Popular open source Nintendo Switch emulator Ryujinx has been removed from GitHub, and the team behind it has reportedly ceased development of the project after apparent discussions with Nintendo.
Ryujinx developer riperiperi writes on the project’s Discord server and social media that fellow developer gdkchan was “contacted by Nintendo and offered an agreement to stop working on the project, remove the organization and all related assets he’s in control of.” While the final outcome of that negotiation is not yet public, riperiperi reports that “the organization has been removed” (presumably from GitHub) and thus “I think it’s safe to say what the outcome is.”
While the Ryujinx website is still up as of this writing, the download page and other links to GitHub-hosted information from that website no longer function. The developers behind the project have not posted a regular progress report update since January after posting similar updates almost every month throughout 2023. Before today, the Ryujinx social media account last posted an announcement in March.
Followers of the Switch emulation scene may remember that March was also when the makers of the Yuzu emulator paid $2.4 million to settle a lawsuit with Nintendo over a project that Nintendo alleged was “facilitating piracy at a colossal scale.”
What is left?
Switch emulator Suyu, which emerged as a “legal gray area” Yuzu fork shortly after that Suyu takedown—is still available on its own self-hosted servers as of this writing (though the project’s last stable release is now six months old). Nintendo previously targeted Suyu’s GitLab hosting through a DMCA takedown and later took down the project’s official Discord server with a similar request. Another prominent Yuzu fork, Sudachi, was removed from GitHub in July via DMCA request.
In the wake of those legal efforts against other Switch emulator developers, the Ryujinx developers posted an automated message on their Discord server in response to any questions about Ryujinx’s ultimate fate. “Nothing is happening to Ryujinx,” the message read. “We know nothing more than you do. No dooming.”
A video of an in-development Ryujinx feature allowing local wired multiplayer between an emulator and official hardware.
Riperiperi reports that development will now stop on “a working Android port” of the emulator, which was not yet ready for release, as well as a tech demo iOS version that would likely have remained a “novelty” due to Apple’s just-in-time compilation restrictions. Developers were also working on updates that would have allowed local wired multiplayer gameplay connections between Ryujinx and real Switch hardware.
“While I won’t be remaining in the switch scene either, I still believe in emulation as a whole, and hope that other developers aren’t dissuaded by this,” riperiperi writes on the project’s Discord. “The future of game preservation does depend on individuals, and maybe one day it’ll be properly recognized.”
According to the developers, “as of May 2024, Ryujinx [had] been tested on approximately 4,300 titles; over 4,100 boot[ed] past menus and into gameplay, with roughly 3,550 of those being considered playable.”