Nintendo of America has initiated legal proceedings against the developers of the Yuzu Nintendo Switch emulator, citing concerns of copyright infringement.
According to a report by Stephen Totilo from Game File, the lawsuit was filed in the US District Court of Rhode Island on February 26th.
Owned by Tropic Haze and released in 2018, the Yuzu emulator enables users to play Nintendo Switch titles on various platforms including Windows, Linux, and Android consoles.
Nintendo’s stance on the matter is clear: they assert that such video game emulators facilitate the unlawful playing of pirated games intended solely for specific consoles on general-purpose computing devices.
In their legal filing, Nintendo argues that Yuzu’s technology violates their intellectual property rights as well as those of other rights holders.
The company elaborates, stating that with Yuzu, users can easily obtain and play unauthorized copies of virtually any game designed for the Nintendo Switch, without compensating Nintendo or the numerous other developers and publishers involved in creating and distributing Switch games.
Furthermore, Nintendo accuses Tropic Haze of breaching the Anti-Circumvention and Anti-Trafficking provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). These provisions prohibit the circumvention of technological measures implemented by copyright owners to safeguard against unauthorized access to their works.
Nintendo highlights a particularly egregious instance where the game “The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom” was playable on Yuzu even before its official launch, subsequently being downloaded from pirate websites over a million times.
The company asserts its pursuit of “equitable relief and damages for unlawful circumvention of copyright protection systems (technological measures) and unlawful trafficking in circumvention technology in violation of the DMCA.”
This legal action is consistent with Nintendo’s proactive approach in safeguarding its intellectual property. Notably, in the past year, the company issued cease and desist orders to the developers of the Dolphin emulator, preventing its release on Steam. Nintendo employed DMCA takedown notices against the Lock RCM, a tool enabling Switch users to extract security keys for unauthorized homebrew or emulation purposes.
