The GameCube And Wii Emulator Dolphin Is No Longer Coming To Steam

Yeah, I read their blog post earlier and it definitely makes sense why they’re abandoning it. Even if they reverse-engineered everything and had absolutely no copyrighted code, even things that were made for the general public, it would still likely be taken down. That’s just how Nintendo is and this is unfortunately just another example of how stubborn they are when it comes to situations like this.

Just remove the product keys for the Nintendo consoles and require users to input it themselves; simple. Why are they making it so difficult when the solution is so simple?

Good, gamers need to support local retro game stores and buy physical copies of GameCube and Wii games there.

@Sambuc and dump them on pc and emulate them in crispy 4k..👌😉✨

This isn’t even a big deal at all. The emulator’s been a godsend for 15 years and will continue to be so. It’s not difficult to download it from their site.

@Sambuc Gonna be realistic here...even that option isn't feasible for everyone, you know. Especially considering the price & cost of 2nd copies of certain games that well in the $80-200 range.

Original Wii machine is still the best choice to play both Wii and Gamecube games.

@Dragonite89 Quick question. Is 4K really that much of a necessity?

I'd rather care more for emulation & dumping than adding 4K.

Dolphin doesn't even need to be on Steam, you could already get it on Android, PC, and Linux and even on Steam Deck. Just use EmuDeck or RetroArch and you're good to go.

@Sambuc I live in the middle of nowhere, the nearest retro game place is 3 hours or more away. You gonna pay for gas every time?

@Sambuc yeah… as if that’ll work nowadays

Better to download it from their website anyway.

Guys actually read the their blog post before you comment, even if they remove the key they still have to get permission from Nintendo to release it on steam according to valve. But this isn’t really a big deal cause they said they would implement the steam features they worked on into the normal dolphin build

It is incredibly easy to circumvent this. The Steam Deck is just a laptop with a controller attached to it, so it can run any OS that supports Dolphin.

If only there were some other way to play it on steam deck

@Link-Hero Dude drank some serious kool aid. It's like saying support scalpers by buying resale tickets.

Doesn’t matter if it’s only “a small fraction of circumvention”. Circumvention is circumvention.

I am not a Nintendo apologist; we should be allowed to emulate old games that they do not give us a way to access anymore, and therefore won't lose them any money, heck it's not exactly the same thing but I bought a multi DS cartridge with lots of different games on it because of the atrocious price of old Pokemon games.

But just maybe if we didn't constantly prove to Nintendo that we can't be trusted (every single new release they make gets dumped online before release) they would be a bit more relaxed about it. I don't follow other consoles, but do other companies games' get leaked this often?

@Anti-Matter Best in what way? Controls? No. Convenience, no. Framerate, no. Graphics, HECK no lol umm best at not being able mod anything? It sure wins that category.

@SpaceboyScreams
I don't care with the modding.
Original Wii machine is a perfect machine to play both Wii and Gamecube games.
Just insert the disc and play.

"Oh well, we tried." - Rex, Toy Story 2 (1999)

There’s a channel on YouTube called Moon Channel. It published a video a couple of days ago about Nintendo and their stance on emulators and the legality of emulators and why Valve is siding with Nintendo. It’s a very interesting watch, I highly recommend it.

Turns out the legality of emulators isn’t clear cut at all. If Dolphin challenged Nintendo in court there is a high chance it would have resulted in emulators being banned. I’m not surprised they backed down.

This was such a pointless battle from the very start. There's no tangible benefit to putting it on Steam. Not even for Steam Deck users, as it's already available as a flatpak.

This has drawn so much unnecessary heat to Dolphin in particular and emulation in general for nonexistent benefit.

Crazy that the Gamecube had a bigger legacy than the PS2. Like the PS2 emulator isn't on Steam but everyone is asking for the Gamecube emulator. This proves the 150 million of PS2 were mostly people who bought a cheap dvd player. It wasn't a real gamer console.

Is it just me, or can anybody else also map just about any .exe file to the Steam library so that it appears among other installed games? I did that for ex. with the Epic launcher. This can result in Dolphin being run inside Steam on a TV, right?....RIGHT?

Oh how sad, they have to ask permission from the copyright holder... /s

This whole thing is absurd

@Poodlestargenerica Scalpers or thieves, it's a difficult decision.

@Sambuc Nope.
Retro game prices are outrageously inflated (precisely because companies are refusing to release fan favorite games on modern hardware), and not a feasible option for everyone.

