I completely understand what you mean, but the problem is that they keep sending mixed signals and pissing off organizers that put their time and money into putting everything together. If they just came out with what their rules are, and what they expect, everyone involved would stand to benefit. Anyway, Hbox has always been there, so if you have the time for his video, he outlines the whole ordeal. Sounds frustrating
I watched the video and I can certainly understand the frustration that Smash fans have with Nintendo. Conversely I understand Nintendo's position. You and the video noted the hot and then cold nature of Nintendo's mixed signals. I there there is some truth to that but then again it is in part on the Smash community as well. There is a ton of baggage there with them using emulators, unofficial netcode for older titles, pushing fan games like Project M, all the behavioral problems w/ accusations of assault...they aren't doing themselves any favors. Nintendo can't support the community and at the sametime turn a blind eye to Slippi, Project M, etc being used in tournaments. At the end of the day I think Nintendo has allowed them a little bit of room in which to operate and it is probably the best they are going to get. It is really tricky but frankly I understand Nintendo's aversion. I wish it did not have to be that way but I respect their decision.
I find it deeply unsettling that a moral debate over something that is AT BEST morally ambiguous was deemed as a derailment. It's kind of a moot point anyway since if Nintendo does decide to give a shit about yuzu, I'm pretty sure that thread will be locked either way.
DESTROYA
Emulation and the homebrew scene in general is an interesting subject. On the emulation side there really isn't anything Nintendo can do. So long as they are "clean room" projects, meaning they are reversed engineered not using Nintendo's own code, they are 100% in the clear legally even if they are emulating current gen systems.
Emulation has definitely helped with preservation and can serve to augment the original experience. Higher resolutions, higher frame rates, enhanced textures, replacement audio, save states, game rewinding, online multiplayer, QOL enhancements, translations, restoring cut content etc. A lot of these features that were pioneered by the homebrew scene have ended up in official Nintendo emulators. Much like how jailbroken features made their way into official iOS releases. There are couple interesting videos out there but one of the guys that developed one of the first NES emulators was actually hired by Nintendo to build the emulators for Animal Crossing and the subsequent virtual console releases.
That said, there certainly the issue of piracy. Nintendo has to protect their IP and when people are freely sharing rom files online it becomes an issue for them. There are definitely people who use emulation and CFW for piracy. Launching back ups/rips via an emulator or on original hardware isn't necessarily the problem. At the end of the day it boils down to whether or not someone is playing a game they do not legally own (this is getting more complicated with patches and games that aren't all on the same cartridge/disc). A lot of the people who are active on the development side of these tools are people who own a lot of games and are motivated by preservation but there are those who develop tools specifically for piracy.
All of that said, I don't think there is really much room to make a claim about emulation one way or the other except to say that there isn't anything illegal about them but there is a legal problem when those tools are used for the illegal distribution of games. Nintendo definitely pays attention to what is going on in the homebrew scene and one could even argue that a lot of the official releases and enhancements that we have are a result of the pressure they have felt from the emulation community both from a feature side and to curb downloads of old games.
I really like that special edition. I wish it was easier to get.
I'll be looking out for preorders. They still aren't up at Amazon. If I end up with a second one I'll PM you.