Nintendo, Capcom, friends file suit over DS piracy-enabling R4 sales
by Christopher Grant 
{ Oct 15th 2009 at 11:15AM } 
Earlier this year, a Tokyo court banned the sale of the devices; however, Capcom now says that "legal action has had no meaningful effect in the intervening period" and that sellers would "ignore" its warnings. Enter: a new lawsuit, which Capcom hopes leads to a ruling that acknowledges "our company and other software manufactures have sustained [extreme] damages from proliferation of illegal instruments." Seems pretty cut and dry to us, but we'll let the courts decide.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
CheeziePotato [Has finally become a Super Saiyan] @ Oct 15th 2009 11:20AM
Video game developers sure hate pirates. I wonder if they like ninjas.
SpyderTaco (PSN: Ar4chNova89) @ Oct 15th 2009 11:24AM
Probably not. Ninjas are just pirates who don't get caught.
SoshiKitai @ Oct 15th 2009 11:30AM
Yeah, but ninjas can be hired. They can be paid to stop.
Rob S. @ Oct 15th 2009 11:32AM
Bet you Nintendo and Capcom's Ninjas are going to be sent out to deal with this.
Papa Midnight @ Oct 15th 2009 11:42AM
Pirate's can be bought too. You just need to give them what they want.
SoshiKitai @ Oct 15th 2009 11:48AM
Yeah, but then Pirates take that AND STILL stab you in the back.
It'd have to be a continuing agreement that benefits the pirates more than you (or at least, make it SEEM that way), in order for them to hold to the agreement. ...and even then, they'll keep expecting more.
Ninjas just go away and come back if you don't hold up to the bargain.
whylekat @ Oct 15th 2009 1:31PM
...Parlay?
Dr. Bradwart [100% Reagan Conservative!] @ Oct 15th 2009 11:23AM
I hope they have a big jar of dirt to throw in court.
Mark C @ Oct 15th 2009 11:23AM
I was under the impression that R4 carts were all but defunct. Wonder if this lawsuit will be expanded include other make/models of flash carts?
SpyderTaco (PSN: Ar4chNova89) @ Oct 15th 2009 11:23AM
Why people go through all the trouble to modify their consoles / handhelds using things like "flash cartridges" is beyond me. It seems like it would be easier just to shell out the few bucks and actually support the developers.
I say this as a recovering pirate of PC games. Thanks to the help of Steam I've been sober of that addiction for several years.
Ryan @ Oct 15th 2009 11:26AM
With the R4 flash cart, theres no modification to the console.
1) Slap the ROM on a microSD.
2) Slap the microSD into the R4.
3) Slap the R4 into the DS.
4) ???
5) Keep These companies from Profit.
Dr. Bradwart [100% Reagan Conservative!] @ Oct 15th 2009 11:26AM
At least you can admit it. That's the first step to recovery.
Zerokku @ Oct 15th 2009 11:32AM
My acekard costed my 28 dollars. Thats less than any new DS game at retail. You wonder why people are willing to pay that much for piracy?
What I hate is this gets in the way of legitimate homebrewers like myself. There needs to be a device that can run homebrew, but cant run legitimate ROMs.
(And if anyone wants to try and call me out for piracy, I'll take a picture of my 30+ DS game collection :P)
CaramelZappa @ Oct 15th 2009 11:34AM
Hah recovering pirate.
When I had a DSlite I had an M3 cart. I bought copies of game that I actually played, like geometry wars galaxies, but it's just realy nice to have them all on the handheld and not have to carry around a bunch of games Not having to carry around a bunch of carts is great because it's just one less thing to keep track of.
More importantly, homebrew, so I could play classic nex/snes games, use homebrew browsers that were better than nintendos version of opera, etc. It's just really convenient to have. And you don't have to "modify" your handheld. You just put games on a microsd, pop the cart in like a normal game and thats it.
SoshiKitai @ Oct 15th 2009 11:41AM
It's hard to see anyone as "legit" when they own things that encourage pirating.
