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A British high court judge has put a spring in Nintendo’s step by makingb a landmark ruling over the legality of R4 emulator cards.
As of today the popular R4 cards – which are used by thousands in the UK to pirate DS games – are no longer legal to import, advertise and sell anywhere in the UK.
The high court set a new precedent by adjudging that it is illegal for the R4 card to circumvent Nintendo’s security systems in order to play content on the DS. This ruling impacts on emulator owners who have hitherto insisted that playing homebrew games on the DS is not piracy.
The high court judgement was made against Playables Limited and Wai Dat Chan.
“Nintendo promotes and fosters game development and creativity, and strongly supports the game developers who legitimately create new and innovative applications,” read a statement from the platform holder.
It added: “Nintendo initiates these actions not only on its own behalf, but also on behalf of over 1,400 video game-development companies that depend on legitimate sales of games for their survival”.
The company adds that in the UK alone there have been over 100,000 game copying devices seized since 2009.
