Tropic Haze Settles Nintendo Lawsuit Against Nintendo Switch Emulator Yuzu

Caitlyn Taylor March 4th, 2024 - 11:05 AM

Nintendo’s lawsuit against Tropic Haze, developer of the Nintendo Switch emulator Yuzu, have seemingly concluded amicably between both parties.

Recent court documents revealed that Tropic Haze is to pay Nintendo a relief sum of $2.4 million. Additionally, according to Video Games Chronicle (VGC), a permanent injunction was issued preventing Tropic Haze from giving out and marketing Yuzu and its source code, this forbidding Tropic Haze from creating any software similar to Yuzu. Additionally, the injunction called for Tropic Haze to relinquish Yuzu’s domain name.

[yuzu]

yuzu will pay $2.4 million in damages to Nintendo to settle their lawsuit.
This was mutually agreed upon by both parties.https://t.co/XeOaaO03Z7 pic.twitter.com/YmpJY7EZRz

— OatmealDome (@OatmealDome) March 4, 2024

The Japanese video game giant had filed the lawsuit last month with the US District Court of Rhode Island. Among its many concerns Nintendo claimed that Yuzu had violated the Anti-Circumvention and Anti-Trafficking provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act which prohibits the circumvention of technological measures employed by or on behalf of copyright owners to protect access to their works by allowing players to access Nintendo Switch games on other platforms such as Windows, Linux, and Android.

“With Yuzu in hand, nothing stops a user from obtaining and playing unlawful copies of virtually any game made for the Nintendo Switch, all without paying a dime to Nintendo or to any of the hundred of other game developers and publishers making and selling games for the Nintendo Switch,” Nintendo said.

According to Nintendo this has resulted in popular titles like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom get leaked and pirated weeks before their release date.

For many gamers the lawsuit against Yuzu was a matter of when and not if, considering the company’s strict hold over its IP. With Tropic Haze settling and the injunction made against it, the emulator’s future seems grim. That said, the settlement is awaiting approval from the judge.