Console-Resistance

My friends at www.dcemu.co.uk have posted an update on how homebrew is going now on the established current generation consoles.

Well, I remember seeing something called the "State of Homebrew as of August 2007" on DCEmu before I joined.

Since a lot has changed in the homebrew world, why not post another update?

MICROSOFT XBOX 360:

So far, there is not really any easy way to boot unsigned code on the Xbox 360, however, Team Xecuter of Xbox 1 fame, has been working at hacking the Xbox 360 for awhile now, and at one time promised us that they would hopefully succeed in finding a good exploit by 2008.
As of right now, there are two methods of booting homebrew on the Xbox 360.

Method #1 - Join the XNA club and develop or try out free homebrew games.

Method #2 - Use the shader-exploit in Peter Jackson’s King Kong: The Video Game discovered by the Wii60 team. This method, however, is nowadays out of the reach of many, as it only worked between updates 4532 and 4548 (which is Halloween 2006 - November 2006). This also required a serial cable and your Xbox 360 to be modded to boot a special version of the King Kong game. But if you did everything properly, you could boot Linux (I’ve seen uBuntu working on youtube)!

NINTENDO WII:

As of right now, the Nintendo Wii is the only seventh generation console that has been hacked and is able to boot unsigned code. The Wii scene is right now beating the PSP scene and has a lot of good homebrew here and on the way, like a homebrew Nintendo 64 emulator (and apparently Sega CD emulation).

As of right now there are a few methods of running homebrew/unsigned code on the Nintendo Wii.

Method #1 (recommended) - Use the Twilight Hack exploit in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.
All you do is put it on an SD card, copy it to your Wii, boot Twilight Princess, load the game, move around, and it crashes the game due to some sort of buffer overflow, which results in the ability to boot unsigned code, from where you can install the Homebrew Channel.

Method #2 - Use the more modernized version of SD Media Launcher and boot Gamecube Homebrew.
This used to be the popular method of playing Homebrew on the Wii, but has since become obsolete thanks to the Twilight Hack.

SONY PLAYSTATION 3:

As of now, PS3 comes in 4th Place, behind the PSP, Wii, and DS and ahead of the Xbox 360. As of right now, there are 2 methods of booting homebrew on the Playstation 3.

Method #1 - The PS3 is able to run homebrew on Linux, with fullspeed NES, Super Nintendo, and Sega Genesis/Megadrive emulation. Sadly, there’s a limit, as Sony made it so you cant really use all the power PS3 offers in Linux mode (I believe it has something to do with the GPU and not being able to use all cell cores).

Method #2 - With the 20GB (American/Japanese), US 60GB, EU 60GB, and 80GB PS3s, you are able to boot PS2 homebrew. Even though the PS2 wasnt very popular in the homebrew world, it still has NES (FCEUltra PS2), Sega Genesis/Megadrive (PGEN), and a decent SNES Emulator (SNES-Station).

In March of 2008, Dragula96, a respected PSP coder, posted a video on YouTube showing a Hello World Exploit. This means that we might actually see some good things in terms of homebrew down the road for the PS3.

To read more on the rest of them go here

xboxfanboy has posted pics showing the rumoured Dukenukem 3d on xbla.

Duke Nukem 3D. Long rumored to be heading to the Xbox Live Arcade when, back in January, rumor-word told us that Duke would be gracing the XBLA in a "few months". A few months passed, then a few more and even a few more and still we have no Duke Nukem 3D (cough, vaporware, cough). But wait, what’s this? Two new screenshots sent to Joystiq by a tipster showcasing the Duke gracing the Arcade. With co-op mentioned in an achievement description too? Yummy yum! It’s rumor for now, but we have a hunch that the XBLA Duke will steer clear of the vaporware bin. Though, the same cannot be said for the other Duke.

Did Ken Lobb, creative director at Microsoft Game Studios, just confirm motion control will be a factor in the newest Banjo Kazooie game? We’re saying it’s a “definite maybe.” Others are saying yes, based on Lobb’s comments in a Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts walk-through with developer commentary. What comments?

