The Ethics of Emulation

[MrPopo]

That's not true at all. Not buying Wii VC games doesn't mean Nintendo's stock will drop. All it would hurt (potentially) is Nintendo's profits

When profits go down the stock goes down, generally.

[17DaysOlderThanNES]

That's not true at all. Not buying Wii VC games doesn't mean Nintendo's stock will drop. All it would hurt (potentially) is Nintendo's profits

When profits go down the stock goes down, generally.

Nintendo would still be doing fine with DS, WiiWare, regular Wii games, etc. Stocks are all about prospective value of the company, if people see Wiis selling like crazy, the stock will stay high, a couple VC games isn't going to cause a mountain of difference. Besides, if they want to sell more Wii VC games, they should lower the price to something more reasonable compared to what the actual per-unit cost to them is.

And, once again, Nintendo isn't automatically entitled to your money just because they re-released games. If I buy the Genesis Collection for PS2, Nintendo doesn't get a cent. On that same note, if I just download the games, Nintendo doesn't get a cent. I refuse to buy games on Wii VC regardless if they are available elsewhere or not, so the profits aren't any different coming from me, it's 0 either way.

Also, I DON'T want to support Nintendo because I DON'T like the way they are doing business right now. In fact, I haven't really liked what Nintendo has done since the SNES days (a small handful of N64 games were OK, but since then, total garbage). Why would I want to support a company I object to? doesn't make sense.

Remember my other example, I will almost definitely buy Battle Kid because I like what the developer did and I like the way they are handling it, thus I will purchase it. Even if I can manage to get a ROM, I would still like to own the real game and pay the developer for his work. Buying games is about reimbursing the developer for a job well done, if the developer does a shit job, they don't deserve a cent from me or anyone else. I mean, how many of us as kids were conned into buying a terrible game due to a cool package, an advertisement, or a license of a TV show/Movie we like? I should be able to determine if developers deserve my money BEFORE I pay, not lament it after the fact. Also, if the developers (and by that I mean the actual staff that worked on the game, not the larger company) have long moved on and aren't going to benefit from me buying a legitimate copy, whats the point? Wii VC is great if you're too lazy or too computer illiterate to figure out PC emulation and don't want the hassle, and for those people I say be my guest, but I don't think anyone should feel obligated to buy Nintendo's re-release just because they snatched up some rights to sell them 20 years after the fact.

[pepharytheworm]

So are we socialist now. You have plenty of money so its okay if you don't get more. It's not stealing because you can make more. Forced sharing the wealth

Maybe we have lots of Robin Hoods? Except they take from the rich and keep for them selves. I would never buy it anyway so its okay.

To me there is one big reason to buy even if used. If no one buys retro stuff no one will sell it anymore. Emulate old stuff you can't get, but buy it when you get a chance. Nothing feels better then actually owning something. I would feel ashamed to tell people on this site I have a big collection and played tons of games but all they are, are roms. you virtually own nothing. Pun intended.

[gtmtnbiker]

Nintendo would still be doing fine with DS, WiiWare, regular Wii games, etc. Stocks are all about prospective value of the company, if people see Wiis selling like crazy, the stock will stay high, a couple VC games isn't going to cause a mountain of difference. Besides, if they want to sell more Wii VC games, they should lower the price to something more reasonable compared to what the actual per-unit cost to them is.

You don't know what Nintendo's development costs are for a VC title. It's not $0 or peanuts. There is definitely a cost to develop the proper emulator, test it, document it, etc. They need to charge an amount to at least recoup their costs and for it to be appealing to consumers unless they want it to be a loss-leader.

If it was impossible to pirate or to emulate, Nintendo will definitely have increased revenues/profits. How much more, nobody knows. But how well a company is doing in terms of revenues/profits has an impact on the stock price which affect individual owners/mutual funds/etc.

And, once again, Nintendo isn't automatically entitled to your money just because they re-released games.

So what should they do for VC games? Give them for free?

If I buy the Genesis Collection for PS2, Nintendo doesn't get a cent.

No, but it supports the overall gaming industry. Money is going for gaming entertainment instead of food/utilities/movies.

