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Nintendo Switch emulator, Yuzu, developers settling lawsuit from Nintendo with $2.4M payout, handing over its domains, and agreeing "Yuzu [is] primarily designed to circumvent [DRM]".

This also includes ceasing development and destroying their copies of the code.

The GitHub repo page for Yuzu now returns a 404, as well. In addition, the repo for the Citra 3DS emulator was also taken down.

As of at least 23:30 UTC, Yuzu's website and Citra's website have been replaced with a statement about their discontinuation.

Other sources found by @Daughter3546:

There is also an active Reddit thread about this: https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1b6gtb5/

Cossty ,

I have never played any Nintendo games. Idk what people see in them. I feel like people buy them mostly because of nostalgia. First game you ever played and all that, and then they buy switch for their kid.

This is bad news for emulation though.

iliketurtles ,

I don't care for them anymore, but the SNES, N64 and Gameboy eras were and still are magical.

TimeSquirrel ,
@TimeSquirrel@kbin.social avatar

Different perspectives I guess. That era to me is the era of Apogee software and DOS shareware games, since we never owned a Nintendo system but my Dad did have a decent PC. Many evenings as a preteen were spent trying to cook up my own shitty games in QBasic.

ripcord ,
@ripcord@lemmy.world avatar

I have bought them because they are fun.

TheDarksteel94 ,

Most of them are good games. Nintendo cares about their games, especially first party ones.

Zealousideal_Fox900 ,

There is a very special place in hell for all nintendo lawyers.

Kolanaki ,
@Kolanaki@yiffit.net avatar

I'm sorry but how is using the actual keys from a legally purchased system circumventing anything? It's like saying using the actual key to your own front door counts as breaking and entering.

Zarxrax ,

Because the dmca says so.

GenderNeutralBro ,

DRM is evil. Laws prohibiting circumventing DRM are also evil.

pivot_root OP ,

Nintendo's angle is more along the lines of:

  • We gave our friend Switchy the keys to a lockbox.
  • You tricked Switchy into giving you our keys.
  • We didn't authorize you to use those keys.
  • Using our keys without our permission is circumventing our DRM.
  • Yuzu is a tool that enables you to use our keys.
  • It's illegal to distribute tools to circumvent DRM.

It's a massive reach, but it's a plausible argument—or even a good one if the judge is a technologically illiterate luddite. Beyond that, Nintendo is the kind of litigant that will drag out a lawsuit until the other party is forced to settle.

freebee ,

There's a different kind of judge now than the technologically illiterate?

pivot_root OP ,

I can't quite remember the name, but there is actually at least one U.S. judge that takes the time and effort to learn about the technology in depth before making a ruling.

samus12345 ,
@samus12345@lemmy.world avatar

Then companies must go out of their way to avoid them.

deathmetal27 ,

He's William Alsup, who presided over the Oracle vs Google case about Java API copyrightability.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Alsup#Notable_cases

pivot_root OP ,

Thank you. I need to bookmark this glorious man's Wikipedia page.

Guy_Fieris_Hair ,

Not sure it will ever get better. Maybe a single person being allowed to decide a case that requires a technical understanding should be consulted by experts in it. I guess a better lawyer probably should have made that happen (shouldn't have to). But, as the old geezers die off and the younger "tech savvy" people take over, they will no longer be young or tech savvy, technologywill keep progressing and pass us up too. And you don't want an actual young person as a judge. So... the system is just broken.

viking ,
@viking@infosec.pub avatar

A court in Germany has recently decided that reading the code of a software you legally purchased and finding plain text passwords there is illegal hacking.

The person was hired to do a security audit (by a third party) and disclosed the finding to the software developer, not even to his own employer.

The developer decided to sue him instead of fixing the problem.

At this point I have lost all trust in the technological capacities of judges out there.

ozymandias117 ,

If I’m not authorized to use those keys, how do I use Switchy?

I guess all Nintendo games are illegal to play by that argument, even with their console

pearsaltchocolatebar ,

Because you're using the system outside of its intended purpose to break the law. That's basically the definition of hacking.

I'm not sure why it being illegal to sell a tool to do that is a hard concept to grasp for so many people.

I'm not against emulation or pirating, but no shit this was going to happen eventually.

echo64 ,

Okay, so no, it's not hacking. It doesn't fall under hacking laws. It's not illegal to sell hacking tools. Basically, everything you said is wrong.

In this case, it's all about copyright and the DMCA, which made it illegal to break the copyright protection systems companies put in place or to make or distribute tools to break copyright protection systems.

So, nothing to do will selling things or hacking. Everything to do with copyright and draconian dot come era laws.

pearsaltchocolatebar ,

Circumventing copyright protections by using encryption keys in an unauthorized manner is hacking.

