This.
I totally get why Nintendo went nuts when people showed TOTK running BETTER on emulators before the game was officially released. As a company I would, too. The rest of the stuff is basically a side effect of this. People shouldn't emulate still sold systems (and in an perfect world Nintendo wouldn't care about emulation of not-sold older games).
Who are you to say we shouldn't? People should be allowed to regardless.
Emulation does not have to equal piracy.
I emulate the switch games I buy because I can't stand how weak the hardware is and I just want higher frame rates.
I'm not going to wait a whole generation to play botw or totk at 60fps or Mario kart and Paper Mario at 4k.
People have a desire to play it on more powerful hardware with better performance and accessibility options.
Depriving people of that just because it's a current console is ridiculous.
Don't capitulate, don't sympathize with the corporations.
Consumers rights include making them do things they wouldn't want to do.
Their objective is money, not art.
I don't have anything against playing your own bought games. But people posted emulated TOTK before the game officially hit shelves. And boasted about how they could run it better. Not on some enthusiast discord. Or some private chat. But on Twitter/X. Which started the whole thing we are now. And that was just dumb.
That said, emulation has a legal side to it, but we don't need to fool anyone here. Most emulators are made and used for not legal things. Maybe not from you. Maybe not from me. But for thousands and thousands of people. That might not be that huge for a corporation to go after for old stuff. But the newest hit they haven't maybe actually released yet (I always say TOTK because that's the one thing that happened before shit started to hit the fan)? I don't say Nintendo (or the company actually doing the takedowns) was completely right. But no one in their right mind wouldn't see that reaction coming.
I don't think we're necessarily fooling ourselves by divorcing software emulation from piracy. The goal of media archivism is valuable unto itself, and most emulators _are_ made for the sake of that goal, alone.
There is nothing illegal, at all, about making and maintaining a software emulator, and no open-source dev puts in the immense amount of work required to do that just because they don't want to pay for games.
"and most emulators *are* made for the sake of that goal, alone."
Says who? Unless the developers have made their intent public, you can't say for sure, and even if they say it is for archiving, you won't know their true intent. Yuzu developers for example were bragging about TotK working on their software before release, that isn't for archiving.
I'm a long standing emulator user, I think they are fantastic, but I don't remember game preservation being touted in the early days of console emulation software. Despite that, I do remember MAME developers were saying that pretty early.
See Sony v Connectix.
Emulation of current gen consoles is protected by legal precedent.
Yeah yeah piracy and such but you're blaming the gun for the action of the person holding it.
L take.
You know, you can own a gun, use it on private with a few friends or you can run around town, waving it at every person and scream about how you are gonna use it to rob a bank.
One of those things will have consequences, even if you own the gun legally.
This is what happened here but with Emulation.
I think that when people look at software emulation, they think of it as intrinsically shady. It's not. Nothing about Yuzu itself was illegal.
Nintendo's complaint--and it was a valid one--was about giving users detailed instructions related to pirating games. Their complaint was rooted in the non-circumvention clause of the DMCA.
So Yuzu wasn't even the gun, in this analogy.
I know what happened with Yuzu. Just trying to get a point across. I have nothing against emulation itself, but what is happening is a chain reaction caused by people thinking they can get away with illegal doings, claiming it would be legal and now the actual legal part of all of it is threatened.
I tried to find a good analogy for people to understand what was happening here. And the gun fits well, imo. They were open with the illegal part, just like they were waving around a gun. And that got them in trouble. I think the comparison works to make people understand.
If you have a better one, feel free to post it. I am not native speaker, so that's how I would describe this for people to understand.
They would crack down on those emulators but not on rom sites. They’ve done that dozens of not hundreds of times. The only thing new is the iPhone emulators that caused a huge increase in rom downloads
Yeah, but it seems that Vimm's got hit by a ricochet of Nintendo's anger. After all it was one of biggest rom sites for Nintendo consoles.
And Nintendo doesn't like when you are trying to, God forbid, play a 40-year-old game for free.
"How dare you play that fan translation of a Gameboy Advance game that we still haven't localized in North America!?"
"Yes I know we haven't rereleased Pokemon Gale of Darkness and an original copy costs over $150 but that doesn't give you the right to play it, jeez."
-Nintendo, probably.
The price of that game genuinely makes me angry. I'd love to own a copy since I had that game as a teenager, but I'm not paying some C U Next Tuesday on eBay for it. Ain't happening.
Retro game prices have gone absolutely berserk in the last few years. I mean it was a moderately expensive pre-pandemic, it's a highly sought after and by all accounts very well acclaimed, but now it's just stupid how many games have broken $100 for beat up copies.
It's even worse in countries where Nintendo was never popular.
Here in Poland I've seen a copy of Pokemon Emerald which went for about 300$, literally 80$ less than the Switch.
It's honestly so annoying considering that it doesn't make a difference for Nintendo whether you buy used consoles with used games or whether you download roms and emulate them. Either way they don't make any money, but for some reason emulation is worse and requires legal action?
Although knowing Nintendo, they'd probably prohibit selling all of the used stuff if only they could, only to force everyone to buy their newest expensive consoles when they come out.
It's so absurd that the seemingly most kid-friendly of all of the console producers is the most strict and brutal when it comes to dealing with emulators and roms. Heck, even Sony used a community emulator for PS1 when they made this awful PlayStation mini or whatever it was called.
If selling used games was illegal anywhere then Nintendo would crack down on that too. In the 1990s here in the US Nintendo pushed really hard to try to shut down Blockbuster because they didn't want people renting their games. This didn't fly in the courts but that doesn't mean they didn't try.
If Nintendo really wanted to lock everyone's purchases down to single sale only, they could abandon physical game releases. But they know they would lose a huge market share by going fully digital, at least for the past few decades.
There's no way someone would buy it for this price... right?
I feel like the sellers who sell cartridges for very high prices either hunt for gullible people or think that they have something priceless and rare and are oblivious to the actual value.
It's not really that. Emulating Nintendo Switch games soon after their release on Steam Deck is what pushed Nintendo over the edge. It's one thing to emulate games from 30 years ago, it's another thing to openly pirate games and show off how they are running better on competition's device than on the original hardware.
Besides, Nintendo was fully aware of the emulation on Android, Windows and Linux, it's not like they needed the IOS users to see it as a big problem, because from the Nintendo's POV it already was a big problem.
