Image: Nintendo Life / NintendoNintendo has recently updated its Account User Agreement to provide a more severe warning to those who "bypass, modify, decrypt, defeat" or "tamper with" their games. In short, if you happen to hack your Switch or run emulators, you may find that it winds up getting bricked entirely. This comes via Stephen Totilo's latest Game File newsletter, confirming that the wording in the User Agreement from Nintendo has been expanded upon significantly, effectively giving more information as to what constitutes an offending action along with the potential consequences. For comparison, here's the original wording, which had been in effect since April 2021: "You are not allowed to lease, rent, sublicense, publish, copy, modify, adapt, translate, reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble all or any portion of the Nintendo Account Services without Nintendo's written consent, or unless otherwise expressly permitted by applicable law." And now here's the updated version: "Without limitation, you agree that you may not (a) publish, copy, modify, reverse engineer, lease, rent, decompile, disassemble, distribute, offer for sale, or create derivative works of any portion of the Nintendo Account Services; (b) bypass, modify, decrypt, defeat, tamper with, or otherwise circumvent any of the functions or protections of the Nintendo Account Services, including through the use of any hardware or software that would cause the Nintendo Account Services to operate other than in accordance with its documentation and intended use; (c) obtain, install or use any unauthorized copies of Nintendo Account Services; or (d) exploit the Nintendo Account Services in any manner other than to use them in accordance with the applicable documentation and intended use, in each case, without Nintendo’s written consent or express authorization, or unless otherwise expressly permitted by applicable law. You acknowledge that if you fail to comply with the foregoing restrictions Nintendo may render the Nintendo Account Services and/or the applicable Nintendo device permanently unusable in whole or in part." Here in the UK, we received our own updated User Agreement from Nintendo, and while it more or less covers the same topic, the wording isn't quite so severe: "Any Digital Products registered to your Nintendo Account and any updates of such Digital Products are licensed only for personal and non-commercial use on a User Device. Digital Products must not be used for any other purpose. In particular, without NOE's written consent, you must neither lease nor rent Digital Products nor sublicense, publish, copy, modify, adapt, translate, reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble any portion of Digital Products other than as expressly permitted by applicable law. Such unauthorised use of a Digital Product may result in the Digital Product becoming unusable." Regardless, it certainly seems as though recent legal incidents have encouraged Nintendo to revisit its user Agreement and beef it up accordingly. Its latest case resulted in a total of $17,500 in damages from a 'pirate streamer' found to be promoting emulators online while playing Switch games ahead of launch. In a broader sense, Nintendo has clearly given its whole legal infrastructure a bit of a sweep ahead of the launch of the Switch 2. It recently confirmed that it may monitor and collect data from GameChat sessions on its upcoming hardware via its updated privacy policy. Wording on the UK version clarified that only the most recent 3-minute segments of the chat would be recorded and stored locally on the Switch for up to 24 hours. The user then has the option to send relevant data to Nintendo if issues arise. Behave yourselves Defendant has so far evaded complaints What do you make of this updated user agreement from Nintendo? Do you think it covers all the bases? Let us know your thoughts with a comment. [source gamefile.news] Share:20 0 Nintendo Life’s resident horror fanatic, when he’s not knee-deep in Resident Evil and Silent Hill lore, Ollie likes to dive into a good horror book while nursing a lovely cup of tea. He also enjoys long walks and listens to everything from TOOL to Chuck Berry. Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment... Related Articles ICYMI: 12 Switch Games Will Receive Free Switch 2 Upgrades ARMS, Pokémon and much more Switch Users Are Getting Error Codes After Updating To Version 20.0.0 Update: A fix has been deployed Oops, Yuji Horii May Not Have Leaked Massive Remake News After All Update: Translator was just having fun with Chrono Trigger Palworld Dev Announces "Disappointing" Game Changes Resulting From Nintendo's Lawsuit "We have had to make certain compromises"