I understand that a good number of you actually BUY the games after playing it, or actually use it as a backup (I sure wish I had a backup for my first copy of Elite Beat Agents... I lost that thing a long time ago, had to buy me a new one) for legitimate reasons (though MOST people don't need a backup, as most neither lose their DS games nor do their DS games break) ---- however, the rest of the community actually pirates games and never buys them.
There's also the good number that say the same things as you guys do -but actually never buy the games or only buy a small percentage of the games, to hide "in plain sight" so they can excuse themselves.
If you could effectively police the rest of your community, maybe we'd encourage things such as homebrew communities and such.
Farseer (GDI) @ Oct 15th 2009 11:47AM
Spyder Taco, your recovery from piracy wouldn't happen to coincide with obtaining a good, full-time job, would it?
acefondu @ Oct 15th 2009 12:06PM
Steam does make life easier. I love Steam.
zenaxe @ Oct 15th 2009 12:14PM
FWIW, on the PSP a custom firmwared PSP is MUCH more powerful/featureful the one with stock firmware. It adds some really useful features that have become "can't live without" type items for many users.
BigD145 @ Oct 15th 2009 1:28PM
I can carry a couple dozen games on me with one cartridge. Portability? On a DS? You betcha.
Quattro @ Oct 15th 2009 5:24PM
I don't have a job, so money buying all the DS games I want to try is a bit of an issue. If 30 games come out in a month, and 15 of them look like they might be fun, I don't really have the cash to go buy 15 DS games I may or may not like.
Not to mention the convenience. I take my DSi to school, and having 20 games on a flash cart sure beats have 20 game cases or cartridges.
bm @ Oct 15th 2009 8:06PM
"There needs to be a device that can run homebrew, but cant run legitimate ROMs."
Then roms will be patched. What you're suggesting is impossible.
"I don't have a job, so money buying all the DS games I want to try is a bit of an issue."
Reviews exist for a reason. There's even a website that collects dozens of reviews on every single game out there so you don't have to rely on a single opinion. "Just trying it out" is such a typical bullshit excuse.
Aerith @ Oct 16th 2009 3:51AM
"Reviews exist for a reason"
Yeah, because I have the same tastes as every reviewer who reviews a game. a lot of reviewers are biased as well so er, no.
bm @ Oct 17th 2009 6:51AM
To rephrase: "There's even a website that collects dozens of reviews on every single game out there so you don't have to rely on a single opinion."
There's also demos, full games playable in stores, game renting and youtube videos. Don't give me the same old weak excuses, you cheap bitch. You thieves are so full of shit.
TriviumSuffocationTheBlackDahliaMurderLambOfGod @ Oct 15th 2009 11:28AM
A good idea. Go after the enabler. While there are a few who will buy one of these carts for homebrew, wallpapers, etc. There are also folks who will buy this to pirate copyrighted material and the manufacturer knows this. Granted, I can't see how they can possibly take legal action against them when most of these carts aren't installed with any firmware to allow these actions.
Also, R4 has become the least popular, hasn't it? Wasn't the old R4 closed down. I remember reading that here or something.
Josh @ Oct 15th 2009 11:44AM
I've been thinking about getting a flash card to play GB/C/Advance games. Hell, maybe even some DS ones.
Is this possible?
-Vexx- @ Oct 15th 2009 11:47AM
They took this long to crack down on those Flash Cart things? really?
SoshiKitai @ Oct 15th 2009 11:49AM
Yes.
Diosoth @ Oct 15th 2009 12:12PM
A lot of effort to stop the resale of a particular brand of flash card. I wonder why the others are not included? Well, not like the can do anything to Acekard, they're cenetred in China.
I'd support the developers, but most game companies, as with the music and movie industry, hate their paying customers. They hate you for selling your unwanted copies, they hate you for buying used games, they hate you for not buying a copy for each separate device you wish to play the software on. Hell, they hate you for not buying triple the amount of games you already buy. They tried DRM to stop piracy but all it's done is punish people who actually pay for their games. Yeah, some anti-piracy plan, guys, slap around your paying customers. DRM has actually encouraged piracy. I don't buy games because they spit on me when I do.