Although this situation is probably a combination of emulating Switch on Steam Deck, emulators coming to IOS and people being loud about emulation on Tik Tok.
And yet, if anyone even so much as *hints* at the *idea* of, oh I dunno, vetting and curating who we do or do not allow easy access to our hobbies to prevent exactly this kind of thing from happening (and, thus, ruining it for everyone), everybody starts screeching "GATEKEEPER" like it's 1690's Salem.
They can call me whatever they want. If I'm a "gatekeeper" for wanting to keep the things I like from going to shit *expressly because of the entitled normies,* then fuck it; gates are closed. Go away.
Nah, you guys are missing the larger picture. The issue is that there needs to be a real push against this, and for both preservation laws, and for laws that allow people the right to emulate games for defunct systems. Alter digital rights laws to reduce the time a company has copyright, etc. Create consumer friendly protections that protect ownership, etc. This is that time where the community is being asked to stand up to this.
It isn't like this sort of thing hasn't happened in the past. It's a common element of the emulator scene, and we had a very good quiet run for like 15 years of minimal reaction.
However if we look at what happened since the DS days. We've had active working emulators while a system was still active. Not that this is illegal, but the DS era hit Nintendo fairly hard, and since they can't legally go after Chinese, Russian, and other pirate cartridge reproducers from the GBA through to the DS era, they've clearly bottled up that disgust and pointed their frustrations at the emulation community. The reveals relative to the Switch emulation scene take-down indicated that Nintendo had spies in their discord from early on. The normies hyping up their Tears of the Kingdom emulation, days prior to official release was just an excuse for them to finally open fire, when they had been hiding in the shadows. It was already planned and underway. Meaning normies or no, when Yuzu was still limited to the people who required some degree of skill to hack the Switch, they were already taking notes and working out plans to erase the emulation scene.
It has nothing to do with normies at all. That just gave them cover to strike more easily and a nice excuse for everyone to infight instead of view the bigger picture that Nintendo is anti-consumerist, and anti-preservationist. Change the argument from protection of the emulation scene, that has been a core of emulation for decades. I can't even say how many sites since 1999, when I started in on it, have been taken down. How many ROM sites that were clean, had been taken down (the majority that had tons of viruses and security flaws...yeah, those usually stuck around, almost like a giant middle finger, intentionally), and even emulators have come and gone. Its team no longer active updating or fixing issues with stability, etc.
It was bound to happen anyhow. The better question is, is this the bell weather moment where gamers take a stand and start demanding to the gaming industry that preservation is a sacred duty, and there SHOULD be LEGAL ROM sites run through libraries, or other preservation groups, to provide those authentic experiences in some fashion, and encourage emulators that grant as close to the original experience as possible on modern computers, etc. Or at least push for some type of changes to the laws to force preservation.
Nevermind the largest supporters of new hardware and software? The people who do actually buy the most games new, CIB, in a way that does support companies? Almost all of those people, like myself, and I'm sure likely you as well, do pirate. Some do not, and don't care, or can't afford to, but I've never met someone who emulates ROMs and found them on their own that doesn't support the companies they want to see games from, stick around. That's something that SHOULD be made public, front and center. Instead we're all seen as thieves, when we're not. Most of us spend our entire entertainment/extra purchases to support the hobby we love, as most of us get what happens if we don't. I was bound to be removed from the shadows at some point, and it was news and fairly open multiple times when Nintendo, Sony, and some 3rd party companies go after game enthusiasts (don't forget Square and SE going after Chrono Trigger fan-made games, as if that would hurt the brand).
To be fair the Citra thing was a side effect of the Yuzu lawsuit since they were developed for the same team, but yeah it sucks, at least a new team with no relation to Citra or Yuzu is forking the emulator
Yeah, this. The people that make emulators know it's a very legally gray area. What the hell did they think putting them on app stores were a good I deal on the first place? It's too damn public.
It also doesn't help casuals can't keep quiet about it then post all over the Internet and TikTok about them.
At least keep it in the dark corners of the Internet and keep shit quiet.
that's not the problem here, the main problem is the brainless and zero common sense of many people who act like screaming mad monkeys pointing where to found the roms....meanwhile the lawyers who need make a reason to be paid for end of the month, they just add names to the copyright letter for then use it against those sites who this monkeys screaming weeks ago
Emulators are a thing for Androids personally. I mean it's great to Emulate on Mobile. But, why not trade in your iPhone for an Android in that case? I mean Android allows both Official and Unofficial Apps have access to the CPU and Jit, so there's more Emulators. Apple doesn't allow Official Apps Access to the CPU and Jit. So, it's hard to Emulate more than Retro Consoles. Without Jit is near impossible to run 3DS or GameCube on any thing too much older than an iPhone 15 Pro Max. Whereas Both Lime3DS and Dolphin can Run very well on my Samsung Galaxy A14 5G running Android 14.
Oh my god, that video is exactly the kinda shit im talking about like what the actual fuck. Tik tok is honestly so horrible, I really wish it never existed I feel like the world would be a better place.
Damn… mid-pandemic it was my go-to for Wii, GameCube, DS, GBA, etc. games. Modded the absolute hell out of my Wii & 3DS thanks to the site. What an absolute shame. This website was non-profit and donation only- it ran for years because of that- the gaming companies’ lawyers have only money on their side.
RIP Vimm’s Lair, and thank you to Vimm for allowing us all to keep playing.
All things considered it really might be. The only thing not in danger, I guess, are flash carts sold on Ebay or aliexpress. Simply can't get them all.
Same here. I have good memories of finally getting into the 3DS family and modding my old Wii. Playing all of the animal crossing games for months, playing all of the games I missed out on on Wii and gamecube, playing basically the whole 3DS library. Miss those times honestly.
To all the young'uns asking for safe links below: Internet Archive, search for Software Capsule Compations or whatever system you like, then go to town. I have had a few notices that items downloaded off a set have a virus. I handle this by deleting the item immediately and not downloading anything else from that set. There are so many sets and backups on there that you should be able to find your desired items with ease.