On that same note, if I just download the games, Nintendo doesn't get a cent. I refuse to buy games on Wii VC regardless if they are available elsewhere or not, so the profits aren't any different coming from me, it's 0 either way.

That's perfectly fine as long as you're not playing downloaded VC titles on your Wii or playing GBA titles on your emulator when you don't own the GBA title.

Also, I DON'T want to support Nintendo because I DON'T like the way they are doing business right now. In fact, I haven't really liked what Nintendo has done since the SNES days (a small handful of N64 games were OK, but since then, total garbage). Why would I want to support a company I object to? doesn't make sense.

Nintendo is doing well right now. If their products don't appeal to you, that's fine but it doesn't change the fact that it's doing well with the Wii/DS.

In any case, this topic is like beating a dead horse so I'm not going to comment further.

[CRTGAMER]

I have to be careful who I let in my house.

Guest might download all my silverware, blame me for having a nice set that developer lost money on, then turn around and sell it to someone else that doesn't know how.

[17DaysOlderThanNES]

Oh, and just to be clear, it is ALWAYS wrong to sell pirated games/movies/music to others, no matter how old. You didn't make it, you don't deserve money for it. The one exception is if you try to tell your friend how to burn DC games and he just keeps bugging you to do it for him and you charge him a "lazy ass" tax, that's Ok in my book because it's not my job to burn games for people all day (though I will usually copy them to a flash drive/hard drive for free if they ask). If a man wants a fish rather than having the patience to be taught to fish, he can pay me to fish for him.

Well this does sound fishy. Isn't this paragraph contradictory? You are still profiting from selling a Pirated game no matter what the reason. You did provide a link to DCISOZone earlier.

Forgot to address this in my last post. I don't know what you mean with DCISOZONE (was that referring to offering to help people for free?), but let me clarify the scenario. One time on an NES forum I offered to send a Nester DC 6 file I made with Self-Boot Inducer to anyone that wanted it and tell them how to burn it because it took me several CDs and everyone else seemed to have trouble too (this is before I knew about DCISOZONE and the snesorama.us forums). One guy was interested, but he insisted he knew nothing about computers and wanted me to do it for him. I offered to give him any help, but he still just wanted me to burn it. So, I charged him $20 shipped for it, why? I had to drag out my old PC laptop, which is very slow, burn 2 discs, test them, then drive 30 minutes out of my way to the post office, wait in line for another 15-20 minutes, and pay for shipping. I'm sorry, but my time is worth something and all things considered I wasn't even getting paid minimum wage. I didn't charge him for the content of the disc, but rather my time to be his "gofer." If someone pays you $22 to go buy a $2 bottle of Windex because they don't feel like sitting in traffic and waiting in line at Wal-Mart, is that unethical? I offered to help him do it himself, he declined, so he can pay me to do all the heavy lifting. It's not that I was advertising bootleg CDs or offering them for sale, but again, my time is worth something. On the other hand, charging a friend $50 for Segagaga on CD-R because it's $80 on eBay is total bullshit because just burning one disc real quick and giving it to him at work or school is not $50 worth of work. So, I guess to clarify, it's only ethical to charge if you first offered them websites informing how to make the discs, they decline, and then you only charge a reasonable fee for your time and expenses incurred in making and delivering the discs.

So are we socialist now. You have plenty of money so its okay if you don't get more. It's not stealing because you can make more. Forced sharing the wealth

Maybe we have lots of Robin Hoods? Except they take from the rich and keep for them selves. I would never buy it anyway so its okay.

Ok, sorry, but you can go fuck yourself here. I didn't say Nintendo has plenty of money so they don't need more, I'm saying I don't like what they do and I DON'T WANT TO SUPPORT THEM. I'm not pirating Wii games, I'm playing old games that have long been out of the market, many of which Nintendo had nothing to do with other than licensing in a modern context. I also don't feel Nintendo deserves to profit from something a programmer busted his ass on to make maybe a couple grand and will receive none of the Wii VC profits. That is a fundamental protest to the way our copyright system works.

And you know what? when it comes to digital copies that doesn't involve theft of a physical product, I say if you wouldn't buy it anyway, it is OK. I wouldn't pay $500 for Photoshop to dick around with photos for the internet, that's insane. I just use Gimp instead, but if Gimp didn't exist, I would probably find the latest cracked version of Photoshop. If I was using it professionally, I would buy the retail version to compensate them for helping my profession as well as to help future development. It's up to the person to know when they honestly wouldn't buy it or if they're just trying to save a buck because they can.

