More than 1 million copies of Tears of the Kingdom were downloaded before its release. And donations on Patreon more than doubled during this period

I wouldn't be surprised if most illegal copies of TOTK were played on Nintendo's own console.
So I wonder if that argument would hold up.

I'm surprised Nintendo is actually taking legal action. I already know the community is going to hate Nintendo for this, but realistically speaking why? I'm on Nintendo's side for this one. Personally, emulating older consoles and legacy titles is fine (especially if you can't buy them officially). However, it never stood right with me that you can emulate current-gen consoles. You can still buy a Switch and its software. In addition, the leaks and people being able to play games way earlier than the actual release date. Why should people who follow the law, buy the actual product, and wait for the actual release date suffer through the leaks and people playing them BEFORE the game even comes out?

Can't blame them. Piracy is theft if the pirate doesn't bother buying a legitimate copy.

Switch was hackable with a paper clip.
That's way easier to set up and cheaper than having a capable PC, plus having to attach an actual Switch profile on your Yuzu before you can play the game.

I would not be surprised if most of the early illegal copies were played on a hacked Switch.

As for current games, here's a conversation I had with a friend yesterday regarding Unicorn Overlord.

He buys the games. Dumps them on the emulator, and never uses his actual Switch. Because he wants to play them in a good state.

And as for me, the only way I see myself going through the rest of Breath of the Wild is if I mod it so that weapons don't permanently break, because that system only discourages me from using strong/nice weapons, ever. Just ask Fire Emblem where I go through the whole game with Bronze weapons, saving the good ones for a special occasion, that never happens.

The IGN article said this:

"The suit also states Yuzu's website provides detailed instructions on "how to unlawfully acquire" cryptographic keys used to decrypt and play unauthorized copies of Nintendo games through Yuzu."

If true, this is pretty damning. I think Nintendo does its homework and knows which cases it can win and which they cannot. They spend a year to prepare for this one.

Source: https://www.ign.com/articles/nintendo-says-tears-of-the-kingdom-was-pirated-1-million-times-pre-release-in-lawsuit-against-emulator-creator

Whatever the method, my problem is the leaking culture. It just kills the hype and excitement. You might say I can emulate the game early as well, but it just doesn't excite me the same way just like you can't handle weapons breaking, it's my preference. It's just annoying and immoral IMO. It's fine if it was just a couple of copies leaking early, but thousands and millions of people make it unavoidable. Emulating is one of those methods, which is why I'm ok with Yuzu gone until the Switch lifecycle ends. It's also annoying seeing people brag about how they are playing a game on an emulator as if anyone cares. People spend way too much time telling others they emulated than playing the game. Once again, it kills my joy of the game seeing those people.

For this case though, ironically I think the main issue would be that Yuzu was making money off of content they don't own through Patreon donations. That's clearly illegal from what I understand. 

I agree that those people are causing other people problems. Case in point, this situation. But when Switch is probably the most hacked/modded system since PS2, even if you go after every single emulator, there are still going to be millions of people doing this on their Switches with every new game, spoiling things early, etc.

Although the monetization of Yuzu through donations seems like a morally gray area, I don't think that's illegal, in a similar manner to how a TV maker makes money off content it doesn't own by me watching movies and playing games on their TV.

But their patreon being supported is interesting, since in those cases it's probably less about people who want to avoid paying to play games, but rather people who want to pay because they appreciate getting a better experience with those games, since the emulator is free.

I haven't tried Yuzu yet, but I planned to at some point to continue BOTW there instead of on the Switch.

Good. Fuck pirates.