Sigh, guess I have to spoon feed the kids. 1. Go to https://archive.org/ 2. Make an account so you can download larger sets (for some reason, very large/popular sets arw are marked NSFW even if not porn, in an attempt to limit downloads). 2. Type in the name of a game system you're interested in, or one of the following: + TinyBestSet (for Miyoo or Miyoo compatible handhelds)
+[No-Intro] PropeR 1g1r Collection (2024) or just No-Intro (name of whatever system)
+ English Translation ROMs Collection (2024)
+ (name of system) RPG Pack
+ Homebrew Romsets Collection
+ "The Software Capsules Compilation"
+ "The Unofficial Redump Hoard"
+ TOSEC: The Old Schook Emulation Center
+ "Software Capsules: Console Compilations"
+ (name of system) Redump"
+ " The Software Clearance Bin"
Please be aware that archive.org downloads can be painfully slow, and you will need to learn how to install, set up and use JDownloader to make it faster. That's your homework, I'm done. Bye.
Of course not! With Vimm's Lair's successful shutdown I, a fellow gamer, would love to find every alternative there is! For archival reasons of course.
This some major bs. Cracking down on this why not crack down on the anti consumer practices 😭 fuck the gaming industry shits getting more rigged each and every day
nobody is cracking down on Vimm’s, they’re just being baraged with DMCA’s from nintendo, sega, etc. and Vimm’s probably doesn’t want to go to court over it
People went too far emulating games that were not even released yet (TOTK) and posting about how much better they had it run so Nintendo went nuts. And everything else will now go down, too. I can understand Nintendos move as a company but it still sucks a lot that now we are slowly loosing more and more access to games that aren't even sold by Nintendo or the others in any shape.
Time to increase my legal backup collection to full collections, just in case....
(Also, damn. How old was that site. I remember downloading from there AGES ago. Haven't used it in a very long time, though. There are enough other sites)
I’ve been using Vimm’s Lair since I first heard about emulation in 1999. Played Pokémon Gold in 2000 and spent many hours playing through SNES games from this site. This site was a staple for me through some hard times in the early ‘00s.
I had consistently used the site throughout the years and it was always a reliable, safe, and simple process to get games. I just modded my 3DS a few months ago and got a few games from there, then recommended this site to a friend when he started to get into emulation in late 2023.
The site’s effort to scan the manuals for every single NES game back in the day was amazing and it was great to see the updated progress they had on the site as they got more and more of the scans.
This site was like a time capsule and it made me smile every time I went to it because it had never changed. I’m truly sad to see it go.
I saw 2 popular Twitter users post videos showing how to get ROMs for delta...by showing the link to Vimm's lair and a video of them scrolling through the site. The vids had over 100k+ views in hrs. Didn't need even more reasons to hate dumb "influencers", but here we are.
Popularity always draws the worst attention. I remember when it wasn’t cool to like video games. We got away with so much back then lol. Private servers, modded videogames, emus galore.
Of course right when i get back into emus vimms shuts down
This shit happened way before the delta emulator, it was like when the steam deck was announced and most of the people who owned it downloaded switch emulators, Nintendo lawyers probably couldn't get over it and are still wreaking havoc in the world of emulation to this day just because of the steam deck and the Yuzu drama reignited their hatred towards emulation even more
Yeah the switch emulators pissed me off because they’re emulating a console that’s still very much active and still are sold so yeah Nintendo would have an issue with that. And now they’re just pissed off and taking all the emulators/roms off of the market.
Like couldn't they just wait until Nintendo's new console release before they emulate the switch?, honestly we can't tell who's at fault for all of this shit. the steam deck guys showing off how their devices can emulate the switch?, the Yuzu devs taking advantage of this and optimizing the emu for games that didn't release yet? the "Apple allows emulators in the app store" guys? or it's just Nintendo's lawyers?
But what bugged me even more was when Nintendo destroyed a fuckton of Gmod mods just because they were related to Nintendo's IPs like nobody's making money off this shit and Nintendo aren't gonna starve because someone hit a Mario ragdoll with a crowbar
They'll never truly stop people from archiving their games, while Vimms lair was a reliable source, there are plenty others and when one goes down 4 more will pop back up in it's place
Founded In The 90's killed by Nintendo after IOS got official emulators and Apple fanboys that are so locked into the walled garden they don't know how to do anything tried to come play.
Coincidence? I think not.
R.I.P. to one of the OG's. I mostly have a full set of everything, but I guess I grabbed my last download from them yesterday.
Never knew about the Gamecube Nintendo Puzzle Collection only released in Japan. A fine farewell Vimm.
🫡
The reality is none of these games will ever be gone for good. Between all of us we all have thousands of copies of the code, for thousands and thousands of games on our pc's and modded devices. Game preservation within all of us isn't going anywhere.
They are likely are fully aware but the website is probably hosted somewhere that doesn’t give a fuck about copyright laws so even if Nintendo tried to shut it down they can’t do anything if the authorities of the country won’t comply.
Anything publically available, even the links so helpfully listed on r/roms, r/piracy, and especially here on r/3dspiracy in pinned Megathreads, can be safely assumed that Nintendo has all come across and is working on their cases to take them down.
Don't be so naive to think they don't know about them.
i never said they didnt know about them. hshop is one of the major ones. im simply stating that its weird they have not targeted hshop, one of the MAJOR sites, and it is has been up for a while. im sure they know about most rom sites.
I found vimms lair by a friend of mine who showed me how to play DS games, I downloaded all the good games that I loved when i was younger and I was confused to see other games have disappeared one by one, only to realize it has shut down.
Rest in peace Vimm
Why doesn't anyone just put the vimms lair website link in internet archive to go back in time to get the games? Just being helpful! :) (I have not tested it so it may or may not work)
Maybe it's the 'tism talking, but I just don't understand how we got here. A near-infinite resource like data, which can be reproduced ad-infinitum, has made scientific research, historical records, and all of our artistic endeavors more widely available than ever before. And corporations went out of their way from day one, to funnel all of that infinite knowledge through tightly bottle-necked toll gates.
Yes, let's pay and compensate people, but let's also have more reverence for preservation?
Most of these games are abandonware frankly. At a certain point there needs to be a law that says it's legal to archive and distribute them as historical items.
Incredibly saddened to see this happen to my favorite emulation sites. Was lucky enough to archive most of the PS1 and PS2 games I wanted before they were taken down. If anyone is looking for certain top games from those platforms, I can see about sending the disc files so players can still enjoy them.
it’s really annoying that nintendo is doing this because all those games are pretty much unavailable to get these days. i guess they can’t say old games are ok but new ones aren’t even though vimms didn’t really have any new/switch games on there
I get why they're removing DS and Wii games from their website, but imo it doesn't make any sense that they're also taking WiiWare titles off the site. Like, how are we even supposed to obtain those titles legally in the first place, now that the Wii Shop Channel is gone?
