Nobody's life is being ruined by a C&D.

At this point I have no idea what you are even talking about.  All I can say is the your violence based reply was uncalled for.  

You put the blame on everyone else for how they perceive you and react to your aggressive demeanour and constant tantrums?

Isn’t it more than due time for you to take responsibility for your actions? 

You know, I think that there are ways to protect your IP without going the gestapo route with your fan community, especially folks that aren't making any money off of it and are well under the radar.  But whatever, I guess that we can agree to disagree.

I really don't think that the N64 would have had a 2D Metroid even though I completely agree with you that the N64 hardware is bested suited for 2.5D style games more than full 3D.  The problem is that the games were so bloody expensive back in the 90's and gamers were heavily demanding that practically everything be full 3D akin to Mario 64 to justify the cost.  In fact games like Mischief Makers got a lot of hate for looking like an SNES game back in 1997 with the main argument being "I am paying $60 US or more for a game, it had better look next gen."  There was just this expectation that everything be full 3D even though, ironically, the N64 games like Ogre Battle 64 and Yoshi Story today have aged so much better visually than even games like Ocarina of Time.  240p really just isn't enough for an enjoyable full 3D experience.

You know what, I regularly take multi-month breaks from this site for my own sanity.  A lack of empathy and social skills is a real issue in the gaming community and I see that expressed so much here both the in the way people say stuff as well as what they are saying.  I scratch my head why people cheer on a mammoth company suing into oblivion some poor bloke that hosted a ROM site even though almost all of those same people have downloaded ROMs in the past, often from the very site that was taken down.  I don't know how people compartmentalize their own past behavior and then rejoice in the misery brought upon others.  It just seems so superficial and, frankly, cult-like.

Ah, yeah I was just thinking about US laws. You're right, it's really messy when you are considering other countries. That said, I'm fairly certain US Copyright law allows for a backup/archival "exception", where you are allowed one backup copy. However, you are not allowed to distribute your physical copy without transferring ownership of the backup copy as well (or vice versa). 

Personally,  I think it would be fairly easy to find and show the court a causal link between advertisement pay and the distribution of the ROM's based on site traffic. That is, the website simply would not be receiving the advertising space they do without the use of ROMs to bring the traffic in. 

Cool demo. I believe it would be more like Jet Force Gemini!

Animation and control are too good for N64.

Because being a big company doesn't mean people can steal your intellectual property. I've yet to hear an explanation or reasoning besides what amounts to "c'mon Nintendo, be cool."

It's not just some poor bloke that started a rom site in his spare time, it's someone who is trying to profit off the hard work of others and is making a pretty large effort to do so. I see no reason why the relative size of the parties should matter. I don't think being a large company should entitle one to more or less protection of the law than a small one. If you're going to say people could use Nintendo's IP however they like, then the same has to be true for indie developers, or really any creator of any IP. Your argument taken to its logical conclusion means no protection for intellectual property. 

As for how to compartmentalize my behavior, I've downloaded roms before, and probably will again. If Nintendo wants to sue me for the value of those roms, then they'd be well within their rights. But, I've caused a relatively minor amount of damage, if any, and the rom site has caused way more.  

You are mostly correct oon the first part. The code itself is copyrighted, so distributing it is itself tortious conduct as you do not have a license to distribute it in that manner, even if you could sell the physical game itself. Circumventing DRM is itself also a problem under the DMCA I believe.

It could be argued that the money is from advertisements, but I'm about 100% sure that argument would fail. First off, monetization is not directly relevant. You're not allowed to use other people's IP even if you are not making money. It depends on what exactly your claim is. If your claim is lost revenue, then it's pretty helpful to be able to show that the person infringing made money, but not essential. If you're arging for damage to your IP, then whether or not they made money is generally not relevant.

