In latest piracy and emulation battle, Nintendo seeks $17,500 in damages from streamer accused of broadcasting "at least 10" unreleased Nintendo games

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door
(Image credit: Nintendo)

Nintendo is seeking an injunction and default judgement against a streamer it previously filed a lawsuit against for allegedly broadcasting leaked Nintendo games before they were even released.

The lawsuit was first filed against Jesse "Every Game Guru" Keighin in November last year, but as spotted by TorrentFreak, Nintendo has now requested a default judgement after Keighin "evaded service" and "failed to respond" to Nintendo's complaint.

Furthermore, the company alleges: "By his failure to respond, Defendant has admitted the factual allegations in Nintendo's complaint and the Court must accept the complaint's well-pleaded allegations regarding liability as true."

Previously, Nintendo alleged that "starting in as early as 2022, Defendant has streamed unauthorized gameplay of at least ten of Nintendo's leaked games before their publication, and more than fifty times in total." It was claimed that these included Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door, The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, and Super Mario Party Jamboree.

On top of that, Keighin was accused of "providing users links to circumvention software (Nintendo Switch emulators), Nintendo’s proprietary cryptographic keys (prod.keys), and pirated ROM repositories," and by doing so, "giving his viewers everything they need to pirate as many games as they wish."

Paper Mario

(Image credit: Nintendo)

While Nintendo previously sought $150,000 for each alleged violation of the Copyright Act, as well as a further $2,500 for each alleged violation of the Copyright Act's anti-circumvention and anti-trafficking provisions, it's now demanding less. Specifically, it's seeking "an award of $10,000 for infringement of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door," which the company calls "particularly reasonable since Nintendo is electing not to seek damages for infringement of the other nine works as to which Nintendo has established liability."

On top of that, Nintendo also seeks a "statutory damages award" of $7,500 in regard to its "circumvention and trafficking claims." That's $500 for each of the 15 violations Nintendo alleges has happened – one for each of the 10 games allegedly streamed by Keighin at least once, and then the apparent distribution of four links to Nintendo Switch emulators, as well as one to prod.keys.

As well as the total of $17,500 it demands, Nintendo seeks a "permanent injunction" to stop Keighin from "engaging in further violations of Nintendo's rights." Specifically, this would prevent the defendant from, amongst other things, streaming Nintendo's copyrighted works, and it would also require him to "destroy all circumvention devices" he owns.

This request hasn't been granted at the time of writing – it was first filed on Friday, April 18, so we'll have to wait and see how the court responds.

Nintendo is reportedly taking legal action after last year's massive Pokemon "Teraleak," which supposedly unveiled Legends: Z-A source code and unannounced Gen 10 games.

Catherine Lewis
News Writer

I'm one of GamesRadar+'s news writers, who works alongside the rest of the news team to deliver cool gaming stories that we love. After spending more hours than I can count filling The University of Sheffield's student newspaper with Pokemon and indie game content, and picking up a degree in Journalism Studies, I started my career at GAMINGbible where I worked as a journalist for over a year and a half. I then became TechRadar Gaming's news writer, where I sourced stories and wrote about all sorts of intriguing topics. In my spare time, you're sure to find me on my Nintendo Switch or PS5 playing through story-driven RPGs like Xenoblade Chronicles and Persona 5 Royal, nuzlocking old Pokemon games, or going for a Victory Royale in Fortnite.

You must confirm your public display name before commenting

Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.