Nintendo Issues Mass DMCA Takedown, 379 Fan-Made Games Forcibly Removed

Welp, looking forward to the great debate again. I have lost count of how many times this debate will be held. =P

Although as the article points out, ad revenue for these games was probably the main culprit.

Gosh all other companies I know are chill but Nintendo just goes time to die.

Creators of fan games have to distance themselves from any sort of revenue stream. The solution is simple, remove your adverts and prove that you’re creating this fan game for fun, not to profit off Nintendo’s intellectual property.

Okay, someone in Nintendo needs to put a damn leash on the NOA legal team and yank it. They're getting completely out of control at this point.

Here we go again, why can’t Nintendo be cool with this kind of stuff like Sega is? 🙄

@nessisonett It really is that simple. But here come the "They did it because Nintendo hates its fans brigade"

Smash them all, Mario !

I know, Nintendo sucks etc. But you do have to wonder who would even start making a fan-made Ninetendo game these days when everyone knows this is exactly what’s going to happen to it, and there are plenty other games they could make instead.

@FroZtedFlakerZz Some random guy: Hey guys, look at this fan game I’ve been making for years that shows my passion for Nintendo games!
Nintendo of America: N O

@Folkloner That’s the thing, I normally side with the fans because I really do have a great love of these sorts of fan games (as long as they’re good) but this is a pretty open and shut case.

@SorridoSnake SEGA needs the Sonic fanbase for the franchise to survive. Nintendon't

How much bad news do you think your readers can take in one day?!

Yeah, this is kinda to be expected since they were making money of Nintendo's property without permission.

@Folkloner @nessisonett You're right. Try to have a Assassins Creed or Call of Duty fangame with revenues and see how long it survives. Somehow only Nintendo is hated tho.

Nintendo more like tom tillis

@SorridoSnake how about hey guys get permission from Nintendo and stop with ad revenue then you have more legit opportunty.

"Five Nights at Yoshi's" ok you know what they deserve that one, there is only one person benefitting from that......

I may lonely here-but I agree with Nintendo.

I always wonder what the actual creators of these franchises think about this issue.

@mattesdude yeah if I were to make a game with nintendo characters i would ask

So, um... this means that NCL is ready to release games using all those IPs, just as Samus Returns appeared after AM2R was targeted... right?

Right?

After long absences for stuff like, oh I don't know, F-Zero or Kid Icarus, I wouldn't want to think that their lawyers were more concerned with these franchises than the actual developers or management...

Pretty simple really. Nothing to do with revenue either. I wouldn't want my wife deepfaked into a porno and Nintendo dont want their creations being used outside of their remit. Why there's a debate is silly. If the geeky coders put their efforts into something of their own Nintendo wouldn't have to round up the Gestapo each time

I'll give the Nintendo Ninjas this round, these people were profiting off of Nintendo properties.

That would be the Add revenue.
I just wish Nintendo put half as much effort into making new games as they do hunting down the fans who are making content.

We should move to a system where fan produced art and media can legally be sold so long as its labeled fan made and the original creators share in the revenue.

Just like......make your own games with your own characters?

Five Night's at Yoshi's will be lucky to survive another 5 nights.

If you're ripping off assets and then putting ads in your games yeah... you kinda deserve it. I support Nintendo in discouraging this activity.

As much as I love Fan gamed ( i even review them) but they were making money off these fan games through ads so this time it seems fair. Nintendo do need to embrace fan games though, that Missing link one sounds awesome.

Here we go with the whining and crying...

@Slowdive Because it's Nintendo's intellectual property....

Oh yeah, that will totally work and get these things off the internet.

I sure hope Nintendo's lawyers enjoy their new boats, because nothing else of value is going on here.

@Slowdive But that goes both ways doesn't it? If the notion of owning 'intellectual property' goes away it means all the big established companies can just take anything they like from smaller people trying to make a start.

