The first domestic switch cracked infringement case has been judged recently. The Zhonglou District People’s Court of Changzhou City, Jiangsu Province determined that the sale of a cracked version of the Switch game console by the defendant Zhonglou’s shop infringed the plaintiff’s trademark rights, and ruled that the shop immediately stopped the infringement and compensated 300,000 yuan. As the first domestic case involving the cracking of piracy and infringement of console games, it has a positive role in regulating the behavior of relevant market entities and clearing the copyright ecology of game consoles.

"Nintendo Switch" is a portable electronic game console released by Nintendo in 2017. It won first place in the "Top Ten Technology Products of 2017" by Time Magazine, and was selected as the "Top Ten Digital Products of 2010" in 2019. In February 2019, the plaintiff was authorized by Nintendo to act as the exclusive distributor of Nintendo Switch hardware products in mainland China. In December of the same year, the National Bank version of Nintendo Switch was officially released on official channels.

The switch game console adopts the integrated design of the home console and hand-held console. Once it was released, it set off an upsurge, and some criminals began to use it for improper profit. In this case, the defendant purchased the National Bank switch game console sold by the plaintiff in mainland China and then modified it. The game console was disassembled and then attached with a chip to crack the game entry program so that the game originally purchased for a fee can be used for free. High official selling price and profit from it.

The court held that the defendant modified the plaintiff’s goods without permission but still used the packaging box with the plaintiff’s trademark and sold them at an increased price, cutting off the plaintiff’s connection with the national switch game console that it sold, and objectively causing consumers to react to the product. The confusion of sources caused the public to mistakenly believe that the goods were original of low quality, damaged the reputation of the plaintiff’s trademark, and violated the plaintiff’s exclusive right to use the registered trademark. 

Based on this, the court ruled that the defendant should immediately stop the infringement of the plaintiff’s trademark exclusive rights, and compensate the plaintiff for economic losses and reasonable costs of rights maintenance totaling 300,000 yuan.