Two months ago, it was revealed that RTA in Japan Summer 2025 would feature no Nintendo games at all. As no official explanation was provided at the time, speculation and concern had been spreading online. On August 4, the organizers of RTA in Japan addressed the situation and confirmed that their decision was made in response to a warning from Nintendo.
According to the announcement, due to a direct notice from Nintendo, RTA in Japan will not be using any Nintendo-owned title for this summer’s event (scheduled to run from August 9 to 15). For all future events, they’ll be applying for individual usage permission for each title they want to feature.
RTA in Japan is the country’s biggest speedrunning event, and as people were heating up for the Summer 2025 competition, the newly announced list of games meant to be featured at the event stirred up controversy among Japanese gamers. While previous years have customarily featured numerous Nintendo games (which were always the highlight of the event – Super Mario 64 having the highest viewership), none were found on the list of featured games that was announced for this summer. This was quickly picked up by media, and fans speculated that Nintendo might be directly involved.
According to RTA in Japan’s organizers, Nintendo reached out to them on June 13 to let them know that “as a legal entity, they would have to ask for permission in advance” to feature Nintendo games in their event. Additionally, Nintendo stated that all previous instances of their games being streamed as part of RTA in Japan constitute “unauthorized use.” As RTA in Japan hopes to continue using Nintendo’s games in future events, the association has begun negotiations with Nintendo. Although RTA in Japan is a non-profit organization, with revenue from viewers and subscriptions going towards various charities, the problem seems to lie in the fact that they are officially a legal entity (they became one in 2020).
RiJ stated that, from now on, they will be sending separate requests to Nintendo for each title they want to feature in the future. However, as they were not able to accomplish this in time for RTA in Japan Summer 2025, they decided not to feature any Nintendo games in the event. This will also affect the guidelines and requirements for nominating games for future competitions. The organizers have promised to provide more concrete information soon.