I'd have to look into this more, but if these projects were fan-made and free, and the site itself wasn't making money in some way from them, then I think this would be a case of Nintendo totally abusing its position and power. Fans can make free projects based on stuff they love so long as they ain't selling it or profiting from it in some way; that is part of the law. So, like I said, I don't know the exact details of how this has played out, but it seems a bit dodgy to me. Maybe the problem here is the site and not the fan projects themselves, and if so then I'd really like this to be made clear in articles like this so people don't get the wrong idea about their rights when it comes to creating fan works.

Edit: I dunno ... This looks like Nintendo is slightly twisting the use of the law to make people think something is a particular way in law when it actually isn't and getting all these fan projects shut down when in reality only the site is potentially breaking any copyright laws (but may actually not be since it's not the site creating these games but simply hosting them). So, yeah, maybe the site should be held accountable or wherever, but not the fan creators and their free projects. The fan creators aren't doing anything wrong though from what I can see, and there should be somewhere they can present their creations for others to appreciate for what they are without always having to fear a corporate giant shutting them all down in a kinda sneaky indirect and insincere way like this.

Maybe someone in the know needs to look into some legal basis and protection for fans being able to show off their works on some site without that site's independent advertising for profit and the like be linked with the games themselves, which are absolutely not being sold or monetized in almost all cases as far as I can tell. Because, I don't care what you think, Nintendo does not have the legal right to and absolutely should not be shutting down any and all free fan creations that use some of its artwork and the like.

@UmbreonsPapa sites this one are also effectively making money off of Nintendo's IP's so should these be shut down too?

I remember when Nintendo used to make games and not the opposite.

@Mr-Fuggles777 Are you referring to video game news sites like a NintendoLife or IGN? My assumption is that there probably exist clear, legal distinctions when it comes to journalism and what it covers and how that relates to a companies intellectual property. Otherwise, Entertainment Weekly, ESPN, or any other sites that covers these types of media wouldn't exist. I'd assume news media in general wouldn't exist. But I don't know, maybe someone with more knowledge of how that works would have a better understanding

It's a ***** thing to do, but I dunno, you gotta wonder if maybe them being so strict against fan content has helped the likes of the Mario franchise not become the cluttered mess that the Sonic fanbase has become, since it's the wild west over there. Of course we also wouldn't have Sonic Mania were it not for SEGA being so cool with their fans making their own games. I dunno, you see the best and the worst with fans creating their own games with the Sonic franchise, which makes it both a great argument for and against the practice.

I'd argue this is okay. People are making profit off of Nintendo's property, which isn't fair. If you want your "fan game" to last, just don't make profit off of it. Simple as that.

@UmbreonsPapa if it was a case that the fan made game sites have to be shut down because they are making money on the back of Nintendo IP'S then isn't the exactly what the news sites are doing.
I only come here to look at Nintendo products (and to chat in the comments) is that any different than the traffic generated to the ones getting shut down?

@Hmm the crappy thing is Nintendo has shut down non profit fan games in the past too though.

This is a pretty open and shut case in which I'd normally side with the creators otherwise HOWEVER, the iffy thing with this is that it still technically isn't the creators' faults since all they did was make the game.

Sites like Game Jolt are the ones that host the games to begin with and are making it look like it's the Devs fault when they're actually the ones puting the ads up.

Funny enough, they did this back in 2016, the same year they took down AM2R.

That’s a lot of games. :0

The article says they were making money from ad revenue so Nintendo are well within their right.

@Slowdive In a world of communal sense of property there is no incentive for companies to develop and innovate as they will just be snatched up. You are arguing against capitalism while saying you like the stuff companies create.

You want to avoid this? Create your own IP.

As long as I can still download Nude Punch-Out for the NES I'm fine

@SorridoSnake more like:
"Hey look at my Mario game It's made with pure passion...but ALSO look at these advertisements...and also you know...throw a little money my way..."

I think it's goes too far when people try to mix their fandom with a money-making venture. You can like Nintendo all you want but the moment you try and make money off Nintendo IP, you're no longer acting as a fan, you're acting as a business.

@MS7000 Generating ad revenue is precisely why NintendoLife loves posting these articles. Fortunately most of the ads I see are for Pure Xbox, and since I've never owned a Microsoft console and don't visit the site, I can hardly be accused of helping anybody profit from my own clicks.

