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Maven's email on the Legality of Gambit
Maven
October 14, 1999
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Thanks for being so patient for the last 6-7 months.
I've actually been working on the emulator lately, and also on the
legalities regarding release. I know many emulators exist, and people
seem to have no problems releasing them to the web, but I want to stay
legal -especially since my name is plastered all over the web. Unlike
the guys who wrote the Nintendo 64 emulator, I'd be real easy to find
<grin>.
What I have found is very interesting. Suffice it to say that what you
read isn't necessarily true when it comes to copyright law. I've found
an excellent source of information, if you'd like to look at it
yourself, check out the EMU FAQ at:
http://delirium.funzt.net/eidolon/emufaq/index.htm
There's a lot of good research there. What it boils down to is: I can't
release the emulator without opening myself up to some serious lawsuits
from Nintendo.
Now the bad news: Due to the threat of litigation, I've about scrapped
the Gameboy emulator. I will not be able to release an emulator that
plays any more than the free Gameboy games available. I do plan on
releasing an emulator which will play the freeware games, but I know
that's not what you were waiting and hoping for. It's certainly not
what I was hoping for.
On the other hand, (this is the good news) I have been pursuing another
tact.. I have been in contact with the major publishers of Gameboy games
regarding 'porting' their games over to the Palm Platform. Quite a few
are EXTREMELY interested in expanding their market in this way. This is
pretty exciting news. This way the game authors will be able to get
their rightful royalties, and we will all be able to play lots of cool
games on our Palms we couldn't play before!
The rest of the bad news: My talks with Nintendo have come to naught.
They have absolutely NO interest whatsoever in allowing their games to
be played on any other platform then their own. I must say I understand
this, because Zelda and Super Mario are powerful motivators to get
people to buy Nintendos. Unfortunately, it means we can never play
Zelda or Mario or even Tetris on our Palms - at least not Nintendo's
version. This was a big disappointment to me. I can't tell you how
saddened I am by this.
So, now I gotta ask you: Which games would YOU be the most interested
in playing on your Palm, knowing that Nintendo's games are not included?
Would you be willing to pay $10-15 for some good, professional games
ported from the Gameboy if they had SOUND? Oh yeah, that's the other
good news: by not making a generic emulator, the games can be recompiled
in advance, and some of the original sound may be retained! Of course,
we all know the Palms speaker does not compare to the Gameboy's stereo
sound, but we should be able to get some of the effect anyway.
Let me know what you think, and please, please don't argue with me about
releasing the emulator until you've at least read the FAQ at the site I
listed above. You could cuss me out for my decision, but I'm the one
who has to live with the choices I make, and I want to be honest on all
my dealings.
There is one possible way for it to be legal to play ANY Gameboy game on
the Palm platform: If you had to plug the actual cartridge into the
Palm to play, them it would be completely legal. Any hardware
engineers out there interested in collaborating on an adapter for the
Springboard? It could work!
I am serious about this. It would involve a lot of digital electronics
knowledge... let me know if you are interested, or forward this message
to anyone you know who has the knowledge to make it a reality.
I look forward to hearing from you!
Sincerely,
Michael Ethetton
a.k.a. 'Maven'
maven@planetkc.com
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