Nintendo told us: “Backups are not needed.” Now they are in fact admitting (on the German website) that cartridges and consoles can fail (surprise, surprise).
Rough translation of their claim (I have a link and a screenshot but I’m not sure if it is a good idea to post either of them): “If only this game does not work, and if it does not work in another SNES, there is a dysfunction within the game. Repairing the games is not possible anymore.”
Look at this two sentences:
Sina is confused!
(Sina sees little yellow birds flying around her head and is going to hurt herself with a 50% probability).
Someday I’ll end up in the nuthouse – banging my head against padded walls wearing this nice white jacket which is closed behind the back. With each bang against the wall I will be constantly shouting: "Backups are not needed! Repairing is not possible anymore! Backups are not needed! Repairing is not possible anymore!” I really have to stop reading such a nonsense!
Cartridges and consoles can and will fail, new TVs are not compatible with old devices. From this it directly follows that copying our old (and expensive!) cartridges to a rom file for usage with an emulator is required to ensure permanent usability/availability. I already got to this conclusion in part 2.
Now, let me elaborate a little about this attitude concerning the false claim about the impossibility repairing in case of depleted battery. They could have written something like: “If your old NES/SNES/GB(C) early N64/GBA game does not save anymore, the battery is empty. We do not offer service anymore (But we did offer the service when the battery was still new and you did not need it. [NELSON]Ha-ha![/NELSON] ) Do it yourself or find somebody willing and able to solder a new one into the cartridge.”
I consider this not only to be bad behavior but also pure evil.
They deliberately lie to their unsuspecting customers! They do not even tell people about the batteries inside the cartridges. Not everybody knows about the technology SRAM and the need for constant power. While most SRAM-batteries still work, the ones that also powered clocks are done for. I think it is very possible, that many second generation Pokemon games have been thrown away because of the false claims on the Nintendo website.
The only thing missing on there is: “You can buy Zelda/Super Mario World/Pokemon Silver… on Virtual Console again. If you have a non working game, which is not for sale in the Eshop, you’re out of luck. Do not download it from illegal websites or you will go straight to hell where you will be tortured for all eternity!”
And you, Nintendo can… read the third act of Götz von Berlichingen (Goethe) if you want to know what. Backup copies are justified and technically needed and DRM sucks, period!
Next time I will present a non-Nintendo example of a problem that only exists because of DRM.
Rough translation of their claim (I have a link and a screenshot but I’m not sure if it is a good idea to post either of them): “If only this game does not work, and if it does not work in another SNES, there is a dysfunction within the game. Repairing the games is not possible anymore.”
Look at this two sentences:
- "It is in no way necessary to copy a cartridge."
- "Repairing cartridges and consoles is not possible anymore. (They say this also for the case of a depleted SRAM/clock battery!)"
Sina is confused!
(Sina sees little yellow birds flying around her head and is going to hurt herself with a 50% probability).
Someday I’ll end up in the nuthouse – banging my head against padded walls wearing this nice white jacket which is closed behind the back. With each bang against the wall I will be constantly shouting: "Backups are not needed! Repairing is not possible anymore! Backups are not needed! Repairing is not possible anymore!” I really have to stop reading such a nonsense!
Cartridges and consoles can and will fail, new TVs are not compatible with old devices. From this it directly follows that copying our old (and expensive!) cartridges to a rom file for usage with an emulator is required to ensure permanent usability/availability. I already got to this conclusion in part 2.
Now, let me elaborate a little about this attitude concerning the false claim about the impossibility repairing in case of depleted battery. They could have written something like: “If your old NES/SNES/GB(C) early N64/GBA game does not save anymore, the battery is empty. We do not offer service anymore (But we did offer the service when the battery was still new and you did not need it. [NELSON]Ha-ha![/NELSON] ) Do it yourself or find somebody willing and able to solder a new one into the cartridge.”
I consider this not only to be bad behavior but also pure evil.
They deliberately lie to their unsuspecting customers! They do not even tell people about the batteries inside the cartridges. Not everybody knows about the technology SRAM and the need for constant power. While most SRAM-batteries still work, the ones that also powered clocks are done for. I think it is very possible, that many second generation Pokemon games have been thrown away because of the false claims on the Nintendo website.
The only thing missing on there is: “You can buy Zelda/Super Mario World/Pokemon Silver… on Virtual Console again. If you have a non working game, which is not for sale in the Eshop, you’re out of luck. Do not download it from illegal websites or you will go straight to hell where you will be tortured for all eternity!”
And you, Nintendo can… read the third act of Götz von Berlichingen (Goethe) if you want to know what. Backup copies are justified and technically needed and DRM sucks, period!
Next time I will present a non-Nintendo example of a problem that only exists because of DRM.
