Nintendo demands $4.5M from piracy store operator

Nintendo of America is suing James C. Williams, also known as “Archbox,” for facilitating a network of unauthorized online shops offering public libraries of pirated Nintendo Switch games for download.

The defendant not only copied and distributed Nintendo games without authorization, but he also actively promoted the copying and distribution of games to thousands of others across a variety of websites and online communities.

In addition, he allegedly asked gamers for “donations,” meaning they could download Switch games faster and without restrictions. Lastly, he offered technical advice on how to download and install pirated copies of Nintendo Switch games.

The defendant received a cease-and-desist letter on August 13th, 2024, but didn’t respond to the complaint. Therefore, Nintendo was forced to take legal steps to protect its intellectual property (IP) rights and those of its partners.

“These activities have substantially damaged Nintendo of America’s (NOA’s) overall business and intellectual property rights, as well as the business and intellectual property rights of NOA’s development and publishing partners, and further has caused harm to the many artists, game designers, programmers, and others whose livelihoods depend upon the sale of authorized Nintendo products,” Nintendo said in court documents.

Before Nintendo could take action against Williams, the gaming company first attempted to establish his identity. To this end, the company appealed to Reddit, where the defendant was a moderator of a group called SwitchPirates, to share his personal information.

Nintendo was ultimately able to track down the defendant because he posted revealing information about himself on Reddit, which could be linked to his email addresses, which in turn could be linked to repair requests he made to Nintendo.

Nintendo is asking the court for a so-called default judgment. This is a ruling made by the court when the defendant fails to fulfill its legal obligations in a lawsuit. In this case, the defendant didn’t appear in court, which, according to Nintendo, means that it should win by default.

Nintendo claims it’s entitled to a permanent injunction for ongoing copyright infringement and monetary damages of $4.5 million. As a “gesture of reasonableness,” Nintendo chose to neglect to seek statutory damages for Williams’ DMCA anti-trafficking violations, even though such damages could be several million dollars.

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