To say nothing of the fact that not everyone lives in an area with used game stores that sell 20+ year old games.

I support retro emulation, and because of this, I have to say the developers of Dolphin were ridiculously foolish by trying to release this on Steam.
In doing so, they've basically painted a big red "hey look at me!" target on retro emulation projects in general.

@glaemay Everyone is asking for a Gamecube emulator and games because this is a Nintendo site. Moreover, most PS2 classics are or will be available in modern platforms.
@CharlieGirl Yeah, I never got why they did this. If you are into emulation you know how to set up an emulator in PC or Steam Deck. They basically put a target in their backs gathering unnecessary attention from Nintendo. I guess they thought they could get away with it since Retroarch is on Steam for some reason.

Makes sense, Nintendo will eventually put their own emulators on the Switch or its successor. How can they sell a subscription method if you pay nothing for more or less the same on Steam Deck?

@Sambuc I agree with you....

@DanijoEX you don't have to buy the expensive games? The vast majority of my Wii collection is worth under £10 and they're all good titles. You don't have to buy the expensive titles for it to be a good game.

My only real defence for emulation is for preservation purposes.

Yea, I see this as an impossible reality.

This doesn’t bother me too much. Call me old fashioned but I like my emulators downloaded off a janky looking website with 20 pop up ads per click

@DanijoEX depends if your pc is powerful enough and can handle 4k without lag it’s definitely worth it, it’s like playing a 4k remaster of a game without having to wait for the developer of a particular game to port their game in HD or 4k since you can just upscale your ROM in the emulator.

Were they going to charge for it on Steam or would it have been free?

I do not understand why it needs an official Steam Release.

It's still out there as a stand alone emulator. How else would I be playing Super Paper Mario and Four Sword Adventures?

Cue the anti-emulator, Nintendo/corpo defending sycophants lol

@Dragonite89

Only makes them look worse. Older games are best played on CRT at the resolution the games were designed for. Upscaling to "crispy 4K" is like AI-upscaling an old painting.

Nintendo needs to hire the Dolphin developers to work for them and get some Cube and Wii goodness on the eshop and online subscription.

I miss my GameCube. Some good games there. With all the mediocre Star Wars games ported recently, why can't LucasArts and Aspyr sort out the Rogue Squadron trilogy for a port or remaster?

@Sambuc
The nearest retro game store for me is nearly an hour away and has the prices extremely jacked up. I refuse to pay upwards of 300$ to pay the fire emblem radience games so I tend to just emulate most hard to find games. If old GameCube games got a modern release I’d be there day one but for now dolphin is there for me.

@RasandeRose no they don’t, idk what kind of monitor, settings or pc you have, but it looks good on lg ultragear oled monitor, and you can put other emulators such as playstation and not just gamecube & wii in 4k, you don’t know what you’re missing, but whatever..

Good if this stunt hasn't left them wearing a legal bullseye on their chests but I still fail to understand the incentive for having attempted it in the first place. All the less so now that it turns out that the "QoL features" for that supposed Steam version are implementable in a regular build.

@Sambuc our local retro game stores generally went poof a fair decade before they could even be qualified as "retro". Although I can't even add a rant about eBay scalper alternatives like some others here do because practically no one on eBay sends complex electronics here anyway (and I mean since way before 2022 - Belarusian custom services were always infamous for the high odds of your package ending up in one of Minsk's confiscated goods stores instead, just because😘).

The Dolphin team is saying Valve is to blame for this, Valve is saying it was Nintendo who told them to do it, and Nintendo is saying get rekt Team Dolphin.

Surprised Valve is getting off the hook so easily by basically everyone. St. Gaben the Holy is the winner again.

@Dragonite89

I've played plenty of upscaled games. They're still native low resolution, the upscaled output just highlights the ugliness that are normally hidden, exp on a CRT monitor for which Gamecube, Wii and PS2 games are designed for.

@Duncanballs

They wouldn't need them. Nintendo already have a team in Europe that works more or less with emulators only (plus video formats).
The fact there is no Gamecube-games on Switch Online is probably a business decision, MB they want Gamecube on Switch 2.

@RasandeRose I disagree 4k emulation just can’t be beat, especially with good emulators…you can see more details you couldn’t on native console resolution, CRTs are the ones that look ugly and 💩 to me..