This case might not be explicitly about hacking, but profiting off tools that use IP to circumvent protections is illegal.

echo64 ,

It's not hacking. Sorry.

tabular ,
@tabular@lemmy.world avatar

The electronic key I purchased and collected from my own hardware is "hacking" because Nintendo's doesn't intend it? Maybe the legality of selling a tool to get the key is a hard concept to grasp because the premise is objectionable. If a Switch makes a good doorstop then it will be doing it's "intended purpose" if that's what I intend for my property.

I'm against companies having unjust control over our own computing. Eventually we will stop tolerating the abuse of people contributing to an open/libre community.

pearsaltchocolatebar ,

You might own the hardware, but you don't own the rights to the OS that runs on it. The encryption key is part of that software.

It's not a hard concept to grasp. If I was openly selling a tool to break the activation lock on Windows, I could expect the same result.

mashbooq ,

That's a ridiculous idea. If I buy a computer with an OS that has an encryption key to protect the hard drive, and later I need that key to remove my data to another system, I have an entirely reasonable expectation that I'm allowed to do so, regardless of how much the computer manufacturer doesn't want me to.

TORFdot0 ,

It shouldn't be illegal, but it is because the law about it was written by the industry 25 years ago because our lawmakers think the internet and indoor plumbing work the same way.

markr ,

Except of course anyone can manufacture and sell plug compatible pipes.

JasonDJ ,

Hey man, IP, you pee, whatever.

stealth_cookies ,

It isn't, but when you are a small project the law is inconsequential if a massive corporation goes after you and you don't have the money for the legal battle.

Atomic ,

You didn't read the article did you?

helenslunch ,
@helenslunch@feddit.nl avatar

Whether or not you paid for the game is completely irrelevant to whether Yuzu is designed to circumvent DRM. DRM is designed to prevent making unauthorized copies, which is exactly what Yuzu does, regardless of whether you paid for it or not.

I'm not defending Nintendo, just the English language.

Kolanaki , (edited )
@Kolanaki@yiffit.net avatar

Yes, but the emulator doesn't circumvent any copy protection. It utilizes the decryption key from your own hardware (assuming you dumped it yourself) to run ROMs which have already had the DRM circumvented by whatever was used to dump them in the first place (which the emulator doesn't do).

This is generally the same reason why emulators such as Bleem (which works the same way as Yuzu with the decryption keys but for PS1) have been ruled legal in past court cases.

A good analogy would be that you're using their keys, on their locks, but put in a different door.

stoly ,

Honestly

A_Very_Big_Fan ,

I'm pretty sure the keys aren't a part of the actual game/download, it's a part of your Switch. So if you have an emulator with one of those keys built in, it's piracy.

I think what they should have done is prompt the user to put it in themselves and then we could just find keys on the internet and avoid this whole situation. But I'm no expert

Kolanaki ,
@Kolanaki@yiffit.net avatar

I think what they should have done is prompt the user to put it in themselves and then we could just find keys on the internet and avoid this whole situation. But I'm no expert

That's exactly how it is... Yuzu does not distribute those files. They give you a guide on how to dump it yourself from your own Switch.

A_Very_Big_Fan ,

Oh... Huh, yeah then I'm with you lol, idk how they ended up winning that battle

Kolanaki ,
@Kolanaki@yiffit.net avatar

Yuzu settled. They basically laid down and died. But I don't blame them. $2.4m is probably nothing compared to what they would have paid in legal fees to actually go to court. Even if they won.

nebula ,

They’re likely not going to win. Nintendo’s legal team is pretty strong as far as I know.

markr ,

I started out in the computer industry working for a company that reverse engineered and built IBM compatible terminal systems, This was more than 40 years ago, when that was its own large and profitable sector of the computer hardware market. It was absolutely legal to build 'plug compatible' reverse engineered third party systems. DRM is almost entirely horseshit that has helped turn the entire tech industry into silo'd enshittified monopolies.

LodeMike ,

Nothing capitalists say about feudal rights mean much of anything. More or less the entire tech industry isn't allowed to have non-competes and it's such a big field because of it.

SkyeStarfall ,

Then people will argue capitalism incentivizes innovation.

ed_cock , (edited )

Man... in a better world Nintendo wouldn't have a case because liberating encryption keys is the basis for interoperability, which is good for, you know, competition. Competition is good. Or so I've heard.