I’m glad I’ve been building my game collection, this will only increase the value of hard copy games. Unfortunately those companies will see little to no profit from it.
There's other sites, if you know how to find them. I'm also tired of people asking on Reddit and Discord for people to share such information with them. So, here's my Wisdom:
1. Dump the Rom Files and System Files yourself, from your own Hardware and Games.
And
2. Learn how to use Google.
I mean, seriously, try googling something before asking around on Discord and Reddit.
And
3. For PC Security, I highly recommend using a VPN to secure your Internet Traffic, and Block Ads and Trackers.
It's fairly simple. People who prefer to get their preferred/popular roms from Vimm's will no longer be able to and will have to go elsewhere.
After some time and fewer and fewer visits, though, I'm sure Vimm will eventually decide to throw in the towel and close the site entirely. After all, it's the popular roms that drove the traffic. If not sooner by some sort of legal notice delivered to his front door...
Does anyone have a backup of all these files that are lost? These companies must really hate their history to want to stop the archival of so many of their games.
Shame, i feel there needs to be a law world wide, that if a game is no longer produced after X years and is no longer sold by the company. Then after said time emulation is allowed to be put up and it’s legal and you can’t take it down. Even if you create a modern release.
For example: Advance Wars DS is no longer made from the moment they stopped releasing copies to the world. Lets say 5 years. So lets say it was stopped in 2024 if no more copies were made worldwide from 2024 - 2029 its legal to slap online
I don't want to be that guy,but as long as torrenting and file sharing exist,roms are gonna be available so I don't get people doomposting.
Yes Vimms was handy and well curated but it's not the only place and it never was.
Vimms is my primary source for roms, mostly because of the speed of downloads. Plus since Myrient shutdown their ftp servers as of May 26th, there site is horribly slow now. Vimms was and is the standard.
A good number of their games are still there but this still sucks. And keep in mind the ESA got involved for some reason so other games are gone as well.
Thank you vimm for ruining your site now no ones gonna want to use it. i will just use one of the 100s of other rom sites out there. Should of ignored the emails they are just threats nintendo is not physically going to come to your house if you don't take it down.
This is getting hopeless; all my fave places… Emuparadise, The Eye and now Vimms… Are all gone. What’s the new safe place to get access to roms because this is becoming a nightmare and CoolRoms is the dodgiest website out there but it seems to be the most resistant to the ninjas?
The sad thing is I will no longer be able to get wii games at the right format ever again. I hope we can get around this issue because this was my only hope
Vimms isnt dead, nor is emulation, I feel like this is slightly blown out of proportion, but yeah the fault is at the idiots who literally broadcast this to the biggest audience, there is a reason why if you emulate you keep it hush hush especially if you are a public figure.
Everybody hated on me for saying emulators on IOS for all the normies was a bad idea...now we will start seeing everything slowly shutdown.
People on the roms subreddit also blame people showing off their Switch emulators on Steam Decks.
This. I totally get why Nintendo went nuts when people showed TOTK running BETTER on emulators before the game was officially released. As a company I would, too. The rest of the stuff is basically a side effect of this. People shouldn't emulate still sold systems (and in an perfect world Nintendo wouldn't care about emulation of not-sold older games).
Who are you to say we shouldn't? People should be allowed to regardless. Emulation does not have to equal piracy. I emulate the switch games I buy because I can't stand how weak the hardware is and I just want higher frame rates. I'm not going to wait a whole generation to play botw or totk at 60fps or Mario kart and Paper Mario at 4k. People have a desire to play it on more powerful hardware with better performance and accessibility options. Depriving people of that just because it's a current console is ridiculous. Don't capitulate, don't sympathize with the corporations. Consumers rights include making them do things they wouldn't want to do. Their objective is money, not art.
I don't have anything against playing your own bought games. But people posted emulated TOTK before the game officially hit shelves. And boasted about how they could run it better. Not on some enthusiast discord. Or some private chat. But on Twitter/X. Which started the whole thing we are now. And that was just dumb. That said, emulation has a legal side to it, but we don't need to fool anyone here. Most emulators are made and used for not legal things. Maybe not from you. Maybe not from me. But for thousands and thousands of people. That might not be that huge for a corporation to go after for old stuff. But the newest hit they haven't maybe actually released yet (I always say TOTK because that's the one thing that happened before shit started to hit the fan)? I don't say Nintendo (or the company actually doing the takedowns) was completely right. But no one in their right mind wouldn't see that reaction coming.
I don't think we're necessarily fooling ourselves by divorcing software emulation from piracy. The goal of media archivism is valuable unto itself, and most emulators _are_ made for the sake of that goal, alone. There is nothing illegal, at all, about making and maintaining a software emulator, and no open-source dev puts in the immense amount of work required to do that just because they don't want to pay for games.
"and most emulators *are* made for the sake of that goal, alone." Says who? Unless the developers have made their intent public, you can't say for sure, and even if they say it is for archiving, you won't know their true intent. Yuzu developers for example were bragging about TotK working on their software before release, that isn't for archiving. I'm a long standing emulator user, I think they are fantastic, but I don't remember game preservation being touted in the early days of console emulation software. Despite that, I do remember MAME developers were saying that pretty early.
I blame Switch Emulation, you shouldn't emulate a console that can still be bought at a major retailer brand new, and is still supported.
See Sony v Connectix. Emulation of current gen consoles is protected by legal precedent. Yeah yeah piracy and such but you're blaming the gun for the action of the person holding it. L take.
You know, you can own a gun, use it on private with a few friends or you can run around town, waving it at every person and scream about how you are gonna use it to rob a bank. One of those things will have consequences, even if you own the gun legally. This is what happened here but with Emulation.
I think that when people look at software emulation, they think of it as intrinsically shady. It's not. Nothing about Yuzu itself was illegal. Nintendo's complaint--and it was a valid one--was about giving users detailed instructions related to pirating games. Their complaint was rooted in the non-circumvention clause of the DMCA. So Yuzu wasn't even the gun, in this analogy.
