A big change is coming to the App Store, as Apple is opening up its doors to allow video game emulators.
For the longest time, if you wanted to emulate games on your phone, out of the two most popular operating systems, Android was the only way to do it. Playing emulated games on iOS has been a pain and mostly not popular since its inception, but in an update provided by Apple earlier this week, the hardware and software maker announced that emulators will now be allowed to release on its storefront, the App Store. Important to note is that any retro game console emulator apps are “responsible for all such software offered in your app, including ensuring that such software complies with these Guidelines and all applicable laws.”
Essentially what that means is that they can’t let you download ROMs and the like through the app, as the distribution of ROMs does count as piracy. Emulators themselves are perfectly legal, as well as playing games on them, but it’s ROM distribution sites that typically come under fire from companies like Nintendo. It’ll obviously take a bit of time for certain emulators to make their way to the App Store, so you won’t be able to jump into them immediately, but if you are interested in emulation and only use Apple products, you’ll soon be able to more easily get into it.
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