Curious what makes you say it'd be less legally dubious than an emulator? To me, it seems this would be at the same legality as the NES emulator because you're basically 'emulating' the environment Roblox game code runs in. To be fair if that intuition's correct it'd still be legal like emulators are if they're careful.

(also not a lawyer)

▲ conradev 5 days ago | parent | next [-]

  So long as the specific code used to implement a method is different, anyone is free under the Copyright Act to write his or her own code to carry out exactly the same function or specification of any methods used in the Java API. It does not matter that the declaration or method header lines are identical.

Emulators often require handling copyrighted materials like games or firmware, whereas APIs are not copyrightable.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_LLC_v._Oracle_America...

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LocalH 5 days ago | parent [-]

The NES itself contains no code. Any NES emulator that ships with no software, or software under proper license (such as homebrew) is unambiguously legal. Does your PC, and the OS that drives it, suddenly become inherently illegal if you, as a user, installed pirated software? No, of course not.

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conradev 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

Absolutely! It’s completely, unambiguously legal, which is why Google allows emulators on the Play Store.

Apple, beholden to copyright interests, is wary of software that allows even the possibility of copyright infringement. They just recently allowed video game emulators on their store.

It’s not a legal distinction, sure, but it’s also not apples to apples.

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pbhjpbhj 5 days ago | parent | prev [-]

No firmware, no microcode? It's all completely hard-wired?

(Genuine question, I've no idea what chips it uses or anything - was never rich enough to have a game console until I started work myself.)

	▲	zeta0134 4 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Nope! The system does include a CIC lockout chip, but emulators pretend it doesn't exist. The CPU immediately begins executing game code at power on. There is no BIOS or operating system, and indeed no fixed ROM inside the console at all.
	▲	ronsor 4 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		No firmware, no microcode. The NES uses an old 8-bit CPU and a few custom chips; at the time, including firmware would've been too costly (think of the RAM and ROM!).

▲ 5 days ago | parent | prev [-]

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