I wish more projects like this would just think smarter.

If you implement an engine and include a tool that takes the assets from the official game, it’s a lot harder for the IP owners to argue it infringes, and thus a lot harder to shut down.

That's not at all what this project is. Did you even look at anything before commenting. Its just a fangame someone made from the ground up.

Yes, that’s the point. If, instead of using/recreating assets yourself, you made the game in such a way that it asks you to point it to a game install folder or ROM/ISO to extract those assets itself on install, you can get away with a lot more, because you’re not distributing anything infringing. That’s why OpenRCT or Ship of Harkinian can be hugely popular games operating in the open; because you have to provide a copy of the game they use assets from, they can use only fully legal assets.