Re: is emulation piracy?

As Vimm said,"law isn't always black and white.". You have a better argument if you owned the physical copy of a game and wanted a backup copy digitally, but as pointed out 99% of the time the physical game is near impossible or is impossible to obtain legally, hence the roms. I have no qualms downloading roms. The ones I download are ones I've owned in the past and thanks to a stupid younger self I sold them or lost most from moving around so much. In fact I've ripped my entire DVD library to a 5TB HD just in case something happens to the physical copy. With this said we have seen Nintendo coming down hard on websites and individuals using the law. So it's up to you if you want to proceed with roms or not.

In the legal sense, all emulation is piracy. The law isn't always black and white though, and what you're describing is the spirit of the law. Take speeding for example. Speed laws are designed to keep roads safe, so if I drive by a cop who clocks me going 60 in a 55 zone I'll get pulled over, right? Of course not. I'm driving safely and following the spirit of the law, why waste his time? Clock me at 100 though and he'll throw the book at me.

The same is true for emulation. Copyright laws exist to protect developers from piracy so downloading a Switch or PS4 game is clearly wrong. But as those games age the line blurs. Is it really "piracy" to download a Ninja Turtles game that hasn't sold in years? Nintendo unfortunately has to follow the letter of the law, so they can't sell any virtual game without permission. That's why if Konami changes their mind Ninja Turtles gets pulled from the store. It's also why most virtual store games are Nintendo published. But there's unscrupulous sites out there that don't fret the letter of the law, and as long as we drive safely the cops won't bother.