Switch emulator Yuzu shut down earlier this year after a settlement with Nintendo, which wasn't altogether happy about extensive pre-release Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom leaks. Now, following another round of pre-release leaks for another series entry with The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, the other big Switch emulator has disappeared from the internet. Ryujinx, it seems, is no more.
Ryujinx paused entry to its Discord server as it disappeared from GitHub earlier today, and while the emulator's main webpage still exists, the download section has been scrubbed clean. This came without any official announcement from the emulator's developers. A few hours later, a message from the dev team in that now-locked Discord appeared to confirm what everyone suspected.
"Yesterday, [lead Ryujinx developer] gdkchan was contacted by Nintendo and offered an agreement to stop working in the project, remove the organization and all related assets he's in control of," according to fellow developer riperiperi. "While awaiting confirmation on whether he would take this agreement, the organization has been removed, so I think it's safe to say what the outcome is. Rather than leave you with only panic and speculation, I decided to write this short message to give some closure."
[Ryujinx]Ryujinx, a Nintendo Switch emulator, has ceased development. The lead developer was pressured by Nintendo of America into shutting down the project.All downloads and the GitHub repositories have been removed. pic.twitter.com/2cQe96dBm1October 1, 2024
A more formal announcement from the Ryujinx team is likely on the way. I guess it's possible that this is all a big misunderstanding and the emulator will have a new path forward when the proper announcement comes around, but that seems exceedingly unlikely. Just like Tears of the Kingdom before it, Echoes of Wisdom leaked well ahead of launch, and I have to imagine that Nintendo wasn't thrilled to see so many screenshots of the game running on Ryujinx across the internet before it had even hit store shelves.
Nintendo knows it can't prove emulation is illegal, but historically it's tried to knock out sources of Switch piracy through DMCA takedown notices. It doesn't appear that the DMCA hammer was wielded here, as the company instead apparently got in direct contact with Ryujinx's lead developer to broker the end of the project. Between this and the Palworld lawsuit, Nintendo seems to have renewed its historically aggressive stance on anything that comes close to infringing on its property.
Nintendo doesn't even want you to have pictures of emulated Switch games.
