It is an understatement to say that Nintendo has been engaging in a war on piracy. There are now 2 new examples of the company’s latest attempts to put an end to piracy. One of them, Nintendo says, is a Nintendo Switch modder enabling piracy. Another is the moderator of a Nintendo piracy Reddit group.
It has been confirmed that Nintendo is suing Ryan Daly, a modder who Nintendo claims runs a company called Modded Hardware. According to Nintendo’s lawsuit, they warned Daly in March to cease selling modded Switch consoles and MIG switches, which was enabling people to play pirated Switch games on unmodded hardware. Daly is also accused of offering a mail-in service where customers could send in their Switch consoles so they could be modded and receive pre-installation of pirated games. Nintendo alleges that Daly agreed to stop, but continued his activities anyway. Nintendo is accusing Daly of 6 charges, including copyright infringement and “trafficking in circumvention devices”.
Nintendo is also suing James Williams. Nintendo is accusing Williams of being “operator, overseer, and driving force behind several Pirate Shops, through which Defendant has offered massive libraries of pirated Nintendo Switch games”. Williams was also a moderator for the r/SwitchPirates group on Reddit, where he used the name Archbox and, according to Nintendo, became a place where Williams would direct users to his pirate shops, as well as providing technical advice on how people can mod their Switch consoles and play pirated games.
The lawsuit also says that Williams has openly acknowledged that what he was doing was illegal, and even says that he has openly called himself a “pirate” who refuses to pay for Nintendo’s games. Nintendo’s lawsuit says that Williams ran 4 pirate shops. Only 1 of them is still active. Nintendo is seeking financial damages for Williams, as well as an order to shut down his remaining pirate shops and associated social media accounts.
The comments here will be a good test of people who read the article vs people who just read the headline.
Wow, somehow I got to the comments before all of the piracy apologists. That’s new.
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
Is this a thing with you now?
Arrghh!!
I know there will be a load of comments on this page soon because of the whole piracy of companies like Nintendo.
Sounds like they deserve what they get.
knew what he was doing and got caught, next!
Sometimes that struggle be real
Donkey Kong country returns HD isn’t Nintendo’s own version of piracy 🏴☠️
I don’t see the mods as a problem, but preinstalling pirated games for the customer is a nono
Fair I guess
Hmm… I feel like he should’ve just kept his services only at console modding since on paper there’s nothing wrong with that. Providing installed nsp/xci files on Switch consoles was the big boneheaded move here.
They only get what they deserve, piracy is a scourge whether for companies or consumers but only the blind and the narrow-minded don’t see it
And I’m sure we’ll still see stupid comments like “it’s shameful what Nintendo is doing” or “they don’t have the right !!”
i like how you nintendo whiteknights are talking to a huge brickwall about ”the guys defending piracy” when in reality none of us approve the piracy of recently released titles for the switch, lmfao
Nintendo white knights on a Nintendo focused news site. Duh. You’re not very bright eh? Kotaku is your place if you want to bash Nintendo without restraint lmao.
y-you do understand that you can be a nintendo fan without being their servant ready to defend every decision made by them right?
It’s not about whether they’re legally right or wrong.
It’s about them being so extra and dickish. Meanwhile, we’re still being fed crap, yet all their efforts go into ruining the lives of the little guy.
Nintendo giving out warnings for THIEVES who are STEALING property isn’t dickish, it’s polite. They’re not ruining the little guys lives, the dumbass THIEVES are ruining their own lives. It doesn’t matter what you think about Nintendo, the simple fact is a POS THIEF is STEALING what doesn’t belong to them and YOU are trying to defend THEFT. Grow up you ignorant POS.
“Switch Pirates, NekoTits”.
What’s up with these names?
See this? This is where I side with Nintendo. Getting games without paying for them is bad enough but to go so far as to actually charge for it is so far over the line that they are begging to be punished.
Now this is the type of mod worth going after, not gameplay mods of games people already bought & paid for.
Yea because nintendo hasnt overcharged for games for the last 35 years.. i think 35 years is a good enough run… let the people enjoy themselves. Nintendo has made hundreds of billions of dollars..