Nintendo certainly treats its virtual console service as an afterthought. The company sits on one of the world's largest stashes of classic games, yet it only manages to release 2 or 3 ones each month.
Gamers wondered how hard is it really to upload all of Nintendo's NES and SNES games library to the virtual console store directly, but the company always insisted that there is a lot of work involved in bringing a classic title to the virtual console than simply dumping its ROM. Interestingly enough, when Eurogamer's Chris Bratt inspected Super Mario Bros. virtual console firles, he found evidence that Nintendo is probably re-uploading (officially illegal) ROMs ripped by emulation fans.
ROMs are created by dumping the content of actual game cartridges to a computer, but they are not an exact replica. Depending on the cartridge version and the method used to extract the data, minor variations may occur. With that in mind, Bratt checked the content of Super Mario Bros. virtual console game on Wii and found that it was an exact match for one ROM available online.
Emulation and ROMs fall in a legal grey area. Dumping your own ROM from a cartridge you legally own is a protected legal right while downloading a ROM for a game you never owned surely is illegal. However, the lines get muddled when you download a ROM for a game you own or used to own. The modding community believes this to be just another way of backing up your game while Nintendo and other content owners insist that the legal protection extends only backing up your physical copies directly.
When contacted, Nintendo denied that it ever used ROMs from the internet and refused to explain the similarities.
