Nintendo copyright claims strike again, this time with Zelda: Breath of the Wild multiplayer modder
"Don't take this creativity away from us."
Prolific Zelda streamer and modder PointCrow has been hit by dozens of additional content claims and takedowns on his videos by Nintendo, in the run up to the release of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.
PointCrow, who's real name is Eric Morino, has seen several of his videos affected by Nintendo's copyright claims recently, including ones pertaining to his Breath of the Wild multiplayer mod. Needless to say, he is not happy about it.
PointCrow recently released a video about the various claims and takedowns on his channel (a video which he said was vetted by his lawyer before its release).
He revealed that, on 6th April, Nintendo blocked videos on his modified Breath of the Wild multiplayer. He appealed these takedowns, claiming he was "in line with [Nintendo's] content guideline policies".
Following this, Nintendo then "escalated" the situation, and issued PointCrow's YouTube channel (which at the time of writing has 1.61 million subscribers) with multiple copyright strikes.
PointCrow subsequently wrote to Nintendo in a bid to reach an "amicable resolution" following these strikes. You can see this email below:
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Nintendo then went on to claim "24 more" of PointCrow's videos.
The content creator stated many of these were Breath of the Wild related videos which were showing modded content. Others were of other modded Nintendo games, such as Pokemon and Mario Odyssey.
However, one removed Breath of the Wild video showed no modded content. It was just "vanilla" gameplay, in PointCrow's words.
"These takedowns may have started with modded content, but they've spiralled into something else entirely," Morino said in his video.
PointCrow also drew attention to other affected Zelda streamers, such as Croton.
Last week, Croton revealed 10 of their streams along with two of their videos were "nuked" from the platform.
"No answers, no context, just a copyright removal," Croton tweeted. "And one of these videos has literally nothing to do with mods and was simply a Zelda challenge run."
The streamer closed stating they were "very saddened" by this decision by Nintendo.
PointCrow is now concerned about any upcoming Tears of the Kingdom streams.
"This is a little scary because the precedent that they set with this case may apply heavily for their upcoming release of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom," he said.
"As per [Nintendo's] decisions to take down challenge and gameplay videos alongside the modded content it will be difficult for any content creator to post creative concepts without having the fear of Nintendo exercising their copyright over video that is in line with their own policies."
PointCrow, understandably, does not want to jeopardise his channel, and has voiced an "open letter" to Nintendo appealing its actions.
"Don't take this creativity away from us," PointCrow said. "These channels you've targeted - these videos you're claiming - are from some of the people that are most passionate about your games. You're stifling that imagination and punishing those who want to share it with others - when they do it in the way that you have outlined for us creators."
He continued: "Please remove these strikes and claims or at least start a dialogue with us so we can all move forward with the excitement I'm sure you would love to see about your future games."
Eurogamer has asked Nintendo for further comment.
You can see PointCrow's full video on the takedowns and copyright claims below:
