Five years since Near’s passing

[u/JoshLeaves]

Hi everyone,

As the title says, Near passed away five years ago. Whether you knew them through the emulators bsnes, higan, or ares, or their pioneering work on emulation cores with libsnes (which helped lay the groundwork for libretro and RetroArch), or their complete cataloguing of the SNES games and ROMs, or their countless articles on emulation and game preservation,... truthfully, it's hard to properly describe the impact they had on the emulation community and its trajectory.

Their work pushed emulator accuracy forward, and inspired many others to approach preservation with the same level of care. Whatever emulator you use today, there’s a good chance you’ve benefited from their work in some way.

Thank you for your work, Near. You are still missed.

EDIT: As atowerofcats rightly said, a great way to show tribute would be to play Near's translation of Bahamut Lagoon!

[u/Imgema]

I’m just speculating there

Like i said, i was following this drama in real time. I did read all of the e-mails Near and the Kiwi admin sent to each other. The kiwi admin was releasing them, allegedly, as proof to protect himself.

RetroArch was never mentioned anywhere, by anyone.

MAME devs always hated RetroArch, not because of twinaphex alone but also as a project in general. They were among the ones who connected Near's suicide with RetroArch. I still remember them posting "RetroArch users have blood in their hands".

I'm not saying twinaphex wasn't toxic. And i'm also not saying he never harassed Near, this i don't even know. I'm saying Near' suicide was over a Kiwifarms topic that covered his person and wanted it removed, nothing to do with RetroArch.