You don't own the software's intellectual property, but you own the hardware and it is expected to work under normal operating conditions. If you bought a camera and the manufacturer arbitrarily decided to make the software stop functioning soon after purchase the product would be considered malfunctioning.
Nintendo turning off your software should fall under some kind of consumer protection law.
> You don't own the software's intellectual property
I don't own the intellectual property of a physical book I purchase, but I do own a copy of the book and the copyright owner can't just show up at my house and redact the whole book or just take it from me.
But somehow if they do it with software it's different.
They can, but if they do the consequences for their business wouldn't be small. If Nintendo thinks piracy of their products is a problem now, try teaching people that investing in their hardware is a gamble and a potential waste of money and see how it goes.
Nintendo is not really a company whose target audience is people who care about homebrew and device ownership.
I think although it would make a very vocal segment of the consumers angry, it's not something that ultimately would hurt Nintendo.
It's kind of sad imo but it's the reality of it, Nintendo is one of the most litigious and protective companies in the world when it comes to their intellectual property and this isn't a new thing.
That vocal part of the consumers are those that grew up with the old 'you buy it, you get to play it' approach.
And those consumers are now the ones who will decide what their children get to play. Needless to say, I do not see Nintendo in my household anymore after the switch2 announcement.
Nintendo's focus is on the generation that came after you. Same as Reddit after the whole API and 3rd party app extinction event. The vocal types are the ones that reminisce about the pre-DMCA days and whine about corporate greed and "you'll own nothing, just what the WEF wants".
There is an entire generation of consumers that grew up with Wii U, Switch 1, Netflix and Spotify and don't know or care about ownership and future preservation. That's where the money is. You may refuse to buy one for your kids but there're many more parents who don't play video games or care enough to keep them from getting one for their kids.
The problem with that idea is that you need evangelists. It's not something that Nintendo will feel now, but I have successfully converted 6 families into PC gaming with my kid. I caught them at kindergarten and now they are in Valve's garden. My sister's family and her circle is all Playstation. Her kids have never touched Nintendo.
Sure there are people who don't care, but those people don't bring people into the fold. It's a slow erosion. It's how Microsoft is losing ground to Chromebooks and Macs. People who don't know aren't hearing that they need a windows machine as much. They hear they need a Mac for security/ease of use or all they need is a Chromebook because they just surf the web anyway.
Microsoft of course will be fine because they have business on lock, but they used to have consumers as well.
I never bought a Sony console again after they took away OtherOS on the PS3. And now that Nintendo starts acting like they own the device I paid for, a customer relationship that started in the mid-1980s ends.
Hopefully one of these days someone legally pushes back against N and wins, the way it's going it's doubtful though. To me, this isn't a far cry from them permabanning Switches via serial from online play for cheating and piracy, just the difference of them encroaching on hardware territory now. Piracy, uh... finds a way.
edit: and come on, what other purpose do eFuses really provide besides lockin
Phones are a necessity, videogame consoles are not. In any case, most people are not looking to flash alternative firmwares on to devices they rely on daily for work and their personal life.
The option is still available for Pixel phones and those using niche brands like Purism and Librem.
They already do this with used consoles and games. If you buy a used Switch that someone tampered with on the software side, the only way you would find out something is wrong is when you get blocked from Nintendo servers months later. Or perhaps you bought a used game that someone cloned the card ID from, and you end up getting blocked when others use the ID.
Getting blocked from the Nintendo servers doesn't just mean losing online play, you can't update the console or games, play game-key card games, or run downloaded games that it needs to validate your ownership of.
You can still buy the console that can read physical games and buy the physical games and never plug it on the internet, right?
But I guess most people, like me bought a numerical version and plugged it to the internet. Then you're a few clicks away from a monthly subscription or from buying new games.
They really don't have any incentive to brick your console except if you pirate the games. They don't earn money on the console by itself.
> You can still buy the console that can read physical games and buy the physical games and never plug it on the internet, right?
Not always. Many games don't get physical releases, or only get an expensive limited-run physical collectors edition, and when they do get a physical release it doesn't necessarily even contain all of the game data so part of it may still have to be downloaded.
The latter is apparently going to be even more common with the Switch 2 due to the high cost of its faster storage. Nintendo is now giving publishers the option of releasing "game key carts" which contain zero game data and are essentially just DRM dongles that grant permission to download and play the game.
> You can still buy the console that can read physical games and buy the physical games and never plug it on the internet, right?
I'm not positive this is possible. I seem to remember times when trying to play a newer game on the Switch required a system update, even though I had the physical card. I might be misremembering, though.
Games can require a firmware update to play, but AIUI the physical carts are supposed to have their required firmware bundled alongside the game so you can update without an internet connection.
They even did that on the original Xbox. The first year of consoles didn't have Xbox Live and therefore had no knowledge of the service to obtain updates, dashboard updates were delivered on games that used Xbox Live. For that first year, the only thing the Ethernet port was used for was LAN games (and WAN games with private networks). To my knowledge, dashboard updates were only delivered with games but title updates and DLC could be downloaded over the internet.