Okay so i made an account to type this but

Everyone saying its ok because its in their legal right really needs to realise that legal and moral are two entirely different

Sure, they have the legal right. But what do they get out of it? It doesnt get them any money, it doesnt get them any sales, it doesnt get them better pr. The people making these games arent doing anythimg morally wrong just because the host website runs ads and makes money off of ads. Nintendo is doing something morally wrong by doing something that they have absolutely no motivation over aside from some weird corporate insecurity or bullying.

@Jaygold "But what do they get out of it?"

What happens is if they don't do this at all and leave it go on for too long they will eventually lose their TM as they didn't protect it enough which will mean that it will become public domain which means everyone can use nintendo's tm characters that they failed to protect.

Now I do agree on the Legal right and the morally right part but it is a double edge sword. I wish Nintendo would loosen up and let people make fan games but on the other side if they do they could end up losing the TM to characters.

@Jaygold Websites like Gamejolt have sections for fangames. They should disable adverts on games in those sections.

You're saying it's morally right for host websites to be able to make money off Nintendo IP as long at the uploaders aren't asking for money. Nintendo isn't doing anything morally or legally wrong in this case.

@Slowdive Stop with the notion that "Owning ***** Is Bad Cause of XXX Reasons"
If you made a game with characters in it, would you want someone using those very same characters in something like a porno, potentially giving people the wrong impression of your game and turning them away? Hell No.

Or would you be fine with them using said characters in their own game and making a ton of money off of it while you get nothing? Again, No.

Do you see the problem? You're nothing but an edgey 13 year old who wants to follow modern trends of hating companies and Capitalism; how about growing up?

When Nintendo starts taking down Pokémon ROM hacks that’s we we need to start worrying. All that stuff usually lives in small ad-free forums and Nintendo leaves them well alone. Even when the content is of poor quality or very inappropriate. You also can’t just click to play em. You need a rom, a patch program, and an emulator or flash card. Nintendo aren’t losing any sells to those folk and they leave em alone.
I seem to remember a popular Pokémon PC game a few years ago that was a pre-patched ROM in an executable file. Quick google search and you where there. Too easy. I think it got taken down real quick.

@JimmySpades I am not sure if you are referring to me mentioning ad revenue as to why Nintendo did these DMCAs, or if my comment is being interpreted as to why NintendoLife likes doing these articles. Whilst I am sure NintendoLife appreciate the clicks, I don't think they makes these articles for that purpose... definitely is convenient however.

@Dr_Lugae no, i also dont think its morally wrong though. Theyre a hosting website and they need the ad money for upkeep. I dont really consider it 'making money off of a nintendo product'
Its more 'running a website where people upload works inspired by or using nintendo ip where ads are used to keep it running' i dont think thats wrong. Its not like the creators are directly ripping assets either.

I stand with Nintendo ✊They were my childhood.

@SilentHunter382 i doubt it. So long as they stop people from monetizing content and using ripped assets and stuff. No one but corporations like nintendo ever worry or question these things, nintendo products will always be nintendo property and so long as people give nintendo credit for their ip in their fan works it should be fine and obvious that theyre creating something based on a nintendo ip.

@Dr_Lugae people arent trying to make money off of a nintendo ip though. The games creators dont get paid and the ad money goes to host site upkeep.

@Slowdive who pays the people who work there? They don't pay themselves and they aren't there for fun.

You are comparing a development style with Hades to a government structure. If you don't get that companies and money are what breeds creation but love companies and live off money youre just short sighted.

@Jaygold Most of them do rip the game assets, e.g. here's one that survived the removals but clearly uses NSMB2 assets:
https://gamejolt.com/games/NSMB2/567695

I don't think its right for a host site to be untouchable while making money off infringing content via advertising as long as they let someone else upload that content for them. That'd be an insane massive loophole that anyone could exploit, you could get free Nintendo fangames onto Xbox or Playstation that way.

I think it's reasonable for fangame creators or sites hosting fangames to just simply avoid making any kind of revenue via these games.

