, look at all the money they didn't make off of the ones that weren't digitally available. Shame.

I never did weigh in on the morality of hosting roms. I just stated that companies don't care about preservation. Ideally, I'd say I'd want to see the hosting site just try to recoup hosting costs. The upkeep to provide the doorway for gamers to play older games.

For old games that have no rerelease, it isn't as if the original company can even get through the licensing to rerelease them or would they make money from someone buying a used copy.

I am so sick of people saying this, licensing issues aren't an issue for first party games that Nintendo themselves own. There is no reason for them to NOT release them.

 

[Ericthegreat]

Is it even possible to have 12 million dollars without being Bill Gates ???

12 million, is a lot, but more people then you think have 1 million (not me )

 

[the_randomizer]

Just to set the record straight:

Piracy = illicit duplication of something copyrighted
Theft = the physical/forcible removal of an object, i. e taken by force

See the difference? Yes, still illegal, but it's not the same as physically taking something.

Example: I rent a movie from Redbox, I put it in my DVD burner, rip the ISO from it, then return the disc the next day.
I returned the disc, right? So I didn't steal the disc, I merely made an illegal copy. This is piracy.

So please, stop the "piracy is stealing" bullshit, it's not the same, it's no less illegal, but they're not the same thing. Thanks.