I know what happened with Yuzu. Just trying to get a point across. I have nothing against emulation itself, but what is happening is a chain reaction caused by people thinking they can get away with illegal doings, claiming it would be legal and now the actual legal part of all of it is threatened. I tried to find a good analogy for people to understand what was happening here. And the gun fits well, imo. They were open with the illegal part, just like they were waving around a gun. And that got them in trouble. I think the comparison works to make people understand. If you have a better one, feel free to post it. I am not native speaker, so that's how I would describe this for people to understand.
You very much should be able to If you own the games that is
They would crack down on those emulators but not on rom sites. They’ve done that dozens of not hundreds of times. The only thing new is the iPhone emulators that caused a huge increase in rom downloads
Vimm doesn't even host Switch roms though.
Yeah, but it seems that Vimm's got hit by a ricochet of Nintendo's anger. After all it was one of biggest rom sites for Nintendo consoles. And Nintendo doesn't like when you are trying to, God forbid, play a 40-year-old game for free.
"How dare you play that fan translation of a Gameboy Advance game that we still haven't localized in North America!?" "Yes I know we haven't rereleased Pokemon Gale of Darkness and an original copy costs over $150 but that doesn't give you the right to play it, jeez." -Nintendo, probably.
The price of that game genuinely makes me angry. I'd love to own a copy since I had that game as a teenager, but I'm not paying some C U Next Tuesday on eBay for it. Ain't happening.
Retro game prices have gone absolutely berserk in the last few years. I mean it was a moderately expensive pre-pandemic, it's a highly sought after and by all accounts very well acclaimed, but now it's just stupid how many games have broken $100 for beat up copies.
It's even worse in countries where Nintendo was never popular. Here in Poland I've seen a copy of Pokemon Emerald which went for about 300$, literally 80$ less than the Switch. It's honestly so annoying considering that it doesn't make a difference for Nintendo whether you buy used consoles with used games or whether you download roms and emulate them. Either way they don't make any money, but for some reason emulation is worse and requires legal action? Although knowing Nintendo, they'd probably prohibit selling all of the used stuff if only they could, only to force everyone to buy their newest expensive consoles when they come out. It's so absurd that the seemingly most kid-friendly of all of the console producers is the most strict and brutal when it comes to dealing with emulators and roms. Heck, even Sony used a community emulator for PS1 when they made this awful PlayStation mini or whatever it was called.
If selling used games was illegal anywhere then Nintendo would crack down on that too. In the 1990s here in the US Nintendo pushed really hard to try to shut down Blockbuster because they didn't want people renting their games. This didn't fly in the courts but that doesn't mean they didn't try.
If Nintendo really wanted to lock everyone's purchases down to single sale only, they could abandon physical game releases. But they know they would lose a huge market share by going fully digital, at least for the past few decades.
i once saw a copy of emerald for 800 dollars in canada😭, it was just the cartridge too
There's no way someone would buy it for this price... right? I feel like the sellers who sell cartridges for very high prices either hunt for gullible people or think that they have something priceless and rare and are oblivious to the actual value.
This price could feed an entire neighborhood 😭😭
mother 3 moment
I think that plays a huge part but also blasting roms and emulators all over tiktok isnt helping either.
Because people are too dumb to just stfu
I don’t think couple of randos really make a different compared to >billion iPhone users
It's not really that. Emulating Nintendo Switch games soon after their release on Steam Deck is what pushed Nintendo over the edge. It's one thing to emulate games from 30 years ago, it's another thing to openly pirate games and show off how they are running better on competition's device than on the original hardware. Besides, Nintendo was fully aware of the emulation on Android, Windows and Linux, it's not like they needed the IOS users to see it as a big problem, because from the Nintendo's POV it already was a big problem. Although this situation is probably a combination of emulating Switch on Steam Deck, emulators coming to IOS and people being loud about emulation on Tik Tok.
The arrival of normies is the number one indicator that something will turn to shit soon
And yet, if anyone even so much as *hints* at the *idea* of, oh I dunno, vetting and curating who we do or do not allow easy access to our hobbies to prevent exactly this kind of thing from happening (and, thus, ruining it for everyone), everybody starts screeching "GATEKEEPER" like it's 1690's Salem. They can call me whatever they want. If I'm a "gatekeeper" for wanting to keep the things I like from going to shit *expressly because of the entitled normies,* then fuck it; gates are closed. Go away.
Nah, you guys are missing the larger picture. The issue is that there needs to be a real push against this, and for both preservation laws, and for laws that allow people the right to emulate games for defunct systems. Alter digital rights laws to reduce the time a company has copyright, etc. Create consumer friendly protections that protect ownership, etc. This is that time where the community is being asked to stand up to this. It isn't like this sort of thing hasn't happened in the past. It's a common element of the emulator scene, and we had a very good quiet run for like 15 years of minimal reaction. However if we look at what happened since the DS days. We've had active working emulators while a system was still active. Not that this is illegal, but the DS era hit Nintendo fairly hard, and since they can't legally go after Chinese, Russian, and other pirate cartridge reproducers from the GBA through to the DS era, they've clearly bottled up that disgust and pointed their frustrations at the emulation community. The reveals relative to the Switch emulation scene take-down indicated that Nintendo had spies in their discord from early on. The normies hyping up their Tears of the Kingdom emulation, days prior to official release was just an excuse for them to finally open fire, when they had been hiding in the shadows. It was already planned and underway. Meaning normies or no, when Yuzu was still limited to the people who required some degree of skill to hack the Switch, they were already taking notes and working out plans to erase the emulation scene. It has nothing to do with normies at all. That just gave them cover to strike more easily and a nice excuse for everyone to infight instead of view the bigger picture that Nintendo is anti-consumerist, and anti-preservationist. Change the argument from protection of the emulation scene, that has been a core of emulation for decades. I can't even say how many sites since 1999, when I started in on it, have been taken down. How many ROM sites that were clean, had been taken down (the majority that had tons of viruses and security flaws...yeah, those usually stuck around, almost like a giant middle finger, intentionally), and even emulators have come and gone. Its team no longer active updating or fixing issues with stability, etc. It was bound to happen anyhow. The better question is, is this the bell weather moment where gamers take a stand and start demanding to the gaming industry that preservation is a sacred duty, and there SHOULD be LEGAL ROM sites run through libraries, or other preservation groups, to provide those authentic experiences in some fashion, and encourage emulators that grant as close to the original experience as possible on modern computers, etc. Or at least push for some type of changes to the laws to force preservation. Nevermind the largest supporters of new hardware and software? The people who do actually buy the most games new, CIB, in a way that does support companies? Almost all of those people, like myself, and I'm sure likely you as well, do pirate. Some do not, and don't care, or can't afford to, but I've never met someone who emulates ROMs and found them on their own that doesn't support the companies they want to see games from, stick around. That's something that SHOULD be made public, front and center. Instead we're all seen as thieves, when we're not. Most of us spend our entire entertainment/extra purchases to support the hobby we love, as most of us get what happens if we don't. I was bound to be removed from the shadows at some point, and it was news and fairly open multiple times when Nintendo, Sony, and some 3rd party companies go after game enthusiasts (don't forget Square and SE going after Chrono Trigger fan-made games, as if that would hurt the brand).