@Jaygold You can actually lose your ip if you don't fight for it.

"long as people give nintendo credit for their ip in their fan works it should be fine"

That only works for "Creative Commons" work which doesn't work for IPs owned by a company which have been filed for as TM. Creative Commons does have a sort of IP protection where people can't TM creations that have be created under CC since.

Example of a Creative Commons the SCP stories. That is under Creative commons which means people can create stories. You can use other peoples scps that they created and integrated into yours or even change aspects of the original creators work as long as you created them. You can even make games and sell them if you want aslong as all the peoples creations you used are credited.

Good I'm glad.why waste the time to make something you know will get taken down.why not spend your time makeing something new of your own creation and it womt get taken down

@BoyfriendOfDeath your wrong if people wouldn't steal Nintendos games then Nintendo couldn't shut them down it's that simple.

@Zaphod42 I'll call and bring that to Nintendos attention thank you

While I won't support creators who take assets/IP from Nintendo and profit off those, is there any instance of non-profit games not being taken down by Nintendo? I thought they strike down upon everyone.

Luckily, Super Mario War survived the onslaught.

@MS7000 AD revenue on the site, but not the games themselves. So, in shutting down the site for what may or may not be legit copyright grounds (the site itself didn't make any of these games of making money from them directly but simply hosted them and made its own money from advertising on the site, which is not the same thing at all imo), Nintendo has now also shut down hundreds of free fan-made games that may and probably do in fact have every right to exist under the law. Because it's not illegal to make a fan project that uses another companies assets when that project is not monetized in any way, and that does not include someone else somehow making money by using your free fan project in some.

@San_D It's hard to say with games but they shut down the "Fox in Space" Star Fox animation when they were explicitly asking for money to fund it on Patreon.

But once Nintendo shut down the patreon, Nintendo stopped chasing them once they stopped using the Nintendo branding. Even though they were still using the characters from Star Fox and still taking patreon donations, just not specifically for the animation.

I think it mostly comes down to branding, I think use of Nintendo's logos, trademarks and assets, anything that makes a fanwork resemble or appear to be an official product is probably the biggest red flag. Like all those Pokémon fangames which use the official Pokémon logo.

I'm not gonna pretend it's ok to use copyrighted material...let your game stand on its own.

Nintendo has to see all the demand for different and interesting games with their characters. Seems like making some would be a good idea, but maybe this will help. 🤷🏼‍♂️

@SorridoSnake i always thought a fan game was something like one they love. These people are clever enuff to make these copies, surely they can create there own characters as well. In the spirit of the game they love. Fans will know where they got there inspiration from with out fully ripping a game off.

I think it's best to compare these fangames that get taken down to Peta's Pokemon parody which has been up for years.

https://games.peta.org/pokemon-black-and-white-parody/

They change the Logo to 'Peta's Pokémon', the colour and tagline is different and the logo literally has a Pikachu chained up to it. So it can't really be confused with an actual Pokémon game. Despite using all Pokémon characters they avoid using any of Nintendo/The Pokemon company assets and use their own drawings. Also no adverts.

I'd wager most fanprojects get taken down because they try to make their fangame appear authentic or official by using all of Nintendo's branding and/or assets. When really fan creators should be trying to make it clear at first glance that their game isn't an official product. (and not just some small text when the player boots up the game or gets to the download page)

@nimnio

You can have her dude. It's like owning an Atari 2600 with no controller😂

@Jam78 This is one thing that frustrates me with several industries and the general public. People keep returning to what they know. So these people waste their talents on ripping off Nintendo IP, but if it someone survives long enough, people will be like "OMG, it's Mario! Ignore all these other indie platformers, I want THAT!" Different industry and on a different scale, this is always what inspires Hollywood to beat to death franchises like Transformers (people still keep going), and digging up then violating the corpses of classic franchises like Terminator and Star Trek. Unfortunately, the public rewards with behavior because they keep coming back (except in the case of the last Terminator).

If you make a game, use your own creations. It's THAT simple. These people would be able to even release their games on the Switch (etc) if they made their own characters, names, etc.

