Ryujinx Switch emulator dead after Nintendo intervenes Nintendo

Another Nintendo Switch emulator has been taken offline as Nintendo cracks down on the homebrew scene. Work on the open-source emulator Ryujinx will be halted and its downloads removed after its creator was contacted by the Mario creator, about seven months after Switch emulator Yuzu also bit the dust.

“Yesterday, (Ryujinx creator) gdkchan was contacted by Nintendo and offered an agreement to stop working on the project, remove the organization and any related assets under his control,” reads a message shared by one of his employees, under the handle rip in peri peri, on Discord. “Pending confirmation as to whether he would accept this deal, the organization has been removed, so I think it is safe to say what the outcome will be.”

The Ryujinx website still stands up but the option to download the Switch emulator no longer exists. The project allowed people to emulate Switch games on PC, as well as PC gaming handhelds that have become increasingly popular over the past year. The team behind it was also busy an iOS port to enable games such as The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom And Mario Kart 8 Deluxe to run on the latest iPhones, while the video is being uploaded to YouTube shows test footage of the emulator running on Android for the Odin Pro 2 handheld manufactured by AYN.

The removal comes just months after competing Switch emulator Yuzu was removed after a lawsuit between the makers and Nintendo. Before 2024, Switch emulators seemed to mostly fly under the radar of the company’s lawyers. It’s possible that the success of the Steam Deck, Asus Rog Ally, and other portable devices that can emulate popular Switch games has changed Nintendo’s calculus.

It has now become common for the biggest releases to leak online weeks before launch and be shown via emulation on a higher spec PC. And while emulation enthusiasts promote that users only run ROM files dumped from games they legally purchased, many of the largest Switch emulation communities often overlap with groups promoting Switch piracy.

“Thank you to everyone who continued to code, document, or report on the project,” wrote rip in peri peri on Discord. “Thank you all for following us through development. I was able to learn a lot of cool things about games I love, enjoy them with new qualities and in unique circumstances, and I’m sure you all have experiences that are just as special.”

Nintendo did not immediately respond to a request for comment.