For as long as anyone can remember, people have been trying to use the awesome power and always-on-hand features of iPhones to play games on older consoles like the GameBoy. Emulating the functions of older consoles’ chips is perfectly legal, but distributing the games themselves (usually called “ROMs”) is often not because they are copyrighted.
However, Apple has never allowed these apps in the App Store. Thus, those who create retro console emulators for iPhone have had to make their applications available via sideloading on jailbroken iPhones (a big security risk, and increasingly difficult in fact) or sometimes even by hiding their emulator in an innocuous application like a calculator.
New changes to the App Store review guidelines could change all that. In response to regulatory pressure, Apple is changing some of its rules regarding what is and isn’t allowed. In the EU, music streaming services will be able to include a link to an external site to make purchases/subscriptions. But worldwide it is now possible to publish retro game emulators on the App Store.
Section 4.7 of the Application Review Guidelines now reads:
4.7 Mini-apps, mini-games, streaming games, chatbots, game plug-ins and emulators
Apps may offer certain software that is not integrated into the binary, particularly HTML5 mini-apps and mini-games, streaming games, chatbots, and plugins. Additionally, retro game console emulator apps may offer to download games.
There are of course some caveats. Any game that an emulation application makes available for download must comply with “all applicable laws”, meaning that it can only provide access to public domain ROMs or those that have been subject to copyright infringement. a distribution license. Apple requires that emulators carry an age rating for top-rated content in the app, apps must have a method of filtering and reporting objectionable content, and they must follow all other rules regarding privacy. data, exposing native APIs to emulated software, etc.
It’s unclear whether it will be possible for a retro gaming emulator app to allow users to load a ROM that they have stored on their iPhone’s internal memory or in a cloud storage service. There doesn’t seem to be any legal barrier to this sort of thing: media apps on the App Store can do this. play Illegally acquired MP4s work great, but they simply cannot provide a way to find or download them.
The rule change is only a few days old, so we haven’t seen any new emulators to test in the store yet. Since there’s already a cottage industry of retro game emulation for jailbroken iPhones or things like AltStore, we probably won’t have to wait long.
