Last month, we brought the news that Full Screen Mario, a free, open-source HTML5 web version of the original Super Mario Bros. game, was available thanks to the work of Josh Goldberg, a college student. The website and game were reported on in various news outlets because of how it was an actual recreation of the original game, along with a level creator and random map generator.
Naturally, as with any property that Nintendo still owns and sees other people messing about with, they took notice and made an official statement on the project:
“Nintendo respects the intellectual property rights of other companies, and in turn expects others to respect ours as well. Nintendo is seeking the removal of the content, as we vigorously protect against infringement of our intellectual property rights.”
Remember that? We do. And in a move that surprised no one, Nintendo went ahead and did what it could to get the site taken down. It’s now clear that Nintendo succeeded, because it’s no longer there.
The game’s site now has a notice posted from DMCA, and Josh Goldberg also posted a response:
“FullScreenMario.com has been found in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), and on Friday, November 1st was taken down by an official DMCA complaint from Nintendo. The website allowed players to play an open source HTML5 remake of Nintendo’s 1985 Super Mario Bros, containing the original 32 levels, a random map generator, and level editor. This was in violation of Nintendo’s copyrights and trademarks.”
And this isn’t the first game to infringe on Nintendo’s copyrights—we’ve seen games appearing on smartphones too, which Nintendo is likely going after. Especially when they’re still selling copies of that 1985 game on their Virtual Console—infringed copyright in this case means lost revenue.
Some gamers are clearly upset by Nintendo’s stance, but when the game is still available for purchase on multiple platforms through the VC service, there’s no question about Nintendo’s legal right to pursue the path they have.
