Major classic emulation website Emuparadise has pulled their ROM downloads after Nintendo issued a legal threat.
Classic emulation is a method of preserving video game history. When the market moves on, emulation steps in to allow people to experience video game history. That’s where ROM sites come in, providing a key element in helping players play games long out of print by companies that have long since been dead and gone.
Unfortunately, one of those sites is simply not offering that historic preservation service. The owner of Emuparadise says he will no longer offer ROMs of any kind. This follows an apparent legal threat from Nintendo.
The site has seen its share of DMCA notices in the past. This includes Nintendo. In response, the specific game or games in question is typically removed, allowing the rest of the archives to remain intact for the public to access. Unfortunately, this latest threat proved to be too much for the owner. All ROMs have been removed from the site including Commodore 64 and Atari 2600 ROMs as well as ZXSpectrum tape files.
While some argue that this is an extreme reaction, especially since most of these files have nothing to do with Nintendo, the owner felt that it was the right decision. From their official announcement:
It’s not worth it for us to risk potentially disastrous consequences. I cannot in good conscience risk the futures of our team members who have contributed to the site through the years. We run EmuParadise for the love of retro games and for you to be able to revisit those good times. Unfortunately, it’s not possible right now to do so in a way that makes everyone happy and keeps us out of trouble.
This is an extremely emotional decision for me after running this site for so many years. But I believe it is the right thing for us at this point of time.
Thus, we have decided to make a new start. We will continue to be passionate retro gamers and will keep doing cool stuff around retro games. But you won’t be able to get your games from here for now. Where we go with this is up to us and up to you.
We’ll still have our emulators database, the community, and everything that comes along with that.
We have already made several plans of what is going to happen next. It’s going to be a fun new beginning and there’s going to be lots to come! We’d also love to hear from you in the comments about what you think we should do. But for now, we need to make this change. We’ve served the community for 18 glorious years and it’s been a hell of a ride!
But every end is a new beginning and we’re excited to find a way forward to continue being your #1 emulation destination.
As mentioned in the announcement, Emuparadise has been around for a very long time. Over the years, it grew to be a major destination for all things emulation. This is largely thanks to not serving malware or forcing people to download questionable executable’s. On top of it all, they didn’t ask people to register to gain access to their downloads. As a result of this combination, it’s no wonder the site gradually became a go-to destination for experiencing gaming history.
Alternatives to Pick Up the Slack
As is often the case for sites like this, alternatives to Emuparadise stand to gain a lot with the loss of Emuparadise offerings. These sites include The-Eye.eu, NicoBlog, and Vimm’s Lair. It’s unclear who stands to benefit the most from the loss of Emuparadise, but many know that those users looking for those old ROM images will be looking elsewhere from now on. There’s even that possibility some other site will swoop in and become the next go-to destination for video game history.
For now, things will no doubt be in a state of flux as is often the case when a large destination suddenly drops support for certain kinds of content. It will simply take time for things to settle back down.
Drew Wilson on Twitter: @icecube85 and Google+.