If we took a simple case where you are literally selling bootleg copies of Metroid Dread, then I could point to how much you made to demonstrate how much money I lost. Similarly, they could say that the money from advertising is money made by exploiting their IP, and therefore shows damages and should be theirs. Arguing it came from the advertisements is not an argument I've seen used in any infringement case where it might make sense (I'm taking Internet Law and Taxation of IP right now). For example, websites using copyrighted images from other websites have not used that defense, even when their only source of revenue is advertising. I think it would be considered frivolous, which could get a lawyer personally in trouble. Courts deal with all kinds of monetization schemes, and the ultimate question is could the money have been made without infringement of Nintendo's IP. Which obviously it could not, so they profited off the infringement.

But, even if you just gave away bootleg copies of Metroid Dread, you're still potentially liable. Nintendo still suffered damages as a result of your infringement, as they presumably could have made at least some of those sales. It would be more difficult to prove the damages, which is why monetization is always a good thing for a company suing for infringement, but it's not necessary.

In the case of roms, they would sue for damage to their IP, even if they were given away. Nintendo sells their old games, and does rereleases to convince people to buy Switch Online. That's a less valuable proposition when the games can be easily downloaded. If you're suing for the damages to the asset itself and not for lost income, then the monetization issue isn't important, except to the extent it may show how much damage there was.

On the other hand, with the Metroid 64 example, it's hard to argue for a payout without monetization. You could argue it generally reduces the demand for Nintendo made Metroid games, but it's not like Nintendo is really going to make a Metroid game with N64 style graphics, or that someone is going to be like "Welp, who needs Metroid Prime 4 now". If there was monetization, then they can make a claim for lost revenue, but even that's a little shaky based on my knowledge. It's not exactly money Nintendo could have made themselves. My gut feeling is that the courts are not going to allow someone to profit off their infringing activity and would therefore consider them damages to Nintendo. 

As a disclaimer this is just me working through these theoreticals as I prepare for tests. I am not a licensed attorney and nothing I say should be taken as legal advice. Please don't start selling a fan game and blame me if Nintendo sues you for a gagillion dollars. :)

I am pretty sure that is incorect. There is a copyright exception for libraries and archivists, not for individuals. 

What I think people are referring to is the first sale doctrine. This allows you to generally do what you like with a particular item you bought. If the rom is considered a copy of the item, then that could be allowable, but based on other cases, I'm pretty sure it would not be. For example in one case, a website tried to sell used mp3s, by having users upload their copy and delete the original (verified by software). This was held not to be ok. So I don't think a rom would fall under this exception.

That being said, if you just made a rom from your physical copy, I don't think anyone could really do anything about it. Just on a practical level, who is ever going to care if it's not distributed somehow?

As for the causal link, yeah, I don't think a court would buy that at all. Contrary to popular belief, lawyers cannot simply make any argument they want, and their are potential sanctions for bringing frivolous arguments. Usually that's more for if you bring a whole case on a frivolous argument, but in any event, that's something I probably wouldn't bring up. 

I'm going to respectfully disagree with your analysis there at the end. To start, this isn't a frivolous argument. Even if the court wouldn't buy it that doesn't make it frivolous, that just means it wasn't convincing. There is definitely some base to suggest that the monetary compensation that the company received from advertisement was influenced by the sites downloadable software. Especially since these ROM sites are typically single purpose sites, and you could analyze how often people click on an advertisement from the home page vs. the page that offers the file. In addition, there are many sites that force a tab open to an advertisement when you click on the download (I know this because I'm an awful person who downloads ROM's). These would not be baseless claims to suggest that their monetary compensation is directly tied to the files they are offering. 

As for the rest of your post, I suppose I'm not as sure as I thought I was before. It seems that the DMCA is not nearly as clear about copying videogame software as I thought that they would be, and since there are disclaimers within the game itself about the ownership of the game (i.e. it's entirely owned by the copyright holder) then Title 17 wouldn't really matter. Still, this makes the determination about the legality of ROM sites even more black and white, IMO.