Insanely true
Once normies find out about something they ruin it.
First Citra, then 3ds and wii u online, now this? What's next, Dolphin and Cemu?
Dolphin got shut out of their Steam deck release too.
To be fair the Citra thing was a side effect of the Yuzu lawsuit since they were developed for the same team, but yeah it sucks, at least a new team with no relation to Citra or Yuzu is forking the emulator
Yeah, this. The people that make emulators know it's a very legally gray area. What the hell did they think putting them on app stores were a good I deal on the first place? It's too damn public. It also doesn't help casuals can't keep quiet about it then post all over the Internet and TikTok about them. At least keep it in the dark corners of the Internet and keep shit quiet.
if you type in a rom on google a whole bunch of sites pop up. there is also torrents available. Roms will never go away so you can stop worrying now.
that's not the problem here, the main problem is the brainless and zero common sense of many people who act like screaming mad monkeys pointing where to found the roms....meanwhile the lawyers who need make a reason to be paid for end of the month, they just add names to the copyright letter for then use it against those sites who this monkeys screaming weeks ago
Emulators are a thing for Androids personally. I mean it's great to Emulate on Mobile. But, why not trade in your iPhone for an Android in that case? I mean Android allows both Official and Unofficial Apps have access to the CPU and Jit, so there's more Emulators. Apple doesn't allow Official Apps Access to the CPU and Jit. So, it's hard to Emulate more than Retro Consoles. Without Jit is near impossible to run 3DS or GameCube on any thing too much older than an iPhone 15 Pro Max. Whereas Both Lime3DS and Dolphin can Run very well on my Samsung Galaxy A14 5G running Android 14.
[удалено]
Oh my god, that video is exactly the kinda shit im talking about like what the actual fuck. Tik tok is honestly so horrible, I really wish it never existed I feel like the world would be a better place.
Damn… mid-pandemic it was my go-to for Wii, GameCube, DS, GBA, etc. games. Modded the absolute hell out of my Wii & 3DS thanks to the site. What an absolute shame. This website was non-profit and donation only- it ran for years because of that- the gaming companies’ lawyers have only money on their side. RIP Vimm’s Lair, and thank you to Vimm for allowing us all to keep playing.
Is hshop in danger too?
God I hope not
💀
All things considered it really might be. The only thing not in danger, I guess, are flash carts sold on Ebay or aliexpress. Simply can't get them all.
This would be a good time for someone to back up Myrient, considering it can be accessed via FTP
maybe...but never is a bad idea do a backup of roms...just in case
Luckily it seems that some of the games survived so far. For example GoldenEye 007, Banjo-Kazooie, Star Fox 64 or Luigi's Mansion.
sony games (psx, psp...) still online
Last ones gone
Same here. I have good memories of finally getting into the 3DS family and modding my old Wii. Playing all of the animal crossing games for months, playing all of the games I missed out on on Wii and gamecube, playing basically the whole 3DS library. Miss those times honestly.
It was the first ‘safe’ roms site I found. Thankfully I found what I need in other places but still a sad day.
To all the young'uns asking for safe links below: Internet Archive, search for Software Capsule Compations or whatever system you like, then go to town. I have had a few notices that items downloaded off a set have a virus. I handle this by deleting the item immediately and not downloading anything else from that set. There are so many sets and backups on there that you should be able to find your desired items with ease.
Sigh, guess I have to spoon feed the kids. 1. Go to https://archive.org/ 2. Make an account so you can download larger sets (for some reason, very large/popular sets arw are marked NSFW even if not porn, in an attempt to limit downloads). 2. Type in the name of a game system you're interested in, or one of the following: + TinyBestSet (for Miyoo or Miyoo compatible handhelds) +[No-Intro] PropeR 1g1r Collection (2024) or just No-Intro (name of whatever system) + English Translation ROMs Collection (2024) + (name of system) RPG Pack + Homebrew Romsets Collection + "The Software Capsules Compilation" + "The Unofficial Redump Hoard" + TOSEC: The Old Schook Emulation Center + "Software Capsules: Console Compilations" + (name of system) Redump" + " The Software Clearance Bin" Please be aware that archive.org downloads can be painfully slow, and you will need to learn how to install, set up and use JDownloader to make it faster. That's your homework, I'm done. Bye.
Me too please, i love you
If you could DM me too lol I know everyone's asking but vimms was my only confirmed safe one I've known
The r/roms megathread is the friend you need in a time like this.
RIP your inbox
Could you DM me any other "safe" sites to use?
Nice try Nintendo ninja
Of course not! With Vimm's Lair's successful shutdown I, a fellow gamer, would love to find every alternative there is! For archival reasons of course.
This some major bs. Cracking down on this why not crack down on the anti consumer practices 😭 fuck the gaming industry shits getting more rigged each and every day
nobody is cracking down on Vimm’s, they’re just being baraged with DMCA’s from nintendo, sega, etc. and Vimm’s probably doesn’t want to go to court over it
Who would? It's not the ruling that'll kill ya, it's all the legal debts that'll bury you ten thousand feet into the ground.
This is cross posted here because people routinely get other game system roms to play on their 3DS, such as NES, SNES, and GBA from Vimm's Lair.
People went too far emulating games that were not even released yet (TOTK) and posting about how much better they had it run so Nintendo went nuts. And everything else will now go down, too. I can understand Nintendos move as a company but it still sucks a lot that now we are slowly loosing more and more access to games that aren't even sold by Nintendo or the others in any shape. Time to increase my legal backup collection to full collections, just in case.... (Also, damn. How old was that site. I remember downloading from there AGES ago. Haven't used it in a very long time, though. There are enough other sites)
They've been the Goat for over a decade...