Probably for the best. Most emulators fly under the radar, but putting this on the Steam Deck was bound to raise eyebrows (Nintendo's eyebrows). I'm sure nobody cares, but nobody "owns" any Nintendo game except Nintendo. Despite the hundreds of physical games I "own" on discs and cartridges, they only represent a license between me and Nintendo to play a given game. Sad but true.

Well, now I've seen everything: people on a Nintendo news site bagging on someone for suggesting they support used game stores.

Weird hill to die on. Getting the common key is pretty...common when doing this sort of thing. But it's also weird to flaunt your stuff towards a notoriously litigious company and people just can't help themselves. Probably because that signal boost of Nintendo attacking the little guy is too tantalizing to pass up

@glaemay
as others have mentioned a lot of the more popular ps2 games ended up getting quite a few remasters or collections alongside a few games both popular or lesser known which are able to be purchased via psn (such as wild arms 3, dark chronicle, Rogue galaxy etc) while there are still those hoping on a Xenosaga trilogy remaster.

Overall the ps2 had an extremely strong library.

Though fortunately we have started to see more gamecube games making their way to switch.

Oh what horrible news!

Wait.. no it's not since I'm sure anyone with a Steam Deck, interest in emulation, and half a brain can figure out how to install it without using Steam.

I suppose I'll just play a few more Wii and GameCube games on my Steamdeck and PC, while wondering what implications this article actually has in real life.

@appleseedeon I'm not sure if this is actually true. Original NES games do not mention the cartridge is just a license to play. I think the same with SNES. This idea of it being a license emerged with internet downloads. I would like to see a Nintendolife article exploring this topic and answering some questions regarding laws in different countries and different decades.

@JohnnyMind perhaps because they could play the victim?

Not sure why anyone would be surprised by this , Nintendo is just doing what it always does and is trying to protect its brand and products. I also think it’s likely we’ll see Wii and GameCube games running on the next Nintendo hardware. There is no way Nintendo would ever let this get released.

@Sambuc yep we all need to stand together to give a game store $150 for the chance to play paper Mario

@Dr_Corndog Yeah well it makes the "preservationists" feel uncomfortable about their morale good action when the games they're playing for free are actually still available in shops.

@Sambuc ah man. Good luck.

You suggested people actually pay things instead of just getting them for free cos preservation and stuff.

(Or entitlement...)

Let’s be honest with ourselves, this thing was NEVER coming to Steam.

@Moistnado I'm sure you're right that they didn't start out this way. I learned about the license thing by reading the legal bits in my game manuals. Must have been around the GBC or GBA era, hard to recall exactly. I should bust out a GameCube or DS manual.

@RasandeRose Just want to clear this up, because when you say "They're still native low resolution", and keep using the word "upscaled", it sounds like you may have been using an upscaling device/technique, not actually playing in native HD/4K.

Taking 480p (or 480i!) output and blowing it up to fit your modern TV never works especially well. At best, you'll get jagged edges everywhere, and otherwise, things will be blurred or smeared.

By rendering in native HD using an emulator, the game is literally in HD, just like a remaster. Of course, all of the assets are the same (again, like most remasters), but many games from the 6th gen and later have surprisingly crisp textures that need HD rendering to really show up at their full quality. 480i on a CRT still looks good, I agree, but the texture detail fades away at a short distance.

@Dragonite89 Yeah but you're also missing out on a lot of other details that get lost when you're playing on something that's not a CRT. A lot of effects were done intending that you were playing on a CRT. That and there's always going to be a difference in responsiveness.

https://i.imgur.com/GD6pG7K.png

@KaiserGX CRT looks worse and darker imo, upscaled games on emulator just look better to me..

I can go over the same song and dance every time. But a lawyer actually went over the legal issues with ROMs and emulators in an entertaining way. Give it a watch!

He even discusses why Dolphin has a bunch of issues to get on Steam that go beyond what is discussed in the article: https://youtu.be/wROQUZDCIMI

For those also curious he did a two-part series discussing why Nintendo and Sega treat copyright differently and the legal pros and cons of those approaches. Super informative channel.
Sega: https://youtu.be/IwTXCwqurNQ
Nintendo: https://youtu.be/i13hrynnGNY

Outside of that... duh! I have no idea what Dolphin was thinking doing this considering the unofficial agreement Nintendo seems to have with them and other emulators. "we won't go after you legally if you keep your emulators underground and out of mainstream eyes." Nintendo never had gone directly after an emulator till Dolphin decided to break what seems to be an unspoken policy Nintendo seems to have with them.