Coupled with the dirty actions of Square Enix, who like to send out C&D letters to fan art projects, I honestly think the game industry should suffer for a while. Maybe then they'll treat their fans better, they'll stop treating the paying customers like a possible threat, and they'll stop flooding the market with shovelware. The game industry needs to start putting more effort into making their games good, than in trying to force people to buy mediocre crap such as Mass Effect(well, okay, so I hold zero hope of Bioware making a good game no matter what).
Dr. Bradwart [100% Reagan Conservative!] @ Oct 15th 2009 12:36PM
You are a blinking idiot, sir.
Developers don't hate their customers! If they did, then why do the good ones make every effort to please their customers and fans?
That Chrono Trigger issue was a blatant violation of copyright law, something they didn't seem to understand.
Your claim that Mass Effect is crap really invalidates everything you say. And especially claiming BioWare doesn't make good games. Their titles are Holy Grails for nearly every gamer out there, be it Mass Effect, Jade Empire, KotOR, Baldur's Gate, or Neverwinter Nights.
Go back to sucking on your pacifier, you moron.
whylekat @ Oct 15th 2009 1:33PM
What Bradwart said x1000.
Your long and dumb post makes me assume you rarely, if ever, play video games.
Nightwish @ Oct 16th 2009 3:15PM
What @Diosoth said times infinity. Nyah nyah nyah nyah.
Just because they can abuse the laws they bought doesn't mean jack shit to me.
makimak22 @ Oct 15th 2009 12:48PM
Nintendo finally gets tough against piracy? Maybe the slowdown in sales of the DS (and Wii) in Japan had something to do with it....
phrost @ Oct 16th 2009 3:12PM
Even if I had money I still wouldn't buy DS games... most of the new ones are terrible.. all the good Sonic, Mario, and Mega Man ZX games are a couple years old now. R4's go for around $6 on some sites... that's about 500% cheaper than used at GameStop and you can have 256mb-16gb worth of games on your cart. AND you can play emulators too... piracy just has too much to offer.
emperorzeroxx @ Oct 15th 2009 2:09PM
Or maybe you should fix your consoles with better anti piracy techniques... Whenever a company goes all law suit action that just shows me that the high paid developers in a large corporation are giving up against a battle with 10 year old UK hackers that don't even get paid... it's truly sad with th lack of quality programmers. In fact any loss of money because of this, that so called "extreme damages" should be taken out of developers paychecks since it's their fault for leaving open so many security holes....dsi has been a slight improvement but people apparently still manage.
Warlock @ Oct 15th 2009 2:17PM
Thank you for getting rid of the baby pirates image, it was getting *really* old...
bongoes is no longer a Black Lantern. @ Oct 15th 2009 3:07PM
I liked the baby pirates.
Marco le Polo @ Oct 15th 2009 4:43PM
Me too :(
Dr. Bradwart [100% Reagan Conservative!] @ Oct 15th 2009 5:38PM
Marco...
zero2dash @ Oct 15th 2009 2:49PM
...'Cause of course you know that R4 is the only company making flash carts.
Yet another foolish lawsuit by companies that don't get it, just like the RIAA.
Let's lump another one in there while we're at it. Why not have Pepsi sue RC for making RC Cola, even though Coke makes cola also.
Cypher @ Oct 15th 2009 2:54PM
It's impossible!
None can stop the Baby Pirates!
avan @ Oct 15th 2009 3:05PM
Illegal instruments are those you use to kill the whales!!
MRLN (The Comment God) @ Oct 15th 2009 3:27PM
...the effects of this lawsuit? Acekard and CycloDS sales go up.
I'm listening to music on my R4 right now, and I play GBC games and Quake on it, but otherwise I buy my games and play them in with the intended media.
I wish everyone would do what Moonshell does and not let you play commercial ROMs.
Nelson @ Oct 15th 2009 5:42PM
The only reason I ever bought a DSlite was to pirate :(
I'm broke.
ChuckBartowski @ Oct 15th 2009 10:10PM
... they do know that there are like 10 other, better flashcarts other than R4 rite?
esposch @ Oct 16th 2009 1:17AM
I'm gathering MetaFortress didn't turn out as well as they thought it would. :D