Emulation has been a bit of a gray area regarding legality. While emulating video game consoles are not necessarily illegal, you run into the illegal territory of ROMs and ripping games online. So typically, we haven’t seen much pushback against emulating consoles, especially with most of these console emulators being aimed at older generation platforms. In some ways, it’s great to have access to games that would have been lost to time with no means of enjoying them on modern platforms. But we have emulators out there now that can run Nintendo Switch games, a current platform that Nintendo is actively selling and supporting with new releases.
Nintendo has recently made some headlines for going after Gary Bowser. This individual sold hacked devices for the Nintendo Switch, which allowed consumers to play ROMs. That resulted in some massive charges being placed on Gary Bowser, which might have sparked the reason Skyline is shutting down. Skyline was one of the few Nintendo Switch emulators out there, but this was an emulator that could run on Android. With the different builds released, players could potentially run some Nintendo Switch games on devices like their smartphones or tablets.
Thanks to a report from Mr. Sunjano, we’re learning that the Skyline development team had taken to their Discord to reveal they are disbanding the development of Skyline. This is because Nintendo has issued a DMCA takedown notice to Lockpick RCM. Lockpick RCM allows the dumping of keys from the Nintendo Switch, a process that Skyline requires. While the team claims they were unaware of this potentially being problematic since these keys came from their own Nintendo Switch units, they have decided not to risk potential legal action.
It’s their fear that Nintendo could soon view Skyline as treading on copyright infringement. So rather than take on the risk, the team has opted to stop developing the emulator, which means whatever the latest builds released online will be the final ones from the development team. But that has left some players wondering if this could be a trend we’ll see on other Nintendo Switch emulators like Yuzu which has been popular for the PC platform. After the example Nintendo made of Gary Bowser, there is likely quite a bit more hesitation from some teams on whether they wish to proceed with future development for Nintendo Switch emulation.