Nintendo must protect their trademarks because unlike copyright, trademark can become invalid if they don't protect it.

Meanwhile, I watched some new gameplay footage and trailers or some new Switch games on another site that I haven't seen here yet.

Yeah, this is Nintendo news, but why does actual game news take a backseat to these kinds of headlines?

Put these games on pirate bay. Once they’re torrents they really can’t stop them.

Same with those dsi ware games.

@Kamalen for the sonic franchise to survive they need the sonic fanbase?

I mean...obviously?

Nintendo create some great games, but they can be massive jerks with a 20th century attitude. An aggressive corporation that would ban 'unsanctioned' screenshots of their games if they could. Overzealous fanboys will defend the corporate and legal department of Nintendo because video games and Nintendo are their WHOLE identity.

A statistical analysis of the cross section of post with both use of “assets” in the icon and “fans should never re-use assets type opinions” in text would be revealing.

FanFiction V plagiarism/infringement are usually easy to distinguish in literature; I’m not familiar in gaming.

@Mr-Fuggles777 they do, hence why their games are some of the most beloved and highest quality. I wish these fans put half as much effort into creating their own IP as they do trying to steal someone else's.

@nintendork64 how many New games have Nintendo released in the 3 years the switch has been on the market?
We had a flourish in Y1 and then what? Even the sequels have been met by middling user reviews (AC, MTA and PM:OK) this gen.

@Doktor-Mandrake I think they mean that if Christian Whitehead wasn't a Sonic fan, there'd be no Sonic Mania. The last Sonic game to get widespread positive reception would have been Sonic Generations.

So Sega literally needed a Sonic fan to make a good Sonic game for them otherwise they'd have not released a good one in the last 10 years.

These stories bring me nothing but amusement, I do so enjoy reading the arguments

It's not a debate. You can't just take someone else's IP unless they give you permission. Nintendo is fully within their rights to say "no". That's it. That's a fact. You don't have to like it or agree. You can say 2+2=8 if you want. You're still wrong.

Personally I think Nintendo is shooting themselves in the foot by getting rid of free publicity and generating negative publicity. But it's their IP and their company.

@nessisonett but that revenue pays for the website which ends up keeping the game online and free

Some of these do Mario better than Nintendo.

@Slowdive what do you mean “we” don’t own anything? Anyone can create their own character, their own world, story, music, and they own it as it’s creator. And they get to choose what is or isn’t done with it. This isn’t a thing limited to “them” in the big corporations. It’s ludicrous to suggest that nobody should be able to own the things they create just so that some people can make Metroid fan games. Especially when those people could easily team up with creatives to create a new IP based on the same code and be absolutely fine and maybe even quite successful.

@Guitario That might be true and I sympathise but these fan projects need to be as far away from revenue generation as possible. That’s the only way they can really survive.

@nessisonett I 100% agree

If these were just silly and fun fangames that aren't making any money, then...they should be left alone? I dunno, the fan remakes/ports and all that stuff makes sense when Nintendo is trying to sell that game for the millionth time to this day. But yeah...fangames needs to be left alone...

@Mr-Fuggles777 that's a good point. I never thought of that

@nessisonett Do the creators profit off of Gamejolt or just the website itself?

At this point this is unsurprising, they should had seen this from miles away. At least Nintendo didn't come after the money this time.

@Jaygold this!

@nessisonett Yeah! Just like Pokemon Uranium and Another Metroid 2 Remak-oh wait

@MichaelHarvey Tell you what. You create a multi million company and then let your fanbase do whatever they want with your stuff without you doing anything to stop and see how it goes

You guys on here are worse then trump supporters.

it would be cool if nintendo made good games AND was a good company

I seriously can't stand nintendo when they do this stuff. Just let people make passion projects, it's not hard

@Folkloner because nintendo does, they have shown us they don't give a ***** about us

@TheFullAndy literally more than 50% of all fnaf fangames on gamejolt are just fnaf with a different series, and the whole point they were made was for the Passion of a series they love, and combining it with another series they love to make their own game.

