On May 4th, former president of Nintendo America, Reggie Fils-Aimé, retweeted a photo from a user who was playing a pirated version of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and quoted a classic line from the popular movie Taken, where the male protagonist threatens those who kidnapped his daughter.
On May 4th, former president of Nintendo of America, Reggie Fils-Aimé, condemned the leak of Tears of the Kingdom.
The Twitter account of the user who pirated the game was subsequently deleted, and people in Reggie's comment section were elated. His actions could be considered an attempt to curtail such flagrant behavior.
Recently, there was a similar incident in China that sparked public concern, where a game streamer with over 100,000 followers pirated Tears of the Kingdom, livestreamed it, and openly mocked players waiting to play a legal copy, causing anger among the gaming community.
As the pirated content spreads, many players who support the legitimate version have launched condemnations on Bilibili.
To make matters worse, on Tieba and NGA, some users even claim to have launched an “ultimate weapon” by reporting Tears of the Kingdom to the General Administration of Customs for suspected smuggling.
Some users even claimed to have reported Tears of the Kingdom to the General Administration of Customs for suspected smuggling.
This inevitably reminds people of the recent incident where Resident Evil 4 was also reported. A user made a "refund without return" move to the seller, claiming that the game did not obtain legal permission in China, causing losses to the seller.
Both this and the previous incident have touched on the gray area of Chinese domestic game sales. Most of the time, regulators turn a blind eye to the sale of unlicensed games by small shops. However, the "tacit understanding" that has existed will likely be broken again by the leaking of Tears of the Kingdom.
In fact, it is well known that almost all games that are simultaneously released with physical versions cannot escape the fate of being leaked early. Due to the cracking of the Switch and the existence of relatively effective emulators on the PC, illegitimately acquired game cartridges often have their source files extracted quickly and spread, which can then be played on PCs with relative ease.
But for some players in China, the Tears of the Kingdom leak incident leads to a larger understanding and realization that "supporting legal copies" may seem obvious, but in fact, it is far from being a consensus.
Players who support legal versions can't understand: "Just play the game; it's obviously something that shouldn't be seen. Why do players who support piracy have to come and provoke us?"
Players of pirated games seem to not understand: "I've already played the game; the game company can't do anything to me. Why should I care about the feelings of players of the legal copies?"
On Baidu's The Legend of Zelda forum, the forum management team said, "if you want to play ahead, just play in secret." However, this kind of understanding can only exist in small communities with personnel management or high user autonomy. In more open communities, the recent turmoil surrounding Tears of the Kingdom can be described as "chaos and confusion."
On Baidu's Zelda forum, the forum management team said, "if you want to play ahead, just play in secret."
In fact, the unique atmosphere in the Chinese gaming industry was formed by the consensus of the older generation of players on the "original sin of piracy". They think that one major reason why Chinese games have not been successful is that piracy is too rampant, which has extinguished the survival hopes of small and medium-sized developers, and also caused overseas developers to bypass the Chinese market.
According to them, supporting legitimate copies is about improving the health of the gaming environment they are in. However, not everyone agrees with this "politically correct" stance, especially players who have not experienced that era.
This time, for game livestreamers and influencers, there is also a more practical issue at hand: the highly anticipated games are right here, and whether it's for strategy guides, speedruns, or entertainment, the earlier they start playing, the earlier they can prepare the content. If they don't get a head start, they may fall behind, which could affect their career.
Now, not many people are counting down the days until the release of Tears of the Kingdom anymore, because it could attract negative comments like "I've already played it; what are you waiting for?" The festive atmosphere that was present when the promotional videos were released has disappeared.
Players who support legal versions are upset, and they can only ask repeatedly, "Why did things turn out like this? How can users of pirated versions act so self-righteous towards legal copy supporters?"
The anticipated "bittersweet" experience turned into a genuine period of anticipation tinged with a hint of discomfort.
Source: YYS