Nintendo has brought an action against the alleged operator (Jacob Mathias and his company Mathias Designs LLC of Arizona) of well-known websites for downloading ROMs from console emulators LoveROMS y Love RETRO. These sites are among the most notorious online centers for pirated games, according to Nintendo, and face fines of millions of dollars for copyright infringement.
Nintendo is demanding $ 100 million in damages and compensation
This week, Nintendo has taken these 2 sides to court, offering access to a wide range of ROMs, including many games from the company nipona. The case has been filed in a federal court in Arizona against LoveROMS.com and LoveRETRO.co for copyright infringement and registered trademarks.
“The web pages for LoveROMs y Love RETRO is among the most open and well-known online centers for pirated video games, ”Nintendo said in the notice.
“Through LoveROM’s and LoveRETRO’s web pages, Demandants reproduces, distributes, interprets, publicly and displays a staggering number of unauthorized copies of Nintendo’s video games, all without Nintendo’s permission.”
In addition to copyrighted games, the sites also distribute proprietary BIOS software as long as they use logos and registered trademarks, Nintendo said.
Although some ROM sites may be hobby projects, Nintendo regards these two sites as professional operations that benefit from their work.
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“The defendants are not casual gamers, but sophisticated groups with extensive knowledge of Nintendo’s intellectual property and the video game industry in general,” the company said.
Through the lawsuit, which will also list a list of unreliable competition, Nintendo hopes to close both websites. The company seeks compensation and damages worth $ 150,000 for each illegal Nintendo game and up to $ 2,000,000 for each registered trademark access.
This means that with more than 140 copyrighted titles and 40 registered trademarks, the theoretical damages can reach the number of $ 100 million.
Nintendo is also requesting a permanent court order ordering websites to terminate their illegal activities while providing domain names to the editor. At the same time, Nintendo wants the site operator to uncover the sources of illegal ROMs.
So far, Loveretro has been closed until a new announcement, and LoveROMS has removed all Nintendo titles from the web.
