Cognition Dissemination: The Fear of Nintendo’s Bloodlust Is Palpable

It was difficult to understate how terrifying it was when Nintendo went after the yuzu emulator for Nintendo Switch. This began with the company filing a lawsuit in a case that would eventually find a resolution through the United States’ totally not corporate-friendly and definitely not corrupt federal court system. The outcome was bound to favor Nintendo, which explained why yuzu’s organizers at Team Yuzu and Tropic Haze were quick to settle with them. This sadly involved taking the emulator offline almost immediately after the settlement was announced, with the best way to emulate Switch titles vanishing in an instant.

It’s one matter to consider the reportedly inane way in which this saga started, with big Nintendo fans reporting the emulator’s existence to the large corporation themselves so frequently that they couldn’t have possibly ignored it. Truly goofy behavior. But it had an immediately chilling effect on other emulators for Nintendo hardware, including those the preservation and retro gaming communities needed the most. Citra emulator for 3DS was caught in the crosshairs of yuzu’s disappearance, the legal library for which was wiped out over a year ago, leaving no way to play games that remain exclusive to the platform. This effect, and the mere fear from it, were bound to spread across the internet.

Case in point: Garry’s Mod. The digital sandbox is removing all Nintendo-related materials from its workshop, per the notice posted on the Steam page. This news came after users noticed that Nintendo related materials had disappeared, with takedown threats coming from Nintendo.

“Honestly, this is fair enough,” the statement continued. “This is Nintendo’s content and what they allow and don’t allow is up to them. They don’t want you playing with that stuff in Garry’s Mod – that’s their decision, we have to respect that and take down as much as we can.” The statement let fans know how they can help by deleting their Nintendo-related uploads. They also asked that fans not reupload them.

This, it sure as hell seems, is the result of Nintendo tasting blood in the water following the yuzu drama and its further devastating effects on the emulation and overall PC scene, and needing more to feast on. It was clear from the moment the yuzu settlement and emulator deletion were announced how that wouldn’t be the end of it, with emulators and mod workshops across the internet taking notice. Nintendo knows how to use the internet now, and the modern company is very friendly to that thick red digital liquid. They hunger.

All that said, it’s not entirely clear whether these takedown notices came from Nintendo themselves. There’s suspicion that they came from yet another (or the same?) set of hardcore fans of the company (otherwise known as “fanboys”) who provided their own fake takedown notices to trick Garry’s Mod into thinking they were legitimate. I’ve been on the internet long enough to know that groups of fans would absolutely try something like this. If this is the case, they likely wrote takedown notices that were convincing enough that Garry’s Mod figured they were legitimate threats, and heeded the warning. It’s better to be safe and cautious in these matters.

That said, the only way to see if they were fake or not would be to check with Nintendo themselves. This, of course, would tip them off to this mod scene if they didn’t already know about it, enabling them to send a real takedown notice. This speculation is fun, but there’s a better chance of them being fully real here.

Another story from this week demonstrated how Nintendo remains, let’s say, traditional and conservative compared to other companies. Former Epic Games creative lead Donald Mustard confirmed in an interview with Game File (and reported by other sites that aren’t paywalled) that Samus from the Metroid™ series was indeed strongly considered for Fortnite. This was previously alluded to in court documents released as part of the legal battle between Epic and Apple. Nintendo was willing to let Samus be in Fortnite… on Nintendo platforms. They didn’t want the character to appear the game on competing platforms. This was a dealbreaker for Epic, leading to the collaboration not happening.

This is very much a Nintendo Thing®, as other first-party characters like Kratos and Master Chief from Sony’s God of War series and Microsoft’s Halo series, respectively, who both allowed them on multiple platforms. (Though Microsoft has been making a slow third-party shift in recent months.) Nintendo wants players to know they can only play games with characters like Samus and others on their platforms. It’s very conservative, but it’s also unlikely to hurt them in the current moment. Don’t expect them to relent here.

Just the same: They’ll keep tasting that digital blood on the internet and will maintain their desire to find more red meat in the form of more emulation and mod scenes. They’ve intentionally created this culture of fear and are maintaining their conservatism, and they won’t change until they get a financial penalty from it. That’s the way it’s always been, and will be.