The way these old video game systems work is the cartridge has a program
which is loaded into the system's RAM and then executed. This is
installation. Temporary installation, but installation nonetheless. It's
pretty much exactly the same as running a live system from a CD or DVD.
DVDs work differently. What is on the DVD is primarily data, although video
DVDs do have some instructions on them; I don't know for sure how much of a
problem these instructions present. But the main software is whatever OS is
running on the DVD player.
In fact, if you talk to RMS, the only reason he pretty much completely
ignored video games is because he (incorrectly) assumed that it was a minor,
unimportant activity. Every correspondence I have had with him on the topic
of these video games has shown quite clearly that he considers these old
video games to be just as unethical as any other proprietary program.
