I think the people who are saying that Switch piracy is fine because Nintendo are a big, faceless corporate body need to remember that the vast majority of games in the Switch's library are neither published nor owned by Nintendo. Most Switch games are third party releases, and many of those games are from small, independent studios who absolutely cannot absorb the costs of piracy like the industry's big players can. Times are tough and we should be supporting creators, not defunding them.
Emulation is a vital tool for preserving legacy systems, but we need to use it wisely. Citra being caught in the crossfire here is an ominous sign of what the future of emulators and their creators could hold if we continue to used them for the piracy of commercially active platforms instead of the preservation of the discontinued ones.
This seems to be a hot topic since the Switch came out, but it's nothing new for Nintendo at all. They've long since blocked / given developers the option to block copying saves.
Two examples that immediately spring to mind are F-Zero GX and Sonic Adventure 2 Battle on GameCube, both of which have saves files that cannot be copied onto another memory card. And, whilst I can't name titles of the top of my head, I've come across the same limitation trying to backup certain Wii saves to SD card. It seems to be a case of the internet only latching onto the practice recently though. Makes me wonder if all of these people going on about how important backups supposedly are to them ever actually tried backing up their save data in the past, or if they're just jumping on the latest bandwagon of internet rage...
That being said, I suppose more games with trading and online components these days means that the practice of locking saves is perhaps more prevalent on the Switch than Nintendo's past systems? I can't say as I'd really know as I don't play online games and the single player experiences I tend to go for probably don't tend to fall fowl of the issue...
I had a NES controller die on me back in the day. I kept that controller in a drawer for 20 years, at which point I realised I had to the tools and skills to attempt to fix it. Turns out the Toshiba parallel to serial chip in the controller was fried and it was a simply matter to solder in an off-the-shelf replacement.
@Realnoize I'll accept that SD cards can be fragile, but they're also easily backed up. The Wii doesn't use any special file systems, just normal FAT16B/FAT32. In fact, Nintendo give you instructions on their website on how to copy the contents of your SD card to a PC, so that you can then copy it onto a another, larger SD card for those who want to upgrade the storage in their Wii / 3DS. All of my Wii and 3DS digital games are saved on SD card, which I then have backup up to both my NAS and Google Drive cloud storage. I've worked in sys admin roles in the past and can't stress enough to anyone how important it is to keep good backups!
@Yorumi Haha, well I would say from my perspective that it would cost more than you would think, but you can only speak from your own experiences and I can only speak from mine. I would suggest that security is less of an issue for a game’s server, as opposed to a servers that deal in e-commerce. The truth (presumably) is that neither of us know what backend technologies Nintendo is using for the Wii Shop Channel service, and what challenges they may or may not face in its continued maintenance.
A former employer of mine had a legacy product that ran on the Microsoft Access 2003 Runtime. This started to have minor compatibility issues when Windows 7 was released, so we realised that we had should upgrade to the Access 2010 Runtime to future-proof the product against the next version of Windows. In theory, the 2010 runtime is 100% backwards compatible with code written for 2003. In practice, 2010 broke the product entirely. The company hadn’t scheduled to perform major work on this product, so they had no choice but to employ to extra contractors for six months – and by this time it was hard to find people still working in classic VB, rather than VB.net. It ended up being a massive expense, both in time and money, for the company, but it was an investment that they were willing to make because this product was still generating millions in revenue each year. Unfortunately my former colleagues tell me that the same thing happened with the move from Access 2010 to the Access 2016 Runtime more recently…
You may consider the expense to a business the size of Nintendo to be negligible, but the reality is that businesses want to see a return on investment for every single penny spent – if not they are going to have questions to answer with their shareholders and investors. In the cold, calculating world of capitalism who is going to invest money in a company that spends money on legacy services that generate no revenue whatsoever? It’s not evil or scummy, that’s trying to humanise something inanimate. A business is nothing more than a system, a collection of rules and procedures, designed to generate maximum return for minimum investment.
It’s also worth bearing in mind that Nintendo has already stopped support for the Wii hardware; it’s been some time since Nintendo would repair an original Wii. You could also argue that keeping a few spare parts in stock and keeping their technicians trained on older products would be of negligible cost, but all companies drop support for older products once it’s beyond economic sense to do so (OK, not all, Miele don’t). This applies to both hardware and software; it's nothing new or unusual here, it's just that we're now entering an era where we're seeing it being applied to digital rather than physical products. The 3DS is still profitable; therefore it’s still supported, whereas the failure of the Wii U meant it was killed off pretty quickly. Also consider how the NES and SNES were killed off in Europe before we even got the redesigned “slim” models, but they did so well in Japan that both were still in production until 2003.
