UPDATE FEBRUARY 16th 2026
Following Nintendo’s warning, Developers GreemDev and Zeph, respectively lead developers of the Ryubing and Citron emulators, have stopped their work.
Ryubing will still receive basic maintenance for the time being, but Citron has been completely removed, and its developer has left his own Discord server.
Here are the messages from their Discord servers:
Ryubing is not going anywhere. There’s a lot of things going on in the scene right now, and I want to take the time to clarify some things. — It is with a heavy heart that I announce that GreemDev is no longer maintaining the project. He’s moved on to bigger and better things, and we support him in this decision. LotP and I will be spearheading the project moving forward, and while we do plan to make some changes, we can’t promise anything more than what Ryubing currently is. This is not a phoenix project, this is a maintenance project, and we are sticking to those limited goalposts. We are not discontinuing development, but we do need help — if you want to contribute, please reach out tofor an account on our GitLab.
thanks for sticking it out ~ GreemDev
It is also with a heavy heart that I announce that the Citron project has discontinued. Zeph has taken the project down and left Discord. As this is a pretty hot topic, please refrain from discussing the happenings unless you are knowledgeable about the situation (see Rule #3, no drama, please). We are monitoring the scene for changes, and we are aware that forks will likely pop up. We are working with developers on a solution, but in the meantime, I strongly advise you all to be vigilant and wait for an announcement regarding this. — With this being said, you may see a lot of new members join the server. Please say hello and welcome them to our little hellscape. To our newcomers, hello and welcome to Ryubing! I
and make yourself familiar with our policies, they’re a bit different than what you might be used to. If you have questions, you are welcome to ask — all I ask in return is that you are respectful. This is a difficult time for all of us, but we’ll get through it. If you want to help us out, we are looking for contributors, and boosts help the server a lot! We are about to lose our server tag if we don’t get more boosts, and I know many of you want to see the gradient role colors come back.
We’re also opening chat for notes and suggestions from the community on what we should work on, and we’re going to be accepting applications for a new helper role. You can message me directly if you’re interested (will require verification). Thanks for sticking around, and for reading the giant text wall. love you guys
We would like to thank the two developers who took over the Ryujinx and Yuzu projects.
Eden is still being maintained and has even recently updated its emulator.
ORIGINAL ARTICLE:
The emulation community woke up to a nightmare this week. Nintendo just sent DMCA takedown notices to basically every single Nintendo Switch emulator currently hosted on GitHub, and developers are scrambling to keep their projects alive.
We’re talking Eden, Citron, Kenji-NX, MeloNX, and even dormant projects like Sudachi and Skyline, nobody was safe from Nintendo’s legal hammer.
The notices went out yesterday, and while the repositories are still technically online as of now, it’s only a matter of time before GitHub completes its review process and pulls the plug.
If you’ve been following the Switch emulation scene, you know this has been brewing for a while, but the sheer scope of this coordinated attack caught everyone off guard.
The Yuzu and Ryujinx fallout set the stage
This isn’t Nintendo’s first rodeo. Back in March 2024, the company forced Yuzu’s developers to settle for a brutal $2.4 million and shut down the entire operation.
That was supposed to be the end of it, right? Wrong. The emulation community did what it does best, forked the code and kept building. Citron and Eden emerged as the most organized successors, with active development teams pushing updates and improvements.
Then came October 2024, when Nintendo went after Ryujinx’s lead developer in Brazil and convinced them to pull the plug without even going to court. The community thought maybe Nintendo would be satisfied with taking down the two biggest players and leave the smaller forks alone. That period of relative peace just ended with a bang.
Why Nintendo’s argument frustrates developers
Nintendo’s legal reasoning is the same as always: these emulators “illegally circumvent technological protection measures” because they use cryptographic keys to decrypt Switch games.
Here’s the thing though, none of these emulators actually bundle Nintendo’s encryption keys or copyrighted game files. Users have to dump their own keys from their own legally purchased Switch consoles. The emulators themselves are just software tools.
The frustrating part? Emulation isn’t illegal under U.S. law. Courts have previously recognized the legality of independently developed emulators, like with PlayStation emulators back in the day.
But Nintendo never actually proved anything in court, the Yuzu case was settled, not litigated. So now Nintendo just points to that $2.4 million settlement as “evidence” in DMCA notices, and platforms like GitHub have no choice but to comply when a company with Nintendo’s legal resources comes knocking.
The scene isn’t dead yet
The silver lining? Smart developers saw this coming. Citron, Eden, and Kenji-NX have all mirrored their code to private servers and self-hosted repositories outside of GitHub’s reach.
The code will survive, it’ll just be harder to find for the average user. That’s actually the dangerous part, when legitimate sources disappear, people turn to sketchy websites that could bundle malware with the downloads.
Nintendo’s strategy has always been multi-pronged: sue the big targets, DMCA the distribution channels, and loudly insist that games should only be played on official hardware.
This latest sweep makes sense, Nintendo wants players buying those Switch games again on their newest hardware, the Switch 2, not running them for free on emulators.
Whether this becomes a turning point or just another cycle in the endless cat-and-mouse game between Nintendo and the emulation community remains to be seen.
What’s your take on Nintendo’s aggressive stance against emulation? Do you think preservation and interoperability matter, or should emulators stay in the gray zone? Drop your thoughts below.