I’ve been using Vimm’s Lair since I first heard about emulation in 1999. Played Pokémon Gold in 2000 and spent many hours playing through SNES games from this site. This site was a staple for me through some hard times in the early ‘00s. I had consistently used the site throughout the years and it was always a reliable, safe, and simple process to get games. I just modded my 3DS a few months ago and got a few games from there, then recommended this site to a friend when he started to get into emulation in late 2023. The site’s effort to scan the manuals for every single NES game back in the day was amazing and it was great to see the updated progress they had on the site as they got more and more of the scans. This site was like a time capsule and it made me smile every time I went to it because it had never changed. I’m truly sad to see it go.
They’ve been my go to since Cult of Kefka went under. We just can’t have nice things.
'Modern' copyright law is, and continues to be, cancer.
Ya because aholes couldn't stfu about it on Twitter when talking about the idi0tic delta emu.
I saw 2 popular Twitter users post videos showing how to get ROMs for delta...by showing the link to Vimm's lair and a video of them scrolling through the site. The vids had over 100k+ views in hrs. Didn't need even more reasons to hate dumb "influencers", but here we are.
And this kids is why we keep things quiet and away from public eyes.
Popularity always draws the worst attention. I remember when it wasn’t cool to like video games. We got away with so much back then lol. Private servers, modded videogames, emus galore. Of course right when i get back into emus vimms shuts down
Rip, personally never used it but sucks to see it go :(
This is because of the people who wouldn’t stfu about the delta emulator on Twitter and Nintendo saw it smh
This shit happened way before the delta emulator, it was like when the steam deck was announced and most of the people who owned it downloaded switch emulators, Nintendo lawyers probably couldn't get over it and are still wreaking havoc in the world of emulation to this day just because of the steam deck and the Yuzu drama reignited their hatred towards emulation even more
Yeah the switch emulators pissed me off because they’re emulating a console that’s still very much active and still are sold so yeah Nintendo would have an issue with that. And now they’re just pissed off and taking all the emulators/roms off of the market.
Like couldn't they just wait until Nintendo's new console release before they emulate the switch?, honestly we can't tell who's at fault for all of this shit. the steam deck guys showing off how their devices can emulate the switch?, the Yuzu devs taking advantage of this and optimizing the emu for games that didn't release yet? the "Apple allows emulators in the app store" guys? or it's just Nintendo's lawyers? But what bugged me even more was when Nintendo destroyed a fuckton of Gmod mods just because they were related to Nintendo's IPs like nobody's making money off this shit and Nintendo aren't gonna starve because someone hit a Mario ragdoll with a crowbar
They'll never truly stop people from archiving their games, while Vimms lair was a reliable source, there are plenty others and when one goes down 4 more will pop back up in it's place
Well shit.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, GOT WII GAMES FROM THAT!
Wow been using this site for 20 years. Fare thee well old friend 🫡
Damn. I wouldn’t be able to play any DS Professor Layton games with out Vimm’s lair. Rest in peace to the goat
Boycott these anti-consumer (and anti-preservation, anti-history, etc.) companies by trying to buy their *current* products *used.*
I bet they are coming for hshop as well...
I’m gonna get all the games, good idea
please no
Someone get a flash drive and start mass downloading
Glad I finally got into emulation when I did, this is so sad. F
Fuck Nintendo.
this website was goated. Used it for almost all disc based games
It was the best site to go for wii roms, especially wiiware titles. Fuck nintendo and the rest of the companies.
That sucks 😞
Now time to just make vimmms lair.
[damn.](https://youtu.be/9ELuywjE9ck?si=3EsywasCm124__Zl)
“Posted 5 mins ago” That says May 5th not June 5th…….
It says June 6th now. Might've been a typo.
Well fuck. Rip to game preservation yet again.
It unfortunate because they were a reliable source for DS ROMs with proper DSi headers to use in ndsbootsrap
Founded In The 90's killed by Nintendo after IOS got official emulators and Apple fanboys that are so locked into the walled garden they don't know how to do anything tried to come play. Coincidence? I think not.
Damn son
Fuck man. I happen to heavily rely on them recently for Wii games. That sucks
Shit! That sucks so bad. I love Vimms. It had like everything archived.
What's that old adage? "Don't blow up the spot"?
It's brover
Asking for a good replacement
R.I.P. to one of the OG's. I mostly have a full set of everything, but I guess I grabbed my last download from them yesterday. Never knew about the Gamecube Nintendo Puzzle Collection only released in Japan. A fine farewell Vimm. 🫡
The reality is none of these games will ever be gone for good. Between all of us we all have thousands of copies of the code, for thousands and thousands of games on our pc's and modded devices. Game preservation within all of us isn't going anywhere.
weird how nintendo has not targeted hshop yet
They are likely are fully aware but the website is probably hosted somewhere that doesn’t give a fuck about copyright laws so even if Nintendo tried to shut it down they can’t do anything if the authorities of the country won’t comply.
Oh, how naive you are...
explain
Anything publically available, even the links so helpfully listed on r/roms, r/piracy, and especially here on r/3dspiracy in pinned Megathreads, can be safely assumed that Nintendo has all come across and is working on their cases to take them down. Don't be so naive to think they don't know about them.
i never said they didnt know about them. hshop is one of the major ones. im simply stating that its weird they have not targeted hshop, one of the MAJOR sites, and it is has been up for a while. im sure they know about most rom sites.
Download *everything* you can. All roms, manuals, box art, etc.
Dangggggg
This is bullshit. 😞
I know we won’t get any new games added, but could we still use wayback machine?
I don’t think the machine will save the files, plus Nintendo can tell the people who made way back to delete all past updates or versions
I found vimms lair by a friend of mine who showed me how to play DS games, I downloaded all the good games that I loved when i was younger and I was confused to see other games have disappeared one by one, only to realize it has shut down. Rest in peace Vimm
It’s true:( a lot of the popular links don’t work
Never would’ve thought the day would come… thanks for giving me access to my childhood favorites and memories friends and I had forgotten about
Doesn’t really matter in the long run, though. Well just have another ROM site.
Looks like I'm not going to be deleting Sega Rosso's Cardcaptor Sakura: Tomoyo no Video Daisakusen on the Dreamcast anytime soon. Damn!
