Nintendo To Appeal French Approval Of Flash Cards

Continental judge says Nintendo is deliberately locking out developers.

Posted by Staff
Nintendo To Appeal French Approval Of Flash Cards
Well this is strange. In the latest case surrounding game piracy, a French judge has ruled in favour of flash card manufacturer Divineo, accusing Nintendo of deliberately locking out developers.

That’s the crazy coming out of Continental Europe right now, with the Paris Criminal Court suggesting that the Nintendo DS should adopt a system like Microsoft Windows, where free applications can be made and run on the handheld.

Nintendo, clearly not amused, is supporting prosecutors in filing for an appeal to the judgement. Divineo has already been charged in Hong Kong, which resulted in the prohibition of manufacturing, marketing or exporting its DS products. The company has yet to pay back €45 million it owes Nintendo in damages from the preceding case.

A statement reads, “Nintendo is extremely disappointed with the decision by Paris’ Criminal Court to find Max Louarn, his company, Divineo, and other co-defendants not guilty in the criminal case involving the sale and distribution of game copying devices.

“Nintendo welcomes the Prosecutor’s decision to Appeal the Judgment. As a victim Nintendo will join his Appeal. Nintendo supports action against the distributors of such devices.”

Recently, the house of Mario has been taking a hard line against manufacturers of devices that could be used to play pirate Nintendo DS games. It continues its fight against the R4 Revolution cartridge in Japan, where despite a legal injunction is still selling in grey-market stalls in Akihabara and vending machines in Den Den Town.

Source: MCV
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Comments

Daemon 9 Dec 2009 16:52
1/1
See, I'm having a difficult time with this one. While the manufacture and distribution of flash card devices is clearly always going to primarily appeal to pirates, I've just run my battery down playing Still Alive DS using my R4. So, in one way, I'm finding myself agreeing with the French judge. That said, the people who made said judgement clearly have no idea of why the comparison they made is like comparing apples and napalm.

I don't want developers to lose money, destroying the future of the game industry. I don't want homebrewers to be rendered unable to continue their amazing craft, either. And I fear that homebrew devices that were incapable of running commercial ROMs would never be financially plausible. Le sigh.
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