Valve never caves and Nintendo doesn’t relent. As the two gaming behemoths collided because of the planned release of Dolphin, a popular open-source emulator for GameCube and Wii games, on Steam, Nintendo got a big “W”. All it took was a cease-and-desist order from the Japanese gaming giant, claiming the emulator violates the company’s intellectual property rights under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
Although if we’re being technical, it wasn’t Valve that lost. Rather, it was the team behind the Dolphin emulator.
Here’s an excerpt from the official announcement on the company’s website:
We were notified by Valve that Nintendo has issued a cease and desist citing the DMCA against Dolphin’s Steam page, and have removed Dolphin from Steam until the matter is settled. We are currently investigating our options and will have a more in-depth response in the near future. We appreciate your patience in the meantime.
The Dolphin team planned to release the emulator on Steam within this quarter but it’s indefinitely postponed due to Nintendo’s DMCA notice, which is why its Steam page is no longer up.
The main issue pointed out by Nintendo’s DMCA notice has something to do with Dolphin’s source code containing the Wii Common Key, which is used to decrypt Wii game discs. As per data miner, LuigiBlood, and further corrected by MVG, a game developer, this isn’t new.
Several others have warned about the potential copyright issues the emulator could face if it launched on Steam.
However, the Dolphin team clarifies that interested users can still download the emulator from other locations outside of Steam.
Apparently, the Dolphin Emulator Project team didn’t receive any DMCA notices directly from Nintendo. While this doesn’t mean the developers are in the clear, it’s not doing anything illegal by making the emulator available on its website and GitHub. However, it’s worth noting that other kinds of emulation software like RetroArch are still on Steam.
If nothing else, this situation has only served to highlight the grey areas in the copyright law regarding emulation and how any legal decision could set a precedent that could affect emulation broadly.
Speaking of Nintendo baring its legal teeth, dBrand is still walking around and trolling the company after releasing a Zelda-esque skin for the Nintendo Switch.