And keep in mind that the ability to re-acquire a product is a benefit of digital over physical. I said in a previous post that Nintendo would never replace a disc or cartridge that you previously discarded on the basis that you’d paid once before, but would replace a digital copy that you’d discarded. Once the re-download ability is gone, we just have to be as careful with our digital copies as we do with the physical, because neither are going to be replace free of charge should we lose them.
@Yorumi Unfortunately it's a little more complex than this. The Wii Shop Channel is likely built on outdated technologies which may not longer be receiving security updates nor compatibility updates for newer operating systems and hardware. Keeping the existing servers online would potentially be as bad an idea as using a Windows XP PC for your online shopping these days. To keep the service running on a modern infrastructure would require regular investment and maintenance which wouldn't be feasible for a service that is no longer generating enough income to cover that.
I think this whole digital vs physical thing is just swings and roundabouts. People have been brought up on physical though, and working around its disadvantages is so ingrained into us that many people don't see them as a result.
The ability to re-acquire a copy of the software after the initial purchase is a massive benefit over physical, and the loss of that ability of not a disadvantage over physical in any way. Up until now, if I throw away my Wii Shop titles by deleting them I can go back to Nintendo and get another copy. If I throw away a physical Wii game I can't go back to Nintendo and say "Hey, I bought this once already, so please give me another disc free of charge!"
My physical Wii games are stored securely on my shelves and my digital Wii games are stored securely on my SD card - which is also backed up to my Google Drive. I don't intend on ever having to go back to Nintendo to re-acquire any of them.
The massive disadvantage of digital is the fact that you can't sell/purchase games second-hand (but that's a separate issue from no longer being able to re-acquire past downloads). I can fully understand why that would be a showstopper for a lot of people though.
Comments 7
Re: Reaction: Nintendo's Switch Emulator Fallout Is Shocking Only Because It Took This Long
I think the people who are saying that Switch piracy is fine because Nintendo are a big, faceless corporate body need to remember that the vast majority of games in the Switch's library are neither published nor owned by Nintendo. Most Switch games are third party releases, and many of those games are from small, independent studios who absolutely cannot absorb the costs of piracy like the industry's big players can. Times are tough and we should be supporting creators, not defunding them.
Emulation is a vital tool for preserving legacy systems, but we need to use it wisely. Citra being caught in the crossfire here is an ominous sign of what the future of emulators and their creators could hold if we continue to used them for the piracy of commercially active platforms instead of the preservation of the discontinued ones.
Re: Fan Petition Asks Nintendo To Allow Backup Game Saves In Animal Crossing: New Horizons
This seems to be a hot topic since the Switch came out, but it's nothing new for Nintendo at all. They've long since blocked / given developers the option to block copying saves.
Two examples that immediately spring to mind are F-Zero GX and Sonic Adventure 2 Battle on GameCube, both of which have saves files that cannot be copied onto another memory card. And, whilst I can't name titles of the top of my head, I've come across the same limitation trying to backup certain Wii saves to SD card. It seems to be a case of the internet only latching onto the practice recently though. Makes me wonder if all of these people going on about how important backups supposedly are to them ever actually tried backing up their save data in the past, or if they're just jumping on the latest bandwagon of internet rage...
That being said, I suppose more games with trading and online components these days means that the practice of locking saves is perhaps more prevalent on the Switch than Nintendo's past systems? I can't say as I'd really know as I don't play online games and the single player experiences I tend to go for probably don't tend to fall fowl of the issue...
Re: Poll: Have You Ever Had Problems With Nintendo Hardware?
I had a NES controller die on me back in the day. I kept that controller in a drawer for 20 years, at which point I realised I had to the tools and skills to attempt to fix it. Turns out the Toshiba parallel to serial chip in the controller was fried and it was a simply matter to solder in an off-the-shelf replacement.
Re: Reminder: The Wii Shop Channel Closes This Month, Here's What That Means For You
@Realnoize I'll accept that SD cards can be fragile, but they're also easily backed up. The Wii doesn't use any special file systems, just normal FAT16B/FAT32. In fact, Nintendo give you instructions on their website on how to copy the contents of your SD card to a PC, so that you can then copy it onto a another, larger SD card for those who want to upgrade the storage in their Wii / 3DS. All of my Wii and 3DS digital games are saved on SD card, which I then have backup up to both my NAS and Google Drive cloud storage. I've worked in sys admin roles in the past and can't stress enough to anyone how important it is to keep good backups!
