Is this ok to do? The kids have about 40 games or so between them, and continually lose them around the place - so for going camping this year I thought an R4 would solve the problem till I realised it's not legal???? Can I download just the games I already bought? Or is it all illegal? I can't find the answer anywhere to tell me straight - as I'm not keen on doing this but sick of searching for cartridges down the back of car seats, or under their junk in their rooms....... Help!!!
Law wise it's all illegal. Morality wise if you download the games you already own then no one is going to complain. Especially because creating your own .nds files is a tedious process.
Ok, guess one would need special software or equipment or even that little thing called knowledge to do that ;D Thanks
It's not extremely hard, it's just time consuming (can take an hour or longer depending on the size of the game). And you don't need anything special. Just an R4 (or other flashcart) and either a Slot 2 cart like the EZFlash 3 in 1 or a Computer and a Wifi network at your home. https://www.romulation.org/forum/index.php?topic=33928.msg607244#msg607244
For US residents, if you own the original you are allowed to have 1 backup, this extends to games, movies and music as well as any software you buy legally. Should you ever sell or otherwise loose the original, then you have to destroy the backup. Back in the day before CD's, for those old enough to remember, if you ever dubbed a tape for a buddy, you broke the same laws that pirates break today.
To me the copyright symbol stands for crap with a circle around it. If "morality" factors into this, what sort of morality has Microsoft practiced when they are no longer able to produce Word since they stole another company's intellectual property to create it? And then there's the whole Bill Gates stole the GUI idea from Steve Jobs thing. As far as I'm concerned, there should not be a double standard for the common people that use Windows and the robber baron that created Windows. Will Mr. Gates face a mock trial ever again? Hey Bill, if you read this... I love pirating Windows, thief.
Depends on the country your in, in some any kind of device that can be used for circumventing the copy protection, etc is illegal.
The backup can come from any source, the laws only pertain to having an original, an exact one. You can't have a US version original and pair it with a Pal or Japan backup version. What is illegal in that area is making copyrighted material available for downloading without acquiring permission (buying a license). All rom sites, including this one, are blatantly breaking the laws, however they get by with it because most the stuff offered isn't worth the time and effort of the copyright holder. One thing that keeps the heat off places like this, is that the movie and music industry is screaming louder than the game companies are, so the govt and private entities that police such tend to look the other way.
Your two statements here are contradictory. The only legal way to get a backup is to make one yourself. Any other way involves illegal distribution of copyrighted materials.
The copyright laws are a bit hard to interrupt to plain english, they provide several methods to stop infringement. An individual can make a backup themselves or hire a company to do it, or download such if available. Most companies won't get involved since there's so much grey area with this issue, however, there are many that will backup your server, your personal pc and more for a price. Of course this type of data is not intended to be shared with the world, but it does count as infringement. Illegal distribution is another matter, it is aimed at trying to keep stuff from the public by making it illegal to host such files/data and/or to offer it for sale on disc, etc. This section of the copyright code doesn't prevent one from downloading it, it prevents a site, etc to make it available for such.