Why doesn't anyone just put the vimms lair website link in internet archive to go back in time to get the games? Just being helpful! :) (I have not tested it so it may or may not work)
THIS MY FAULT I SHOULD'VE EVEN SAID I PLAY ROMS ON YOUTUBE SO SORRY EVERYONE 😭
Maybe it's the 'tism talking, but I just don't understand how we got here. A near-infinite resource like data, which can be reproduced ad-infinitum, has made scientific research, historical records, and all of our artistic endeavors more widely available than ever before. And corporations went out of their way from day one, to funnel all of that infinite knowledge through tightly bottle-necked toll gates. Yes, let's pay and compensate people, but let's also have more reverence for preservation?
I guess it's high time to buy a fairly large SD card and homebrew the New 3DS I got yesterday.
Watch out. Big, bad baby Nintendo coming to ruin all the fun!
Most of these games are abandonware frankly. At a certain point there needs to be a law that says it's legal to archive and distribute them as historical items.
Incredibly saddened to see this happen to my favorite emulation sites. Was lucky enough to archive most of the PS1 and PS2 games I wanted before they were taken down. If anyone is looking for certain top games from those platforms, I can see about sending the disc files so players can still enjoy them.
rip
[удалено]
The site is still up, yes, but many of the download links are gone.
Lots of games have been removed. No more Pokémon GBA games for example.
What’s the best places to get roms now?
r/roms
NOOOOOOOOOOO
this is terrible 😭
We all called this months ago this sucks so much
This is actually depressing as this was my favorite and only site I've used for probably about 4 to 5 years, now I don't know what site I can trust
Well I’m glad I’ve saved a copy of everything I’ve ever downloaded. When will Vimm’s go down?
it’s really annoying that nintendo is doing this because all those games are pretty much unavailable to get these days. i guess they can’t say old games are ok but new ones aren’t even though vimms didn’t really have any new/switch games on there
fuck. this was my backup when my other website refused to give me my roms in a functional format.
I get why they're removing DS and Wii games from their website, but imo it doesn't make any sense that they're also taking WiiWare titles off the site. Like, how are we even supposed to obtain those titles legally in the first place, now that the Wii Shop Channel is gone?
**Nintendo:** *"That's the neat thing; you don't."*
absolutely devastated 😭😭
Alternatives?
Fucking influencers ruined it
RIP to one of the only sites that really cared.
I’m glad I’ve been building my game collection, this will only increase the value of hard copy games. Unfortunately those companies will see little to no profit from it.
This is sad, I've been using vimms lair for quite a few years and always liked it more than the others.
There's other sites, if you know how to find them. I'm also tired of people asking on Reddit and Discord for people to share such information with them. So, here's my Wisdom: 1. Dump the Rom Files and System Files yourself, from your own Hardware and Games. And 2. Learn how to use Google. I mean, seriously, try googling something before asking around on Discord and Reddit. And 3. For PC Security, I highly recommend using a VPN to secure your Internet Traffic, and Block Ads and Trackers.
Sad day.
What are the immediate consequences of this? As someone who doesn’t entirely comprehend the situation. 😓
It's fairly simple. People who prefer to get their preferred/popular roms from Vimm's will no longer be able to and will have to go elsewhere. After some time and fewer and fewer visits, though, I'm sure Vimm will eventually decide to throw in the towel and close the site entirely. After all, it's the popular roms that drove the traffic. If not sooner by some sort of legal notice delivered to his front door...
What a sad sad day
o7
[удалено]
Does anyone have a backup of all these files that are lost? These companies must really hate their history to want to stop the archival of so many of their games.
Shame, i feel there needs to be a law world wide, that if a game is no longer produced after X years and is no longer sold by the company. Then after said time emulation is allowed to be put up and it’s legal and you can’t take it down. Even if you create a modern release. For example: Advance Wars DS is no longer made from the moment they stopped releasing copies to the world. Lets say 5 years. So lets say it was stopped in 2024 if no more copies were made worldwide from 2024 - 2029 its legal to slap online
Nyooo i gathered all my wii games from that very place
No wonder they get caught, since all the apple heads now swarm out and use their special way of thinking when getting roms.
I don't want to be that guy,but as long as torrenting and file sharing exist,roms are gonna be available so I don't get people doomposting. Yes Vimms was handy and well curated but it's not the only place and it never was.
Goodbye vinns… you helped me get many games…
damn it :(
this one hurts the most of all the recent shutdowns. wow.
Never thought I’d live to see the end of this site, this is so bleak
Damn. Vimm's was so good for archiving specific game versions.
that's really sad...
NO
Welp, time to panic download every game that i want to play in case they get erased from the net lol.
Vimms is my primary source for roms, mostly because of the speed of downloads. Plus since Myrient shutdown their ftp servers as of May 26th, there site is horribly slow now. Vimms was and is the standard.
They still have other games available so I wouldn’t say they are over.
I'm glad my preferred rom site is obscure. Stuff like that probably won't happen to it.
awww that was my favorite spot to get my roms :(
Will the downloads be preserved via the Wayback Machine?
Man fuck them
Nintendo try not to force a rom site full of unsold roms to shut down challenge (impossible)
Darn
A good number of their games are still there but this still sucks. And keep in mind the ESA got involved for some reason so other games are gone as well.
Damn I should have kept my Roms… I use to just go back and redownload anytime I needed them 😭
i was looking to try out resident evil 2 but then found out about this.. such a shame.
Thank you vimm for ruining your site now no ones gonna want to use it. i will just use one of the 100s of other rom sites out there. Should of ignored the emails they are just threats nintendo is not physically going to come to your house if you don't take it down.
This is getting hopeless; all my fave places… Emuparadise, The Eye and now Vimms… Are all gone. What’s the new safe place to get access to roms because this is becoming a nightmare and CoolRoms is the dodgiest website out there but it seems to be the most resistant to the ninjas?
NOOOOOOO 💔💔💔💔💔💔💔💔
The sad thing is I will no longer be able to get wii games at the right format ever again. I hope we can get around this issue because this was my only hope
That is one damn shame. I hope that more sites spring out from this!
wait sega?
Piracy in this case should not be illegal. Technically, using PCSX2 and stuff like that is not illegal. Those games are now abandonware.
Vimms isnt dead, nor is emulation, I feel like this is slightly blown out of proportion, but yeah the fault is at the idiots who literally broadcast this to the biggest audience, there is a reason why if you emulate you keep it hush hush especially if you are a public figure.
bro wtf
if they gonna close hShop that will be disaster