Topic: The Ethics of Emulation and ROMs (edited)

So, I was watching a a few videos on the subject on emulators and it's what got me in to the emulation and ROM scene and made me realize what a grey area those topics are in rather than them being morally wrong because "insert corporate legal clause here".

But what do you ladies and gents think about the topic in general? Do you think it's morally wrong to emulate an old game or do you think not? Let me know below; Just keep things civil, aight?

Well, it's OK to discuss ROMs and hacking if your staff here, but if your not then it's not ok to discuss.

@Tasuki Oh, so it's "rules for thee, but not for me", got it. What is this, reddit?

I honestly was wanting a thoughtful and mature conversation, which I thought this website was about, that would answer questions people would have about the ROM and emulation scene and enlighten them, but if the staff are too afraid of free and thoughtful public discussion on controversial topics that might ruffle a few feathers that might teach them something, and would rather gatekeep the fragile few, then I guess I expected too much from this site and its community.

How dare those evil staff members come in to ruin the thread. I mean, the discussion so far has been so delightful.

@Link-Hero So then explain to why when I did try to start threads discussing emulation that they were shut down.

https://www.nintendolife.com/users/Tasuki/topics

?

@kkslider5552000 There were years ago. I probably deleted them or they got lost in time. I was told once by a mod and did bring it up again.

@SeantheDon29 Is this your first time using a comment section on the internet? There are no honest and mature discussions.

@kkslider5552000 /.?

"years ago" you do understand forum rules can change over time right?

@tseliot Hey, I can dream can't I?

@Link-Hero I couldn't agree more. I always dabbled around the idea of emulation when I was younger, but couldn't because I thought it was too big a task to understand until just recently when I was browsing Amazon and spotted a handheld emulator and just had to have it when come to find out after I bought it, it really wasn't that hard once I looked up a few tutorial videos and the skies the limit ever since.

Unfortunately, i feel that most people are either ignorant of what emulation actually is or blindly listen to big corporations like Nintendo that tell them that it's illegal, even though it's been proven in court that it's perfectly legal, though those corporations will still stubbornly tell you that it isn't, i.e. Nintendo.

Just doing a little googling and came across this. Would be interested in hearing any counterpoints (@SeantheDon29, you seem to have a pretty strong opinion in this argument).

https://www.howtogeek.com/262758/is-downloading-retro-video-g...

Edit: the link provides some hypothetical situations and how most of it is legally interested (at least in the US) outside of running a site that shares the ROMs.

My entire opinion is "no one should care". You can decide to use them. Or not. Don't care.

I myself go back and forth. Outside of an NES video series I've done (which I've barely touched outside of making those videos), most of the games I've emulated I have owned at some point, and occasionally still do. (I even bought Megaman Legends on PS3 after playing MM64 on emulator despite having bought MM64 back in the day, and having not even sold it, I just lost my copy) I do my best to support games, but between how little of these old systems' games are easily purchase-able online and my lack of interest in buying most of them even if I had no other choice...eh. My old laptop can't even do DS well, not sure this one can either, so its all old stuff anyway.

If I ever bother to care, my take would more specifically go towards "game preservation is good, the rest is a victimless crime at worst, probably".

The way i figure it as long as the game is no longer being sold at regular stores and there's not really a legal way to purchase it in your country then why not emulate? I have alot of roms on various machines but most of them i do own physical copies. The ones i don't I'm like hey if you want me to pay then make it available to purchase and i will. In the case of Mother 3 yeah i have a repo cart but only because it's literally the only way i can play it. No legit american version was ever released. I've paid for plenty of games and i will continue to do so but if i gotta emulate and it's the only way so be it.

This site seems to have no issues reminding us daily how easy it is to hack roms, patch roms and even going so far as to provide us with the links to said patches and hacks so if that's not giving us the go ahead i don't know what is.

Just don't try to make a profit off the roms and don't host a website that distributes them. Keep it to yourself and you're good. Nobody is being hurt that way and the cops aren't going to go randomly door to door and be like scuse me sir or madam, We were just in the neighborhood and we wanted to know if you've been downloading any roms lately? LOL they got better things to do trust me.

@SeantheDon29 I fully support emulation, the only time I don't like doing it tho is when you can indeed for a fact buy it, Like B&K, you can buy both games on the pc or from rare replay so When I found that out I felt bad for emulating it as it felt like stealing. I will go out of my way to emulate it if you can't buy it anymore, I mean why the hell shouldn't I, its not like there selling it, and even if I did buy it off of ebay or something, they would be the ones getting the money, not the company, so in my eyes I don't see anything wrong with it.

@SeantheDon29 I also heard once from this guy (Can't remember who) but he said that the gaming world had made a mistake in not being open to emulation, instead they pushed it away, and now, they not only make no money of off it, but people are also playing there games as a result, going on to say that the gaming scene should have used it when it was brought up, but didn't.

Emulation is legal, Nintendo use it themselves with Virtual Console, Mini NES and SNES, Super Mario 3D All-Stars and more. So discussing it should be more than acceptable.

I’ve emulated one or two games but only games I own in an official capacity. I don’t even use my gaming PC much so running Dolphin is a strange and rare thing for me. I’ve managed to beat the first dungeon of Twilight Princess (GameCube) with a keyboard. It was a very proud moment indeed.

Also managed to play a bit of Xenoblade Chronicles with a similar setup. The full camera controls made thing a tad confusing but ah well.

@SeantheDon29 Don’t wanna be that guy but he was joking. I’ve never read something of malice from @Eel, easily in the last year, which is when I joined.

@Snatcher Or old abandonware for that matter, especially for titles that are 10+ years old and should be public domain as per copyright laws.