Is it ethical? Does it promote pirating? Is it as black and white as people make it out to be, or is a grey area?
It's been a while since we've had this debate, /v/.
Ethical depends on how many assumptions you throw at it. Emulation is legal, so it is ethical, but if you assume that everyone who uses an emulator is pirating, then no it isn't ethical because they are stealing software.
This also plays into the argument of "If you cannot buy a game anymore is it ethical to pirate it?"
Frankly I don't give a shit and Nintendo can eat my asshole with a spoon, emulators provide a better experience than the consoles they are emulating do through higher graphical fidelity, freedom of controller choice and customization, mod support, and other features that the core console cannot provide in most cases. Can't wait for that 3DS emulator to become worthwhile so I can finally play the Majora's Mask and Ocarina of Time remakes on not a fucking handheld because Nintendo thought it was smart to only release those games in that format.
If I can't easily go to a few stores and find a new copy of the game and/or the console to play it, then I'm personally fine with the emulation of that game.
>>321159378
>Is it ethical
If you own the game legally, yes.
If the emulator uses white box reverse engineering, no, but who cares.
>>321159378
>is it ethical
no
>does it promote pirating
yes
>is it as black and white as people make it out to be
no, there are factors to be considered that put emulation in a moral gray area, including the availability of the emulated game (shantae before the virtual console rerelease), its potential inaccessibility (any cps-iii arcade game) and a lack of physical preservation (professional melee, which will switch to dolphin when tube tvs become harder to find)
the argument is pointless because very few people who pirate a game plan on buying it anyway, so developers can't consider them potential customers. you might as well be asking whether video games are art
>>321159378
>It's been a while since we've had this debate, /v/
that should be a good thing, but considering the amount of retards now, I don't know.
>>321159378
who cares it makes games look much better and appreciation for the devs/company can grow exponentially
I've been loving nintendo to death for a while now
>>321160059
How is it unethical?
>>321160027
Roms of any videogame that is/has been commercially available are illegal. It's illegal to back up your software.
I'll emulate when they're being dicks about it, for example being region locked outside of PAL or a Japanese game that doesn't include Japanese voices.
>>321160249
it isn't ethical because the idea behind emulation has nearly always been to make it possible to play games for free. don't get me wrong, I emulate games all the time, but I also don't delude myself into thinking what I'm doing isn't illegal
very few exceptions to that rule exist. higan is a standout example I can think of, because it exists solely as an experiment to see how accurately the super nintendo can be emulated
basically, I just don't care and neither should anyone else
>>321159378
No. Yes. Probably grey, but I don't care.
I emulate games because I don't have the console anymore, don't own the game anymore, I want to play an older game I've never played, or I just want to play a game with better graphics. But downloading all of those games is piracy, and I'm not gonna pretend like it's not.
>>321160516
I've always understood that emulators and emulation in general is a way of backing up your games and making it to where if there's ever a time that a game's life would have come to an end (as in completely disappeared from the face of the Earth) that there would be a copy of it somewhere.
>>321159378
it's kind of a grey area. chances are you're probably emulating a game that isn't on the market anymore, meaning if you buy it online or at a goodwill store, your money isn't going to the company that made them whatsoever. I think it's good to support the companies that make the games you enjoy, but I think it's also important to have emulation to keep the games alive for decades to come.
>>321159378
I do think the existence of emulation is a good thing because it allows people to easily play much older games quickly without a huge investment for one game. Along with that, I believe it may have prevented the prices of older used games from skyrocketing due to its rarity. Talking about piracy doesn't matter at this point. Someone either does or doesn't pirate.
Sure, some games get digital re-releases, but not all games benefit from that. Sometimes in a re-release, game mechanics get fucked, features are taken out or not added in, or don't get released where it should have been, making the original game the superior version to play at times, even if it's played through emulation.
>>321161487
It's illegal
>>321159378
without emulation we wouldn't have played english translated games that never came out in North America. so I think it has its place
>>321161487
then you're a liberal and probably think guns kill people too
get realistic. if you honestly justify piracy and emulation with that carl sagan future-proofing nonsense you should probably get your head checked
just play your games illegally and without consequence without regard for the ethical ramifications. jesus christ
There's nothing unethical or immoral about emulating. You're not stealing anything and god won't send you to hell for copying 1's and 0's
>>321161982
I never once said that it wasn't piracy, did I?
Keep your bullshit conservatism on /pol/, retard. Don't you a have some thread talking about how Obama is a muslim non-American born terrorist that needs tending to?
>>321162269
>bullshit conservatism
hahaha
and here's the reason you brought up the morals involved in piracy in the first place. you didn't have to admit it but now you're going to sleep in the bed you made
pretending that you were playing the devil's advocate doesn't make you less retarded
>>321162269niceme.me
>>321159378
Emulating essentially any game will give me better quality than the old ass hardware it was born on can provide. I don't think I've ever emulated something I didn't own at one point anyway, to be honest, except maybe some weird rom hack at some point. Besides, video games within the public domain will be come more and more prevalent as time goes on.
Emulation shouldn't be condemned for the fact that it can be evil when it can be so much good.
The same argument can be said about humans that argue against emulation. How do you get rid of the evil that humans do? By getting rid of humans. This, too, removes any good that we do as well.
Any argument to illegalize emulation is cancer and I hope anyone who makes a general statement like that dies horribly or goes somewhere else, since they demonstrate a terribly dangerous mindset.