Fan works just seem like a waste of talent to me, especially when they take it far enough in a new direction that they're only kneecapping it by putting the inspiration's name in the title instead of the description.

@LordlyConferer74

Sorry but someone just using a mixture of different existing IPs can never qualify as someone making their own game to me.

Make up your own stuff or GTFO.

@ancientlii They get a lot more attention than the average original indie game purely due to the IP on it rather than the quality. Which for official games is ok, Mario games get a lot of attention purely because Nintendo has carefully built up and maintained its reputation over the years.

But I've never liked when some guy uses Mario Galaxy Assets to create Peach's Castle and Bob-Omb Battlefield in Unreal Engine and then sites report "Look this fan is making Super Mario 64 in HD". Or someone uses the RPGMaker Pokémon Essentials and 95% GBA or DS Pokémon sprites and it gets reported "These fans are creating a new Pokémon game".

Most of the game isn't even their work, and the IP certainly isn't.

I'm beginning to loathe this pic.

Most of the times it's used, the news aren't good.

Dude. Nintendo is becoming so toxic. It's the last thing anyone needs right now.

@FroZtedFlakerZz Dumb, said like a true uneducated fool

Honestly, I think as long as the website can prove that all the money earned goes towards keeping the website alive (and nothing more) then it should be fine. Look at Wikipedia, begging people for money to keep the website up.

Piracy websites are a bigger issue.

I has a silly PuzzleScript game called Mini Mawio taken down on GameJolt because the 5x5 tiles looked a little too much like a famous plumber.

It's okay though.
The games are just getting hidden/unpublished. Not deleted.
Nintendo can stop GameJolt from distributing fan games, but they can't really demand that fans stop making them.

@impurekind True, but let Nintendo shut down all they want. Within days there'll be 1000's of sites hosting the content, so all Nintendo are doing is providing free advertising for the game makers, who aren't even impacting their revenue.

Now that Ultra 64 game development is truly kicking off the future is looking better for fans by the day.

Power to the people.

@Ogbert you miss the point... Of life.

@liveswired the point of life is not to create art but to take that of others and use it for your own?

If they weren't making any money at all I'd agree it would be dumb, but the website made money through ads.

Simply the case, fans games that make money from ad revenue or other means; those games get taken down. Of course, there is the case representation as well. Nintendo probably does not their property misrepresented from content NSFW. It is probably best not to make and publish a fan game in the first place as such a thing can bankrupt creators if they get more than a cease and desist.

@TheSmashTheorist Nintillis

I'll just chime in again with:
Nintendo should make a controlled site as a safe harbor and mutually beneficial promotional site hosting fan-made creations.

This way Nintendo could benefit with these actions:

1. Make it clear the projects are fan-made and not made by Nintendo or official — do not represent Nintendo, etc.
2. Direct visitors to the related official releases that Nintendo offers — links to the store.
3. Build goodwill towards Nintendo by displaying appreciation for the passion of the fan creators with quotes and background, etc.
4. Issue takedowns for those that avoid their reasonable alternative with much less damage to their brand.

@MS7000 Not that advertising or a lack there of has stopped them before.

@SilentHunter382 " which means everyone can use Nintendo's tm characters that they failed to protect." This is incorrect, as they would still have the copyrights on those characters and IPs, which is NOT revoked for not defending them in court and is always protected. Trademarks are also only weakened so much as they are "genericized" which wouldn't be the case with a game that uses their IPs. This is why many companies that are NOT Nintendo are able to turn a blind eye to fangames without much difficulty. It is also worth noting that fangames are no more or less legally protected as fanart or fanfiction, yet we've allowed both of those mediums to thrive while making every excuse in the book why fangames should be different. Rights holders can go after fanart and fanfiction the same way Nintendo does fangames, but they don't because they don't have to, and Nintendo doesn't have to with fangames either.

People are seriously using this article as their catch-all "proof" that a recreation of Mario's model from the movie made entirely from scratch is definitely going to get taken down. And yet to this day models-resource.com remains up with all its Nintendo assets, ripped and custom.