Everyone in the emulation scene can breathe a sigh of relief.
The main link is to the motion paper. This is the link to the actual agreed-upon final judgment and injunction:
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.rid.56980/gov.uscourts.rid.56980.10.1.pdf
In short, Yuzu agreed to stop developing and distributing the emulator, cannot distribute source code, assign it to a new entity, encourage any IP violations, and must surrender their domain.
The findings also include admissions that the purpose of the Yuzu software was “primarily” designed to circumvent technical measures in violation of the DMCA.
So it appears Yuzu didn’t “win” in any real sense. Nintendo got a chilling amount of damages, effectively their full injunction, and also some agreed-upon “findings of fact” that may serve Nintendo in future litigation to justify claims that emulators are “primarily” designed to circumvent technical measures and circumvent the DMCA.
This is bad.
Its bad for Yuzu/Tropic Haze. But it is “not bad” for emulation as a whole because there was no legal precedent.
If nintendo decides to continue to strong arm emulator teams into shutting down that is going to be really bad. But that is ALSO when activist orgs tend to get involved and foot the bill/provide lawyers because they want the precedent that prevents those kinds of lawsuits.
You think Nintendo is just going to stop? They can get an easy couple of million now by going after anyone with an emulator. I’m sure they could even go after discontinued console emulators too now they have a shitty service to play their old games.
No they can’t get an easy couple million from any emulator lol, only from emulator developers making millions of dollars from their emulator…which is basically only Yuzu.
Google Gary Bowser if you think not affording it means Nintendo won’t go after them
If they settled that quickly, their lawyers must have told them they’d have gotten fucked six days to Sunday. Obviously this isn’t good for Yuzu, but if the settlement is only monetary, that means they can continue development (minus whatever detail Nintendo considered too far, probably the keys thing).
Overall this is probably the least bad outcome.
Edit: apparently it’s more than just money, they’re shutting down: https://www.theverge.com/2024/3/4/24090357/nintendo-yuzu-emulator-lawsuit-settlement
Given that it’s GPL software, though, I expect someone else will pick it up before too long.
Edit2: also looks like this is a recent repo fork: https://github.com/archive-nexus/yuzu
Im not a lawyer, but is this really good news? Isnt this just setting a precedent that Nintendo can shake down any emulator developer for ~2.4m any time they feel like it? So small developers are basically screwed?
Isnt this just setting a precedent.
Not a legal precident, it was settled which means there was no ruling.