To me there is one big reason to buy even if used. If no one buys retro stuff no one will sell it anymore. Emulate old stuff you can't get, but buy it when you get a chance. Nothing feels better then actually owning something. I would feel ashamed to tell people on this site I have a big collection and played tons of games but all they are, are roms. you virtually own nothing. Pun intended.

I would never refer to ROMs as a collection, well, unless I called it a "collection of ROMs," and I certainly would never claim bragging rights over files that were given to me for free. For the record, I own 650+ legitimate store bought games spanning from the 2600 (don't even have one, but I have 3 games for it, lol) all the way up to the Wii (worst. purchase. ever.). Owning real games is awesome and people will continue to buy them just for the sake of owning them as well as to have ultimate authenticity. If I really like a game, unless it's obscenely expensive (like a real copy of Mega Man Wily Wars), I will usually buy it. I would never insult someone for wanting to collect games, but emulating for day-to-day use is just an invaluable convenience. Nothing makes an extremely difficult game more bearable than rewinds and save states, not to mention how much fast forward saves you from boring unskippable cutscenes. The real cartridge is always the way to test your skills, but emulators are a great way to "train" rather than just getting your ass handed to you and having to replay early levels over and over again. Emulation also helps with newer HDTVs that usually can't use RF and looks like shit with composite. Kega Fusion with HQ2X and a VGA/DVI/HDMI connection? more of that please .

Nintendo would still be doing fine with DS, WiiWare, regular Wii games, etc. Stocks are all about prospective value of the company, if people see Wiis selling like crazy, the stock will stay high, a couple VC games isn't going to cause a mountain of difference. Besides, if they want to sell more Wii VC games, they should lower the price to something more reasonable compared to what the actual per-unit cost to them is.

You don't know what Nintendo's development costs are for a VC title. It's not $0 or peanuts. There is definitely a cost to develop the proper emulator, test it, document it, etc. They need to charge an amount to at least recoup their costs and for it to be appealing to consumers unless they want it to be a loss-leader.

If it was impossible to pirate or to emulate, Nintendo will definitely have increased revenues/profits. How much more, nobody knows. But how well a company is doing in terms of revenues/profits has an impact on the stock price which affect individual owners/mutual funds/etc.

It doesn't matter what Nintendo pays to develop a Wii title, I'm not playing a Wii VC game, I'm playing an NES game dumped from a real cartridge by a considerate individual and hosted for free online. They could easily profit from 99¢ per game, think about it: there have been almost 70 million Wiis shipped at the time of this posting, if just 1/70th of Wii owners buy a game at 99¢, that's a million dollars. You can't tell me converting an NES game to Wii costs a million bucks. At the most, I would estimate a couple grand, and that's probably well overestimating. As I've said before, I don't know how much licensers are charging (could be quite a bit), but if the licensing fee is relatively small, they could make humoungous profits even with low VC costs. Again, I cite the iPhone with its top grossing games and apps almost all retailing at 99¢. Look up Gameloft's sales numbers, they are making a fortune off of super cheap games ON A CELL PHONE, imagine what a dedicated game console could do with a low price-high volume sales approach. Don't assume because Nintendo is a big company that they are making the best financial decision with this, you'd be surprised how incompetent people in high positions can be. Selling 100 games at $5 is a whole lot less cash than selling a million at 99¢.

as for the rest: Wii Fit, Wii hardware, Wii Motion Plus, New Super Mario Bros Wii, Super Mario Galaxy, heard of them? Nintendo is raking in cash and while I haven't seen any official numbers, I don't think WiiVC is even close to being the main revenue on the Wii.

And, once again, Nintendo isn't automatically entitled to your money just because they re-released games.

So what should they do for VC games? Give them for free?

no, they can charge for VC games for those not competent enough to figure out homebrew emulation or don't want to spend the time to figure it out. I'm just saying a VC re-release=/=the original NES release. An NES cartridge dumped by a collector and offered for free has no hands in the Nintendo cookie jar.

