Nintendo says latest Zelda was pirated 1 million times pre-release as it sues Yuzu emulator creator

Nintendo of America has filed a lawsuit against Tropic Haze, the creator of popular Switch emulator Yuzu.

In a complaint spotted by Game File reporter Stephen Totilo, the platform holder argues that the “defendant and its agents are fully aware of the use of Yuzu by others in performing circumvention, and in facilitating piracy at a colossal scale”.

Yuzu enables users to play pirated Switch games on Windows, Linux, or Android systems, according to Nintendo.

Notably, the lawsuit claims that last year’s biggest Switch release, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, was pirated over one million times in the week and a half before its release in May.

“With Yuzu in hand, nothing stops a user from obtaining and playing unlawful copies of virtually any game made for the Nintendo Switch, all without paying a dime to Nintendo or to any of the hundreds of other game developers and publishers making and selling games for the Nintendo Switch,” the company says.

“In effect, Yuzu turns general computing devices into tools for massive intellectual property infringement of Nintendo and others’ copyrighted works.”

Nintendo is seeking damages for alleged violations and a shutdown of the emulator.

Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom was last year’s second best-selling game. It sold over 20 million copies, a total only beaten by Hogwarts Legacy.