Gameranx reported recently that Russian website VK Play has been offering Nintendo games such as The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and Animal Crossing: New Horizons through Yuzu- according to their source, an X user by the name of Pirat_Nation.
Following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, many international companies such as Nintendo, as well as payment services Visa and Mastercard, have ceased, or at least limited, operations in the country. Because of this, physical Nintendo Switch games no longer ship to Russia, and the country’s Nintendo eShop has been put under maintenance.
VK Play was confirmed to have links to a cloud server for both The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and Animal Crossing: New Horizons, but other games, and from other companies, may also be hosted on the platform illegally. If Pirat_Nation is correct in their post, then it would mean that the cloud connects to a server farm running the game through Yuzu.
(Earlier this year, Yuzu agreed to pay Nintendo $2.4 million in damages, and per that agreement, all Yuzu emulators were to be taken down, along with their copies.)
X users noted that the game listings on the site had been removed since Pirat_Nation’s post, but Gameranx confirmed that, as of this writing, they were still up. As proof, they provided a screenshot of the page for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, which can be seen below, translated through Google Translate:
VKontakte, the social media website that runs VK Play, has been subject to lawsuits at home and abroad, and can be traced to the Kremlin. Its CEO, Vladimir Kiriyenko, is sanctioned by the United States, United Kingdom, and the European Union in relation to the war, and a majority of its shares are owned by Gazprom, Russia’s largest company, which is itself half-owned by the Russian government.
They already delisted it, but it would be fun to see what will do Nintendo in this case
Good luck going after them Nintendo.
Putin is a fud
How can anyone be playing video game sin Russia when Putin has everyone on the front lines?
Did it ever occur to you that maybe the news has been lying to you.
Did it ever occur to you that not even the news are telling what you are saying and you guys are both uninformed as shit?
Lmfao it’s not illegal in Russia you fools.
Your writing is clear and concise. Very helpful and interesting. Solar
Inacurate.
Good!!! Nintendo is on my last nerve with their war on fan content and roms. This is what they deserve.