>>321159378
Emulators are among some of the coolest shit you can do with software. Watching emulators progress (especially Dolphin since they are so open about it) is very entertaining for me, I wish I had the low-level knowledge to contribute to them.
As far as the whole piracy thing, who the fuck cares just play video games.
it is all about piracy, anybody telling you otherwise is just full of shit
not saying it is wrong btw, but at least be fucking honest with yourself
>Is it ethical
Go fuck yourself.
No, really. Get some KY, get a big dildo, make sure you're lubed properly, your bowels are clean and you've been properly stretched out, and fuck yourself.
That this question even needs to be asked is stupid. Emulation allows us to play games that have become rare, has allowed for endless new user content for existing games, and is much, much more convenient for playing older consoles or games that never made it to your part of the world.
Everything about emulation is pro consumer. Is it ethical? Go to hell.
>>321162068
Don't cligger that fligger
>>321162605
it still isn't ethical. it is, however, all of those things that you mentioned and more
Here is the way I see it:
>If the console has long since been out of production and the games are not easily accessible, it is OK. For me personally, I say at least 2 generations or so.
>If the game was never translated in your language and a fan translation comes out, it is OK.
>If the game was translated in your language and never came out in your country, or the game is outrageously rare (Chase the Chuckwagon for Atari 2600 is a example) then it is fine.
>If there is a virtual console version/emulated version of the game on consoles, then it is debatable. Personally, it depends on the game and if any changes were made to the emulated versions or additions.
I personally am not a fan if there is a way you can play it with current generation hardware with no issues or it is easy accessible. I do not like pirating new stuff at all, and even stuff like the Wii emulation I find to be questionable (Only reason I am for it is how low resolution the Wii and Wii U in Wii mode are).
>>321159378
>Is it ethical?
Don't care.
>Does it promote pirating?
Don't care.
>Is it as black and white as people make it out to be, or is a grey area?
Really I am just here to play some games. Not define myself as the next saint or most wanted criminal. Play, finish, sleep, think about the moments I enjoyed it the most, play another game.
>>321159378
>2015
>ethics
Politicians representing the interests of foreigners who own their mandate to their local voters are ethical nowadays, so what's unethical?
>>321159378
It's a grey area. Obviously, having emulators is the driving force behind the piracy associated with it and makes up a large portion of piracy in general.
But emulation is absolutely phenomenal for gaming as a hobby/art form/whatever you want to call it. It has led to the mass digital preservation of video games and continual enjoyment of old titles by new audiences.
Since emulation typically lags behind current console development, I don't think it hurts the industry that much. Companies never seemed that keen on re-releasing old title for a variety of reasons, so it fills a much needed niche. The resell market for old video games is horrible and doesn't help developers anyway, so fuck them.
Emulation is a necessary crime that is healthy for the video game hobby. It's legally unethical but morally just for the video game medium.
If there is no way to purchase the game as "new" where the money goes directly to the developers, it is perfectly ethical
>>321159378
>Is it ethical?
Yes
>>321159378
>Does it promote pirating?
No>>321159378
>Is it as black and white as people make it out to be, or is a grey area?
Grey area
Great thread anon see you next year
It not only promotes pirating, it also facilitates it.
But without emulation (when talking about accurate emulation rather than "enhanced" hacks), most of gaming history will be lost in no time considering how dramatically the medium is evolving. Emulation is the strongest tool for preservation when talking about videogames. Which is a necessity if the medium is to be taken seriously.
Which of course, nobody cares about. At least not right now. Real work into preservation is often put on too late, and this is no exception. Videogames have been better preserved than film for instance, but the work put into it is nowhere near to adequate.
>>321164714
>Does it promote pirating?
>No
lel this tard
Emulating a PS4 is not only ethical, it's the morally superior way to play PS4 due to PS4 emulators being made outside of a child-slavery facility, unlike the actual PS4.
>>321164975
It doesn't, unless you consider playing 10 plus year old games pirating. Emulating handhelds via romcards is a whole other beast and has its own set of issues
When you say emulation I think of games from dead consoles companies want to package and resell us for 20 to 30 bucks
seeing as how emulators like Dolphin can accurately emulate online interaction with other original consoles and emulators within gamecube and Wii games, it's a great backbone for people to experience what it could of been like to play it when these systems were new. it really started evolving into something special this decade.
>>321165645
>It doesn't, unless you consider playing 10 plus year old games pirating.
Of course it constitutes as piracy. And emulation isn't always of things that old.
>>321160516
>it isn't ethical because the idea behind emulation has nearly always been to make it possible to play games for free.
You are fucking retarded.
That's the idea behind emulators by people who only consume them.
The people who make them have completely different goals in mind, especially because they understand all those years of work that goes into these things are completely incapable of outweighing the cost of a console they already own because that's required for emulator development.
>>321162885
He never said it was ethical. Nor did he say it was not. He said go fuck yourself. And I agree. Ethicality has no place in a debate regarding out-of-date software. Who's losing money? The companies who no longer sell the games? Who's it hurting? The families of the people who wouldn't see profit from it whether you bought it from Ebay or from a store? Is it ethical? Who gives a flying fuck?
So no, I completely echo his statement: go fuck yourself.
>>321165594
>PS4 emulator
So, a PC.
>>321159378
Console manufacturers make little to no profit on old consoles. Same with devs on games.
Plus you need to preserve it, since they are exclusive and there's not as much of a problem when switching an OS, unlike with PC games