If I buy the Genesis Collection for PS2, Nintendo doesn't get a cent.

No, but it supports the overall gaming industry. Money is going for gaming entertainment instead of food/utilities/movies.

Right, and I'll spend that money on current games I like for PS3, Wii (yeah right, like there's anything worth buying), or the iPhone. Those games are still supporting their development teams by being purchased, exceedingly old games are not.

On that same note, if I just download the games, Nintendo doesn't get a cent. I refuse to buy games on Wii VC regardless if they are available elsewhere or not, so the profits aren't any different coming from me, it's 0 either way.

That's perfectly fine as long as you're not playing downloaded VC titles on your Wii or playing GBA titles on your emulator when you don't own the GBA title.

I'm not, and BTW, GBA is obsolete anyway, but I wouldn't want to play the garbage for that system. All of my emulators are pure homebrew made by fans and preservationists.

Also, I DON'T want to support Nintendo because I DON'T like the way they are doing business right now. In fact, I haven't really liked what Nintendo has done since the SNES days (a small handful of N64 games were OK, but since then, total garbage). Why would I want to support a company I object to? doesn't make sense.

Nintendo is doing well right now. If their products don't appeal to you, that's fine but it doesn't change the fact that it's doing well with the Wii/DS.

In any case, this topic is like beating a dead horse so I'm not going to comment further.

Yes, they're doing well, but I don't like what they're doing, so there's no sense in supporting it. If other people like the games they make so much, then they can support them, I advocate a change to games that don't suck, and until that happens, they won't get my money. I bought New Super Mario Bros. Wii because it was one of...2, 3? good games on the system. When they can do more of that, they'll get more of my money.

I have to be careful who I let in my house.

Guest might download all my silverware, blame me for having a nice set that developer lost money on, then turn around and sell it to someone else that doesn't know how.

Um, hi, that's a physical product, you've officially just made the dumbest and most irrelevant post on the internet, congratulations. Setting bits on a hard drive is not "stealing" it is "copying," a closer comparison would be if I made a mold of your silverware, injected molten metal into the mold, and made my own set. But if I did that, IKEA should get a cut, right? nevermind IKEA hasn't made that silverware set since 1988...

[pepharytheworm]

@17DaysOlderThanNES
I can go what myself? Did I say I was talking about you and how you feel about Nintendo?
You're not the only one to post on this thread, in fact you're one of the last. If I am directly talking to you I will let you know.


Mods should lock this thread. Like another poster said it's like beating a dead horse.

[dsheinem]

[ you can go fuck yourself here. ...you've officially just made the dumbest and most irrelevant post on the internet, congratulations.

Watch the personal attacks, please.

[Hatta]

So are we socialist now.

Manipulating the market by artificially limiting supply through copyright is socialism. Under a free market the supply is infinite when the marginal cost is zero, so the marginal price would also be zero.

17DaysOlderThanNES, there are lots of ways to rationalize piracy. Just understand that if everyone did so, the games you value (the ones you spend your valuable time with) would not exist. If you're really ok with that (I am, in quite a few cases) that's no one's business but your own. Spend the money you can afford to support the developers you want to succeed and your conscience should be ok. That's all you're truly accountable to in the end.

[MrPopo]

So are we socialist now.

Manipulating the market by artificially limiting supply through copyright is socialism. Under a free market the supply is infinite when the marginal cost is zero, so the marginal price would also be zero.

I assume, then, that you feel the same about patent law, which accomplishes a similar purpose of allowing the "original creator" to decide how much supply to inject into the market.

The old standbys of market theory just aren't equipped to handle digital goods. By their very nature distribution and duplication cost is effectively nil, especially when you consider just how willing random people are to take up that cost pro bono. Compare with something like a CD; selling bootlegs costs a certain amount for the new disc plus packaging. It takes a certain amount of effort to steal physical items; stealing digital items is relatively painless. So content providers have to find ways to monetize content creation with the knowledge that anything digital can and will be made freely available for all. Right now there are a lot of people who are "old fashioned", but as the number of Americans become more and more tech savvy you'll see less and less of people who spend money on something digital because "that's the way it's supposed to be". You'll start seeing it for reasons such as "I want to support this developer" or "I get a bonus figure if I buy it".