AutistoMephisto ,
@AutistoMephisto@lemmy.world avatar

That's how it was. Then the "infinite growth" mind virus infected all of the private sector. I think it's because with the internet and global markets, the competition between firms isn't about fighting for customers - the customer base is essentially infinite, or at least much bigger than the firms need, so the goal isn't to serve your customers better so they come to you instead of your competitors. What's scarce is investment capital - more and more of the equity markets are consolidated into fewer and fewer players, and since the modern share market is much more speculative (i.e. investors buy not on the expected value of the share of the profits they get as dividends, but on the ability to flip their shares to someone else at a higher price later, who in turn is only buying because they anticipate flipping the shares, there's no regard to the fundamentals of the business), the goal is to compete with other firms by showing the capital investors that you can offer the best return on investment.

Under this mindset, you don't have customers to serve, you have assets to monetise, you've gotta show the moneymen that you're getting faster and faster growth with lots of new revenue streams - you don't actually need for these to pan out, because noone cares about whether you're actually making profits so much as whether you look like you're growing so you can be flipped to another speculator. And in that mindset, customers are an obstacle - they're preventing you from monetising your assets by standing between you and their money.

A_Random_Idiot ,
@A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world avatar

I wonder how much the "Yuzu is primarily for piracy" thing will hurt yuzu successors off the open sourced code.

Zink ,
@Zink@pawb.social avatar

The forks were made to use homebrew apps.

Or something else, there's quite a lot of ways to make this work without the whole games thing

inclementimmigrant ,

Can't blame them but at the same time, yeah kind of sad they folded as easily as a Nintendo DS.

I will say Nintendo can count on me, a older game with disposable income and kids, not buying a switch 2 with they way they've been acting with all of their lawsuit and anti-consumer practices.

DudeImMacGyver ,
@DudeImMacGyver@sh.itjust.works avatar

Same here: When I want to buy a game for portable play, I'll just use my Steam Deck and buy from Valve or GOG instead, maybe even emulate some Nintendo games on it out of spite.

evranch ,

Same, I gave my daughter my Switch and used Yuzu to play the games I owned for it on my TV (at greatly improved resolution and framerate, of course).

Now that my PC is hooked up to my TV, my next console is just Steam and my next portable will be the Steam Deck as well.

Huschke ,

As another older gamer I have bought every single switch first party game to display them on my shelves. I also have them all on my PC as roms so I can enjoy them with high fidelity and stable 60 FPS.

I will neither buy another one of their games nor their next console and I also downloaded each and every rom I could find out of spite. I hope their next console crashes and burns like the Wii U...

iegod ,

You sound like a child.

DudeImMacGyver ,
@DudeImMacGyver@sh.itjust.works avatar

Old guy here: Fuck Nintendo

dirtbiker509 ,

Logging in to cancel my switch online right now. I was using YUZU to play games I bought from them, in some cases even more than once. F Nintendo. I won't be buying a Switch 2.

bruhduh ,
@bruhduh@lemmy.world avatar

Better yet, since their hate on piracy is so big, buy HACKED switch 2 when it'll be available and pirate the fuck out of them

Zorsith ,
@Zorsith@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Somebody would have most likely bought a switch 2 to hack it, so that's still money in nintendos hand either way, plus free marketing/advertisement of nintendo IP. Fuck 'em.

Kedly ,

Just get a Steam Deck and be able to play Computer games too!

bruhduh ,
@bruhduh@lemmy.world avatar

I honestly wish there a would be steam deck with size of psvita, the size is only problem, steam deck is better in everything but size

Kedly , (edited )

GPD sells a PSP Go shaped computer, which, if the Steam Deck didnt exist, was probably going to be the computer I would have ended up owning, but Valve's version of Linux and its control mapping is PHENOMENAL, so I dont know how it'd compare in that sense

Edit: According to this video the GPD Win 4 works pretty amazingly with Steams OS, so it seems like a valid option

bruhduh ,
@bruhduh@lemmy.world avatar

Yeah that was good, but price, and psvita had sensor controls as steam deck but gpd didn't, yet i always wanted to have "gpd max" umpc since it's versatile

___ ,

This right here. Disney and Nintendo get no more of my hard earned $$$. These companies create iconic products and they get paid for it. All of the DRM anti-consumer over-reach is where I draw the line though.

0Xero0 , (edited )
@0Xero0@lemmy.world avatar

Here is the latest stable build of Yuzu that I've got from 24 hours ago for anyone who wasn't able to download it in time.

CrayonRosary ,

Anyone downloading executable code from a random person on the internet needs to take a course in digital safety.

I assume you're not being malicious, OXero0, but none of us can possibly know that.

For anyone thinking of downloading it, wait until the popular, vetted forks show up. If you don't already have a working version, you don't need it today.

Adanisi ,
@Adanisi@lemmy.zip avatar

Best to get a copy or two of the source code

A_Random_Idiot ,
@A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world avatar

But she said shes clean, and the scabs are from a genital tattoo!

So surely its okay for me to fuck the 3 dollar hooker?

