Nintendo has suddenly removed thousands of videos from a YouTube channel that uploads soundtracks from franchises like Super Mario Bros, The Legend of Zelda, and Kirby.
YouTuber GilvaSunner, who has over 469,000 subscribers, tweeted that they will be deleting the channel on February 4 after Nintendo removed 3,500 videos from the channel, as reported by Nintendo Life.
It is not permitted to upload copyrighted music to YouTube even if a credit is supplied but GilvaSunner has been posting Nintendo tracks for over a decade and does not monetize the videos. There is currently no way to legally listen to much Nintendo music outside of occasionally released original game soundtracks.
In the Twitter post, GilvaSunner said: "After thinking about this a lot over the past few days, I've decided that at this point it's not really worth it to keep the channel up any longer, and will therefore delete the GlivaSunner YouTube channel (or what's left of it) this coming Friday.
"There are many different opinions over what is happening and that's fine! I can understand pretty much all the sides. I know this is disappointing to read for a lot of you, but I hope you can respect my decision to want to move on."
1,300 videos were removed last week and a further 2,200 were taken down on February 1, and GilvaSunner said they expected more to follow. It's unclear what's spurred Nintendo into action on this recently – we've contacted the company for comment.
Game over pic.twitter.com/lsLKKg8ZF8
— GilvaSunner (@GilvaSunner) August 13, 2019
The YouTube channel received strikes back in 2019 and again in 2020. "I'm not angry or surprised that Nintendo is doing this, but I do think it's a bit disappointing there is hardly an alternative," GilvaSunner tweeted. "If Nintendo thinks this is what needs to be done (to set an example), I will let them take down the channel. It is their content after all."
This isn't the first time Nintendo has reared its head regarding copyright. In June last year the company won a multi-million dollar lawsuit against ROM hosting website RomUniverse, and in March 2020 Sony reportedly removed Mario from Dreams after Nintendo complained.
IGN has reached out to Nintendo for comment but has not yet received a response.
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer who occasionally remembers to tweet @thelastdinsdale.