Re: Reminder: The Wii Shop Channel Closes This Month, Here's What That Means For You
@Yorumi Haha, well I would say from my perspective that it would cost more than you would think, but you can only speak from your own experiences and I can only speak from mine. I would suggest that security is less of an issue for a game’s server, as opposed to a servers that deal in e-commerce. The truth (presumably) is that neither of us know what backend technologies Nintendo is using for the Wii Shop Channel service, and what challenges they may or may not face in its continued maintenance.
A former employer of mine had a legacy product that ran on the Microsoft Access 2003 Runtime. This started to have minor compatibility issues when Windows 7 was released, so we realised that we had should upgrade to the Access 2010 Runtime to future-proof the product against the next version of Windows. In theory, the 2010 runtime is 100% backwards compatible with code written for 2003. In practice, 2010 broke the product entirely. The company hadn’t scheduled to perform major work on this product, so they had no choice but to employ to extra contractors for six months – and by this time it was hard to find people still working in classic VB, rather than VB.net. It ended up being a massive expense, both in time and money, for the company, but it was an investment that they were willing to make because this product was still generating millions in revenue each year. Unfortunately my former colleagues tell me that the same thing happened with the move from Access 2010 to the Access 2016 Runtime more recently…
You may consider the expense to a business the size of Nintendo to be negligible, but the reality is that businesses want to see a return on investment for every single penny spent – if not they are going to have questions to answer with their shareholders and investors. In the cold, calculating world of capitalism who is going to invest money in a company that spends money on legacy services that generate no revenue whatsoever? It’s not evil or scummy, that’s trying to humanise something inanimate. A business is nothing more than a system, a collection of rules and procedures, designed to generate maximum return for minimum investment.
It’s also worth bearing in mind that Nintendo has already stopped support for the Wii hardware; it’s been some time since Nintendo would repair an original Wii. You could also argue that keeping a few spare parts in stock and keeping their technicians trained on older products would be of negligible cost, but all companies drop support for older products once it’s beyond economic sense to do so (OK, not all, Miele don’t). This applies to both hardware and software; it's nothing new or unusual here, it's just that we're now entering an era where we're seeing it being applied to digital rather than physical products. The 3DS is still profitable; therefore it’s still supported, whereas the failure of the Wii U meant it was killed off pretty quickly. Also consider how the NES and SNES were killed off in Europe before we even got the redesigned “slim” models, but they did so well in Japan that both were still in production until 2003.
And keep in mind that the ability to re-acquire a product is a benefit of digital over physical. I said in a previous post that Nintendo would never replace a disc or cartridge that you previously discarded on the basis that you’d paid once before, but would replace a digital copy that you’d discarded. Once the re-download ability is gone, we just have to be as careful with our digital copies as we do with the physical, because neither are going to be replace free of charge should we lose them.
Re: Reminder: The Wii Shop Channel Closes This Month, Here's What That Means For You
@Yorumi Unfortunately it's a little more complex than this. The Wii Shop Channel is likely built on outdated technologies which may not longer be receiving security updates nor compatibility updates for newer operating systems and hardware. Keeping the existing servers online would potentially be as bad an idea as using a Windows XP PC for your online shopping these days. To keep the service running on a modern infrastructure would require regular investment and maintenance which wouldn't be feasible for a service that is no longer generating enough income to cover that.
Re: Reminder: The Wii Shop Channel Closes This Month, Here's What That Means For You
I think this whole digital vs physical thing is just swings and roundabouts. People have been brought up on physical though, and working around its disadvantages is so ingrained into us that many people don't see them as a result.
The ability to re-acquire a copy of the software after the initial purchase is a massive benefit over physical, and the loss of that ability of not a disadvantage over physical in any way. Up until now, if I throw away my Wii Shop titles by deleting them I can go back to Nintendo and get another copy. If I throw away a physical Wii game I can't go back to Nintendo and say "Hey, I bought this once already, so please give me another disc free of charge!"
My physical Wii games are stored securely on my shelves and my digital Wii games are stored securely on my SD card - which is also backed up to my Google Drive. I don't intend on ever having to go back to Nintendo to re-acquire any of them.
The massive disadvantage of digital is the fact that you can't sell/purchase games second-hand (but that's a separate issue from no longer being able to re-acquire past downloads). I can fully understand why that would be a showstopper for a lot of people though.