0Xero0 , (edited )
@0Xero0@lemmy.world avatar

Yes, everyone should be careful downloading files from a rando on the internet. But at the same time, most people just want to get the files and don't want or know how to deal with the source code. And everything is on archive.org but not everyone knows about it, and they probably don't want to wait for a new emulator when they know the old one works.

I'm not saying that you should trust me, you don't know me, I don't know you, so as you said, it's best to be careful anyway.

Btw, I've read that Yuzu collected telemetry, and now that Nintendo owns the site, it's best to set up a firewall and block Yuzu from accessing the internet so be safe.

Scrof ,

F you Nintendo.

Jumi ,

Yup, I don't think I'm buying any Nintendo products anytime soon

A_Random_Idiot ,
@A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world avatar

I mean, why would you? Nintendo has been anti-consumer for a long time now.

This is just a drop in the bucket for them, not nearly as bad as trying to extort lets players/streamers into giving over half their income to nintendo and shit like that.

Kedly ,

I think some of us (At least TWO! [=P] ) were pretty much already ready to, and this was just the straw that broke the camels back

sploosh , (edited )

I own a launch era Switch. When I run Yuzu, I use the keys that I pulled off of it. When I play games in Yuzu, they are games I have purchased and dumped using the Switch Nintendo sold me. The controller I use is a Nintendo Pro controller. I play on my computer because it is MUCH better at playing Switch games than my overclocked Switch is. Just fuck off with this Nintendo, stop making your games worse.

mathiouchio ,

Tell me about your overclocked switch. How

bruhduh ,
@bruhduh@lemmy.world avatar

Google "4ifir" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWcMsGa9Kjs

sploosh ,

Your Switch needs to be hackable. If yours is any revision beyond the initial release chances are you are out of luck. I set it up a long while ago so I can't recall the steps, but googling "Nintendo switch overclock" will get you what you're looking for.

The Switch is based on the Nvidia Shield, whose stock clocks are roughly double the Switch's. This means you can OC it without exceeding the manufacturer's specs, which is pretty neat. Bringing the memory clocks up really helps titles like ToTK.

discomatic ,

I have a hackable Switch but I'm afraid of bricking it or something. Is that a concern? I'm pretty technically inclined but no genius.

sploosh ,

It is dead simple, just make sure you get one of the little jobbies that you slide down the right joycon rail to short the pins that you need shorted - you'll be doing it often when you're setting things up and you don't want to be messing around with a bit of wire. I seriously doubt that you will brick anything, especially if you take your time and read everything through before you get started. These instructions should get you where you want to be.

AnUnusualRelic ,
@AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world avatar

Your games should stutter just the way Nintendo intends them to or you're not getting the full experience!

Wilzax ,

Let this be a lesson: if you try to forcibly pry open the gates of DRM hell and let software be free, you best let it be truly free and only money off it from the donations of your supporters. Don't be like yuzu and monetize the living hell out of your emulator. Don't stuff it with telemetry, don't hide releases behind a patreon paywall.

That all being said, fuck Nintendo.

yamanii ,
@yamanii@lemmy.world avatar

Bleem was a paid and they won, but this was before the anti circumvention addendum. Yuzu wasn't sued for being an emulator, but because it used the keys file to decrypt games.

wax ,

Should have let the decryption be fully external, and not just needing the keys

vox ,
@vox@sopuli.xyz avatar

tbf there was never a paywall. ea = latest yuzu master branch with some work-in-progress-but-almost-ready-for-general-use prs merged in.
anyone could have taken the repo, merged prs from the list and built it, with no need to pay for anything. It's free software after all

Wilzax ,

Yeah you're right, it was brought to my attention that the lawsuit was about decrypting games, especially Tears of the Kingdom, before they were released. The monetization was just to provide earlier access to precompiled binaries

Fisch ,
@Fisch@lemmy.ml avatar

There was actually someone who did that, the repo was called pineapple-src and it was fairly popular

DudeImMacGyver ,
@DudeImMacGyver@sh.itjust.works avatar

Fuck DRM though, all my homies hate DRM.

altima_neo ,
@altima_neo@lemmy.zip avatar

And the digital millennium copyright act

alphapuggle ,

I can load a pirated copy onto a modded console, does that mean that Nintendo is liable for their software being used for piracy?

isles ,

Yeah, they better pay themselves some damages.... Oh wait.

Floshie ,

And I was thinking of cloning the repo. Fuck

jadedwench ,

I set up a script the other day to check the repo every half hour or so and download any updates. I will give myself a reminder tomorrow to post it on Dropbox or something, if you don't find it elsewhere.

Asudox ,
@Asudox@lemmy.world avatar

Torrenting is probably the best idea.

Infernal_pizza ,
@Infernal_pizza@lemmy.world avatar

Any chance you can send it to me as well?

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