The first Nintendo emulator to land on the App Store and stick following an Apple rule change plays DS, GBA, N64 games for free
Apr. 18, 2024Plus Game Boy Color, SNES, and more
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A free retro Nintendo game emulator is now live on the Apple App Store, and because of recent changes made to Apple’s app review guidelines, it’s actually permitted to be on there. Whether Nintendo will take kindly to it is another matter, given its stance that “supporting emulation also supports the illegal piracy of our products.”
In case you missed it, earlier this week, Apple made a tweak to its guidelines surrounding “mini apps, mini-games, streaming games, chatbots, plug-ins, and game emulators,” which can be found under point 4.7 of itsguidelines. From now on, “retro game console emulator apps can offer to download games,” although developers “are responsible for all such software offered in your app, including ensuring that such software complies with these Guidelines and all applicable laws.”
As such, emulators are officially allowed to be on the App Store, and Delta, developed by Riley Testut, is one of them. It’s not the first Nintendo game emulator to be released following the rule changes, as a Nintendo Entertainment System emulator named Bimmy emerged this week before it was pulled by its own developer “out of fear” (viaThe Verge).
Since Delta is just an emulator, it doesn’t come with games pre-downloaded – users are required to import files of them, instead. This is obviously something that may prove to be contentious with Nintendo, which is firmly against its fans downloading or uploading ROM files, including for games that they already own or are no longer sold.
On its officialIntellectual Property & Piracy FAQ page, the company writes: “While we recognize the passion that players have for classic games, supporting emulation also supports the illegal piracy of our products. Wherever possible, Nintendo and its licensees attempt to find ways to bring legitimate classics to current systems (via Virtual Console titles, for example).”
Nintendo has already taken action this year against the popular Switch emulator Yuzu, with the emulator’s developers agreeing to paya $2.4 million settlement. The Yuzu team released a statement to say it has “always been against piracy” and that it hopes “our actions will be a small step toward ending piracy of all creators' works.”
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I’m one of GamesRadar+’s news writers, who works alongside the rest of the news team to deliver cool gaming stories that we love. After spending more hours than I can count filling The University of Sheffield’s student newspaper with Pokemon and indie game content, and picking up a degree in Journalism Studies, I started my career at GAMINGbible where I worked as a journalist for over a year and a half. I then became TechRadar Gaming’s news writer, where I sourced stories and wrote about all sorts of intriguing topics. In my spare time, you’re sure to find me on my Nintendo Switch or PS5 playing through story-driven RPGs like Xenoblade Chronicles and Persona 5 Royal, nuzlocking old Pokemon games, or going for a Victory Royale in Fortnite.
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