It depends on the game. I know some games are too big to fit on a single switch cartridge so you need to download the rest when you insert it. The switch 2 is going to come with blank cards that have nothing on them but allow you to download the game when inserted as well.
A large number of games don’t even get physical releases anymore. Buying a console for entirely offline usage diminishes the value proposition, basically nobody will choose to do this because you’re not really buying what is being sold anymore.
The other problem with incentives around bricking devices sold for a loss is that when the seller is big enough to absorb a bit of negative PR they also have no incentive to address false positives or small infractions, any time spent dealing with these users is viewed as compounding the loss. It also generates a bunch of electronic waste as a consequence.
Doesn't work so well on most games these days; a) Nintendo is pushing a lot of publishers towards their game key carts that have no game data on them because the flash for their carts are pretty expensive b) most games are pretty crap without their Day 1 patches these days.
Nope, games often need console updates to run. This affected me in 2014/15 on deployment, where some Vita games wouldn't load up (and just asked you to update the vita).
Yeah, not sure I wanna buy the Switch 2. So far, have no plans. But they could tempt me if they put out a new big Zelda title, especially, if they don't do open world and go back to dungeon-centric design like Twilight Princes or OOT. Then I'm gonna have to buy the damn glorified Zelda playing machine against my better instincts.
Ocarina of Time was peak. Come play Ship of Harkinian randomizer. I've been trying to add fun stuff like shuffling the ability to use crawlspaces & randomizing how doors connect in dungeons
I have a hard time accepting that this would fly in the UK. We have strong consumer protection laws in the Consumer Rights Act 2015 that I think this would run afoul of. Terms can't be unfair, and are deemed so if "contrary to the requirement of good faith, it causes a significant imbalance in the parties' rights and obligations under the contract to the detriment of the consumer." and a product must be fit for purpose for 6 years - if this ceased to be the case the consumer is entitled to a full refund or replacement.
I think it's very unlikely they would be a problem for the manufacturer in the event of the consumer making modifications which the packaging is very clear that you should not make, or for the facilitation of illegal acts.
Put it this way - it's pretty common for devices to have their DRM keys downgraded in the video industry if they are leaked, and that has never presented any issues for manufacturers under the CRA.
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[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 66.7 ms ] threadYou can only license a console's underlying software, not own it.
Nintendo turning off your software should fall under some kind of consumer protection law.
I don't own the intellectual property of a physical book I purchase, but I do own a copy of the book and the copyright owner can't just show up at my house and redact the whole book or just take it from me.
But somehow if they do it with software it's different.
I think although it would make a very vocal segment of the consumers angry, it's not something that ultimately would hurt Nintendo.
It's kind of sad imo but it's the reality of it, Nintendo is one of the most litigious and protective companies in the world when it comes to their intellectual property and this isn't a new thing.
That vocal part of the consumers are those that grew up with the old 'you buy it, you get to play it' approach.
And those consumers are now the ones who will decide what their children get to play. Needless to say, I do not see Nintendo in my household anymore after the switch2 announcement.
There is an entire generation of consumers that grew up with Wii U, Switch 1, Netflix and Spotify and don't know or care about ownership and future preservation. That's where the money is. You may refuse to buy one for your kids but there're many more parents who don't play video games or care enough to keep them from getting one for their kids.
Sure there are people who don't care, but those people don't bring people into the fold. It's a slow erosion. It's how Microsoft is losing ground to Chromebooks and Macs. People who don't know aren't hearing that they need a windows machine as much. They hear they need a Mac for security/ease of use or all they need is a Chromebook because they just surf the web anyway.
Microsoft of course will be fine because they have business on lock, but they used to have consumers as well.
I never bought a Sony console again after they took away OtherOS on the PS3. And now that Nintendo starts acting like they own the device I paid for, a customer relationship that started in the mid-1980s ends.
edit: and come on, what other purpose do eFuses really provide besides lockin
The option is still available for Pixel phones and those using niche brands like Purism and Librem.
Getting blocked from the Nintendo servers doesn't just mean losing online play, you can't update the console or games, play game-key card games, or run downloaded games that it needs to validate your ownership of.
Not always. Many games don't get physical releases, or only get an expensive limited-run physical collectors edition, and when they do get a physical release it doesn't necessarily even contain all of the game data so part of it may still have to be downloaded.
The latter is apparently going to be even more common with the Switch 2 due to the high cost of its faster storage. Nintendo is now giving publishers the option of releasing "game key carts" which contain zero game data and are essentially just DRM dongles that grant permission to download and play the game.
I'm not positive this is possible. I seem to remember times when trying to play a newer game on the Switch required a system update, even though I had the physical card. I might be misremembering, though.
The other problem with incentives around bricking devices sold for a loss is that when the seller is big enough to absorb a bit of negative PR they also have no incentive to address false positives or small infractions, any time spent dealing with these users is viewed as compounding the loss. It also generates a bunch of electronic waste as a consequence.
Put it this way - it's pretty common for devices to have their DRM keys downgraded in the video industry if they are leaked, and that has never presented any issues for manufacturers under the CRA.