After suing a former Reddit moderator in October 2025 for pirating Switch games, a Washington court has ordered the individual in question to pay Nintendo $4.5 million in damages.
According to a September 25 TorrentFreak report, US District Judge Lauren King ordered former r/SwitchPirates moderator James “Archbox” Williams to cough up $4.5 million in damages to Nintendo after the company accused him of operating several pirate shops to illegally decrypt and distribute Switch games to the public.
The lawsuit, which was filed in a Washington federal court in June 2024, stated that Williams had been running this racket since at least 2019, using “circumvention device” software to bypass the company’s systems and gain access to over 30 Nintendo Switch games. This includes titles like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.
Williams reportedly ignored the complaint at the time, which prompted Nintendo to seek the statutory maximum of $150,000 per title in October 2025. And just this week, Judge King agreed with Nintendo’s request, stating that Williams was aware of the case, as he both hired a lawyer to object to a Google subpoena and continued posting on Reddit but opted to not respond to the company’s lawsuit.
In one screenshot saved by TorrentFreak, Williams called himself a “pirate” in a Reddit thread, clarifying that he–and others like him–won’t “give Nintendo $50 for a game” when there are “months of releases unavailable anywhere.”
It’s a bit like that I Think You Should Leave skit, where Tim Robinson, in a hot dog suit, drives a hot-dog-shaped car through a suiting store and is “looking for the guy who did this.” Both Judge King and Nintendo know the guy who did it, and they want him to pay a lot for his actions.
“The last factor also weighs heavily in favor of the statutory maximum penalty because NOA’s complaint contains well-supported and extensive allegations that Williams knew the videogames were copyrighted but willfully undertook his copying and distribution efforts anyway,” Judge King concluded in the suit. “Williams’ egregious infringement activities merit substantial punishment here.”
In addition to the $4.5 million in damages, Williams has also been ordered to cease all illegal distributions of Switch games through a permanent injunction. This includes barring him from encouraging others to download pirated games or bypass Nintendo’s systems to do so, disabling his myriad pirate shops, and deactivating his social media accounts. According to TorrentFreak, much of this has already happened, as Williams’ Discord, Instagram, Reddit, Telegram, TikTok, and X accounts are gone. Further, some of the pirate shops Williams ran were taken offline after Nintendo sent a cease-and-desist letter in March 2024.
For Nintendo, this is another win against thieves who think they can get away with pirating the company’s games. According to the lawsuit, the company wanted to both stop Williams’ infringing activities and use him as an example of what happens when you go up against the ever-litigious Mario maker. Be careful. Those white gloves might serve you papers.