@CharlieGirl Agreed. Even though a good 50% of the Gamecube's library is a license game which makes releasing them pretty difficult (major league sport, WWE, movie/TV/Toy tie-in or music game) I'm still not a fan of how little of it is currently available on modern hardware. Nintendo seems to be heading in the right direction with Pikmin 1+2 and Prime Remaster... but, I still can't fathom why they've not released the Pokemon Coliseum games, Thousand Year Door, or other games that would require very little work to actually get on the Switch.

Who knows... time will tell I guess.

Though yeah, not a smart move on Dolphin's part. Emulators are in a pretty legal murky grey zone... why put that target on something that Nintendo seems to be ignoring for the most part.

Hot take: good. Mainly because why does it need to be on steam? You’re still a rom hunter afterwards so is having it in steam really that much more convenient? This existed only to hurt them and I cannot believe they didn’t see that coming. They were on Nintendos hit list before but now they’re on their VIP hit list for sure.

@Dragonite89 I read through the post and it seems to be baked into the code, plus they spoke to a lawyer and it seems it wouldn't help. They have no plans to remove it

@smolsauce I just read the dolphin team’s blog, according to them their use of the Wii common key is exempted from copyright infringement law under 17 U.S.C. § 1201(f), if so I think they should challenge Nintendo in court to set a precedent that using and distributing such keys for emulators are legal, at least in the US.

No loss it is easy to emulate but hopefully nintendo figures out that people will emulate games like fe radiance instead of paying hundreds of dollars for a game. I only buy physical copies of old games I really enjoy that aren't super overpriced.

@Dr_Lugae I doubt that's the issue.

@Dragonite89 They should not do that. Emulators are in very shaky ground and most lawyers would say the current statuesque is the best case scenario. It is highly likely if emulators go to court they could be outright banned. So, if Dolphin goes to court they might not just be battling against Nintendo, but also parties to Nintendo (Capcom, Microsoft through Activision Blizzard, Atari, Sega, and dozens others).

There is no reason for them to pursue this legally for what is basically very little gain. Even the legality around emulation is questionable.

What you purpose is bad move written all over it.

@Wexter Why? It’s written in the law, it’s legal & exempted (in the US)…challenging them is the only way for us consumers to stand up for our rights & set up boundaries, which these companies like to overstep whenever they can, I don’t see anything wrong with that, and everything that’s exempted & in the gray area is legal and allowed unless it’s specifically written to be illegal.

@Dragonite89 Nintendo's argument is very narrow in scope so there is a high chance they win. However what is established is the ability to reverse engineer to make an emulator not the usage of one. And Dolphin did break the reverse engineering clause by using the Cryptographic keys themselves (it is why most Playstation emulators require you to use your own bios to avoid this very scenario). Have you watched the video I linked above? It goes into way deeper into the topic and the big trap Nintendo has setup for this very scenario.

@Wexter REally interesting!

@Dragonite89 I mean, they could but that would be costly, time-consuming, and stressful. Easier to keep moving forward and defend yourself if things get ugly. Even if they're not gonna remove the keys, they're not going to start anything either. Just maintain and move forward.

@Wexter Cryptographic keys are legal distinct from Bios, that's why there was a suit between Sony and George Hotz, which was settled out of court. The problem is not that the use of the keys is illegal but rather that there's been no legal precedent on the matter and neither Dolphin not Nintendo want to settle that in court. Right now, what Dolphin is doing is perfectly legal, but only because there's not been an official ruling on the matter. Now, Dolphin could go to court and win, securing legal protection for the keys, but they could also lose and make things harder not only for them but for all emulator developers. Same with Nintendo, if they lose then they cede quite a bit of ground to emulation so no-one wants to take their shot and risk missing so to speak.

@smolsauce not quite. Just because something has not been tested in court does not mean it's legal. At best it is legally grey as it's untested. The reason the keys are a concern is because they circumvent Nintendo's copy protection for their Wii games. This could be a major problem and why I mentioned how Playstation emulators avoid this trap by just not including stuff like that in the emulator. I used the example of the BIOS, but I could see how that can be confusing as they are two different things.

It's untested in court, but we can see. I just think it's a bad idea to try because of Nintendo's legal argument. They aren't arguing against emulation or even reverse engineering. They are just arguing that including the keys violate their copyright protection.