When the Switch emulator Yuzu went down due to legal pressure by Nintendo in March, I saw countless tortured arguments online trying to rationalize it. One was that Tropic Haze had not been smart about how they had gone about development, and many people pointed to competing Switch emulator Ryujinx as a model example. But today it was announced via Discord that the developer of Ryujinx had been contacted by Nintendo, reaching an agreement to stop working on the project and take the assets down from Github. The github repo for Ryujinx is now offline. Ryujinx is no more, at least in its current form, but what did anyone expect? Nintendo was never going to stop with Yuzu, and I doubt this will be the last time they do this.
“Yesterday, gdkchan was contacted by Nintendo and offered an agreement to stop working on the project, remove the organization and all related assets he's in control of,” user rip in peri peri announced in the Ryujinx Discord server. “While awaiting confirmation on whether he would take this agreement, the organization has been removed, so I think it's safe to say what the outcome is. Rather than leave you with only panic and speculation, I decided to write this short message to give some closure.”
“Thank you to @everyone who has contributed code, documentation or issue reports to the project,” they continued. “Thank you all for following us throughout the development. I was able to learn a lot of really neat things about games that I love, enjoy them with renewed qualities and in unique circumstances, and I'm sure you all have experiences that are similarly special”
In addition to that, rip in peii peri noted several in the additions to the emulator that were not public: a remarkably stable version of the emulator that ran on iOS that unfortunately would remain a novelty due to UI limitations, a WIP android version of the emulator, improved metal support and more. Developers Ac_K and Berry also chimed in, expressing their gratitude for the community and the project.
Though I am quite curious what the exact nature of the deal between gdkchan and Nintendo was, the practical reality is it does not matter. Ryujinx was the main Switch emulator that was not an active fork of Yuzu. Since Nintendo reached its settlement with Tropic Haze, other emulators have forked Yuzu’s code and continued development, Suyu and Sudachi being the primary ones. (3Ds emulator Citra has also found a stable fork.) But the process has not been smooth sailing: Gitlab removed Suyu, citing a DMCA claim. Discord nuked the accounts of the Suyu and Sudachi developers, also citing a DMCA claim. Development can still happen, although Nintendo is making it as difficult as possible to do this above board, in public, without self-hosting. On top of this, YouTuber Retro Gaming Corps claimed they were served a DMCA takedown from Nintendo this week for showing off Wii U.
I understand why Nintendo is doing this, in the same way I understand a boa constrictor strangling a small animal to death. It is within Nintendo’s nature and character to act this way, to throw its weight around and to make open source development difficult, particularly as the Switch’s successor creeps into view.
The reality is that emulation itself is not criminal, there is precedent for this and it is telling that most of the time they have settled out of court. Another reality is that the games Nintendo was releasing on its ancient hardware have run like shit for years; just ask anyone playing The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom (I am, it does). These are not the actions of a compassionate or reasonable company; this is throwing your weight around because you can. Year after year they somehow manage to find the most maximally suspect way to go about these things. I should not find myself siding with Palworld, and yet here we are!
We have been living in a golden age of emulation, from the MiSTer to countless other projects. But Nintendo has not only shown itself to constantly be a bad steward of its history, but also a viciously litigious one. If emulation is driven underground again because of moves like this, it will be categorically bad for the history of gaming. We cannot return to living that way, because there is too much at stake.
