Can you rip your own ROMs?

If you're ripping a ROM or Image from a disc that you currently own, and you plan to use that game digitally on your homebrew console or your PC, then there's really no harm being done. Nintendo, or Sony, whichever company's game you just copied, has no “skin in the game…” yet.
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Can you rip games you own?

Emulators are legal to download and use, however, sharing copyrighted ROMs online is illegal. There is no legal precedent for ripping and downloading ROMs for games you own, though an argument could be made for fair use.
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Has anyone ever gone to jail for downloading a ROM?

But no one has ever been prosecuted for it – not even once. Mind you, websites sourcing ROMs have often been asked to shut down.
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Is it illegal to rip switch games?

Copyrights do not enter the public domain just because they are no longer commercially exploited or widely available. Therefore, the copyrights of games are valid even if the games are not found on store shelves, and using, copying and/or distributing those games violates Nintendo's intellectual property rights.
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How does Nintendo know if a game is pirated?

When the cartridge is inserted into the Switch, the console checks the serial number against a database of known legitimate cartridges. If the serial number is not found in the database, the game will not be allowed to run. By checking the game's certificate.
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I am a pirate - How to LEGALLY emulate games ft. Save The Hero / Sanni v3 + Raspberry Pi

Are Pokemon ROMs legal?

If you own a game physically, you are likely to emulate or own a ROM of the game. However, there's no legal precedent in the United States to say it's illegal. There is no trial on record of any company going to court over emulators or ROMs and their use.
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Do ROMs count as piracy?

Pirate copies of game files are often referred to as “ROMs”. The uploading and downloading of pirate copies of Nintendo games is illegal.
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Why is emulation legal?

While emulation software itself are legal, emulating games is only so when legitimately purchasing the game physically and ripping the contents. Freely downloading or uploading game ROMs across various internet sites is considered to be a form of piracy, and users may be sued for copyright infringement.
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How to legally get Switch ROMs?

There several Legal Ways to Obtain Switch ROMs without breaking law. One option is to purchase the games from authorized retailers, such as the Nintendo eShop or physical game stores. Purchasing games legally, Supporting Developers publishers also ensuring infringing copyright laws.
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Is it legal to emulate a game?

Although emulating a game is not explicitly illegal, downloading copyrighted code (in this case, downloading a video game) is, and the many fan-made or parody games that one can play on emulators occupy something of a legal gray zone.
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Are digital games yours forever?

With a library of games stored on your hard drive, you'll never face that dilemma. In the same way, digital games can never be lost by accident; they remain on a player's account, essentially permanently.
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Are custom ROMS illegal?

roms are legal if you own a legal copy of the game and extracted the rom file from this legal copy. 1st party roms and emulators(made and/or disturbed by the original creator of the game and console, like nintendo's virtual console and sony's playstation classics) are pretty much always legal.
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How to legally own ROMs?

Legal ROM is such that is acquired from legal sources. One way to acquire legal ROMs is backing up official copies of the games from owned physical medium using cart readers or modded consoles. As long as a physical copy is owned, it is considered to be legal to use a digital copy for personal use.
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Is it illegal to stream ROMs?

unless the game was classified as “abandonware” then your possession of the rom is illegal, unless you own a copy of the game itself in which case you may be able to claim your rom is just a backup copy you use to prevent damaging the original. broadcasting it for profit would be a seriously stupid thing to do.
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Why is Nintendo against emulation?

Yuzu, like many other video game emulators, had initially claimed it required users to use code from purchased games in order to play them on their PCs or mobile devices. Nintendo accused the emulator makers of circumnavigating the Switch's copyright protections, regardless of where the code came from.
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Are Dolphin ROMs legal?

When Dolphin went open-source in 2008, it was released under the GPLv2 license. However it has since been relicensed to GPLv2+. According to the license, you may use Dolphin and its source code for any purpose, but distributing Dolphin requires that the source code be released and attribution given.
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Why did Apple ban emulators?

Why does Apple ban emulators on the Apple App Store? Apple isn't very clear on its reasoning, but the community believes Apple doesn't allow emulators on its app store because of the likelihood people are using them to play illegally distributed games.
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Can you go to jail for ROMs?

ROMS are actually technically "legal" if you own a copy of the original.
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Is pirating games a felony?

The Law of Software Piracy

The law makes it a felony, punishable by either two, three, or five years in state prison, to take a trademarked product worth more than $400 and copy it without the trademark owner's permission.
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Do emulators trigger anti piracy?

Emulators make software piracy possible by circumventing anti-piracy countermeasures on video game systems. Every Sony PlayStation video game system comes with a special security chip installed that prevents the unit from playing pirated PlayStation games (copies made from the original using a CD burner, for example).
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Are emulators illegal?

Emulators are perfectly legal, and also perfectly ethical. There is nothing wrong with writing code, or using code, that happens to behave the same as other hardware or software. There is something illegal about using code that is actually copyrighted. This includes Roms, Disc images, and even bios images.
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Are fan games illegal?

Original copyright holders can order a cease and desist upon fan game projects, as by definition fan games are unauthorized uses of copyrighted property.
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Is emulating the same as pirating?

Unless you're talking about full bore emulation aka fully reversed engineered, without the requirement of copyrighted material like the BIOS, firmware, etc, then its all piracy.
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Can you go to jail for pirating Switch games?

Answer: Yes, in many jurisdictions, pirating video games can lead to imprisonment, especially in cases of large-scale distribution or repeated offenses. The length of the jail term varies by country and the seriousness of the offense.
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