Nintendo has secured another payout from a lawsuit it pursued against a producer of products designed to help pirate Switch games. Already notorious for its hardline approach to piracy, modding, and emulation, Nintendo has been granted a monetary judgment under which the target of the lawsuit must pay the company $2 million.
As spotted by X user OatmealDome, Ryan Michael Daly was found by a district court in Washington to have damaged Nintendo through his production and sale of modded devices. According to the court document reviewed by GameSpot, he created products “primarily designed for the purpose of circumventing the TPMs [technological protection measures].” The court also found that Daly’s actions “caused NOA [Nintendo of America] significant and irreparable harm.”
Along with having to pay $2 million to Nintendo, the modder is also permanently prohibited from taking any future action to evade Nintendo’s security or digital rights protection systems or to give guidance to other people in modding or pirating Nintendo property. The court order also mandates the seizure and destruction of any devices that Daly used in running his modding business.
This is not the first time that Nintendo has pursued stringent penalties against individuals who create software or hardware that can be used to pirate games. In one of the most notorious cases, the hacker Gary Bowser (really his name) was ordered to pay $15 million to Nintendo after serving prison time, and the company is allowed to garnish his wages until the whole amount is paid.
Nintendo has also increasingly cracked down on creators and advertisers of emulation software. Last year, for instance, it worked with YouTube to apply copyright strikes to creators who show off emulated Nintendo games and devices.
