Nintendo Sues Over R4 Cartridges
Source: Tom's Guide | Keywords: Nintendo, Lawsuit, R4, Revolution | Themes: Digital Entertainment, Business
Nintendo has reportedly filed a lawsuit in a Tokyo District court against 5 separate Japanese games companies, which they hope will prevent the sale of R4 cartridges and other similar accessories that allow users to pirate Nintendo DS software.
The R4 allows for the (admittedly legally dubious) practice of dumping bundles of games to a single cartridge, but it also enables homebrew gaming on the DS, which the Japanese company claims is costing them a considerable amount in revenue.
Nintendo isn’t the only company that wants to see R4 cards off the shelves. The DS manufacturer may be leading the lawsuit but there’s 54 other DS Developers that have jumped on the back of Nintendo’s bandwagon, some of the more notable being Capcom, Sega, Bandai Namco Games, Square Enix, Taito, Hudson and The Pokémon Company.
R4 cartridges are something that have been around for quite a while and Nintendo allegedly claims that up to 90-percent of people could be using these kinds of accessories to play pirated games on their DS.
Details of the lawsuit are not yet available and so, it is unclear how much Nintendo is asking for but we’re willing to bet the company will be asking for a lot, especially if they can prove that figure of 90-percent.
-
Previous News Article
John Carmack Says iPhone on... -
Next News Article
Kiss The Ground Goodbye - Martin...
90% is a bit much, they have to remeber that a lot of the DS systems are going to kids. and i have a feeling that kids don't really know how to pirate things to well.
Lol daft, bout to say the same thing. There is no one, I mean no one who owns a DS over the age of 12 cause it doesn't provide the caliber of games they want. No 9 year old would be able to pirate games on the DS.
Even if it was 90% of people using it for such reasons the fact remains that the cartridge in question can be used for legal purposes.
This would be no different than if they attacked blank media such as blank DVD's. I *could* pirate a game or movie onto it or do something as legal as back up my family photo's with my wife and son. Why punish the users who use it legally?
Its not the R4 cartridges makers fault the Nintendo even made it possible for pirates to use them on the DS.
LOL im 27 and i have had a DS for more than 2 years now and my other friends the same age as me and even older have the DS too. We always have mario cart multiplayer. The PSP just plain sucks compared to the DS but that talking about its games and not ability to mod them
^its more of the fact that the cartridge is used explicitly for that purpose.
It was already stated that the 90% statement was a misunderstanding. It its till high though considering nintendo is suing the people behind the R4.
I wonder when they will be going after M3 ? Anyway the best thing about having one of these flash carts is that you can turn your DS into a nice portable media device for music and movies (amazingly a full two hour movie converts into like 200mb's so even a 2GB card can hold a few and tons of MP3's)
My experience is that yeah you can use them to play the pirate but they also allow for sooo much more.
I am not so sure about kid has no knowledge about pirate game part.
Everyday there are at least 10 people come in my friend's computer shop and ask if he carries R4 card (There are few Chinese game store in the mall.) and 50% of them are kids (Usually company with their parents)
Just because the R4 allows you to pirate games doesn't mean it's telling you to pirate games. I use my R4 to play music, and some homebrew games. That's not illegal, right?
I'll admit I have 1 game on my R4, but I have an original copy of that said game.
Nintendo should go after the people who make the pirated games available for download/sharing/etc. Not everyone knows how to dump a ROM anyway. They can also contact download sites like MegaUpload, RapidShare, FileFactory, etc. to have pirated games removed.
In short, Nintendo is going after the wrong company. They should devote their time and energy eliminating the pirates and leave the R4/M3/Supercard alone.
Can I make a prediction? - When Metallica and co sued Napster for their hand in piracy they won the battle and basically destroyed a company. Soon afterward P2P programs like limewire and torrent software evolved into doing exactly what Napster did - help piracy.
Now if Nintendo and co smash R4 developers then I can't see how they are able to stop the technology from continuing - CycloDS, Supercard, AceKard, Top Toy - all of these cards offer the same opportunities as the R4.
So my prediction is that Nintendo will have some success in breaking R4's financials but will end up still losing more of their own money from the masses of pirates that go unscathed.
I think this is bad. Not for the company but for Nintendo. I think ANY kind of advertisement for the device is bad. Why? Well, let's just say "ignorance is bliss" when they read this, certain people will think "Wow I can just download games into my DS using this? I'm gonna buy it!"
stridervm - I agree completely! I never downloaded a single MP3 in my life until I heard about a little P2P tool called Napster... like a week later I had to buy a couple external hard drives to satisfy my craving for more more more music!
That's kind of like a casino announcing "Don't play the Slots in row 4, they are broken and WILL payout huge $$$! Please don't play!"