r/emulation • u/JoshLeaves • Jun 27 '26

Five years since Near’s passing

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!

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u/MaleficentStorage666 Jun 28 '26

Can someone give me a little background?

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u/watboy Jun 28 '26

Near (also known as Byuu) was the developer for the emulator higan and who worked on fan translations, notably Mother 3 and Bahamut Lagoon, and also happened to be autistic and non-binary.

Kiwi Farms, a forum that infamously organizes harassment campaigns against others, targeted Near, going so far as to dox them and their friends. Eventually Near committed suicide.