Specifically, Ken says “The primary function that Kazooie has in the game is she carries this wrench and the wrench is used for many different things. One of the things that the wrench is used for is to turn these devices. So you basically grab with the wrench and then you twist the controller around and it’ll move different things in the game.”

gamesindustry has posted news about XNA’s general manager Chris Satchell, revealing that microsoft is experimenting with 3D or stereoscopic games.
Speaking to gamesindustry.biz satchell said the technology was “extremely interesting” and that microsoft has experimented with it but said the requirement to wear headgear will hamper its widespread acceptance.

Read more at gamesindustry.biz

This technology although not completely new hasn’t really caught on due to wearing the shutter glasses, however the games that have used them or modified to use them on the pc have looked truely amazing, and have given depth to the games, plus with better controllers then ever, this is the next step to be even more part of the game.

Otomedius G has a special box for xbox360 which includes “character badges” and the hyper stick pro by Hori.

The stick includes a touch pad which factors into the original arcade game.
What would be interesting is to see what other uses the touchpad will have in future games and homebrew development.

To read more about this go to www.insertcredit.com

The different years of consoles have shown an evolution in gaming at home, originally powered by the arcade industry trying to reproduce the same popular games, each generation of console has offered something new to the gamer.
The Atari 2600 offered colour graphics and varied games, and had many of the popular arcade games, the Nintendo NES had even greater colours and better sound and had started to bring the arcade experience home, plus made consoles a household name “he’s playing his Nintendo”.

The 16bit generation brought with it bigger games cd sound and amazing graphic abilities using purpose graphic chips, and for the first time a system that let you play the same arcade game at home, the neogeo was released, however with games costing into the hundreds it wasnt cheap, but went on to release its final game snk vs capcom which was ported to the 128bit consoles.

The 32bit generation brought the gap even closer to the arcades with Playstation and saturn hardware in popular arcade games, meanwhile the controllers brought lightguns stearing wheels, analogue controls and rumble, to create a more entertaining experience.

At this point the arcade had hardware almost identical to its home counterpart, with the dawn of the 128bit generation brought the sega naomi and dreamcast, with the dreamcast being the first to achive this, and became a major selling point when the console had launched, being able to see and play the game first in the arcade then get to play the near identical game later at home a few months later was certainly an exiciting prospect, and with a vms not only did the memory card turn into a portable game, but allowed you to take it to the same arcades and show off your skills in public…well it could of.
But this generation of consoles brought online play to the mass’s, offering a far greater audience then ever before and allowing downloads to increase the longertivity of a game, this generation of consoles had certainly been the biggest leap for your average gamer, with games now in their gigabytes it offered epics and cinematic experiences.
But what about the controllers.
Analogue was now standard but clever technolgy allowed voice reconition, video cameras that let you be in the game, and all sorts of other controllers from fishing to buzzers!?
Oh and did i mention samba de amigo?
A game that had great praise from nintendo which allowed detection of where the sambas where positioned, and a party game that even the non gamer could have a go at.
Sadly it was on a doomed console, and sega as a console manufacter had ended.

Which brings us onto the current generation, a generation of consoles that started with nintendo hyping the wii by talking about the controller!
A controller that could detect its possition…
Wait didnt samba de amigo do that?

The wii had certainly changed how people play games, no longer could you just sit in front of the tv with a joypad in your hands, now if you had to hit something you had to hit it using the wiimote to effect the action on screen.
So long to getting obese by playing to many games, though doing other injury’s to yourself had increased if you were to over do it!
Online play now standard and greatly improved has meant solo gaming and arcades a thing of the past.
With the advent of high definition tv, games have never looked so good either with ps3 and xbox 360 outputting their games at hd.

But whats next for gaming, we certainly have got lots to look forward to in playing games in other ways never thought possible, but with companys such as sony aiming to premote the multimedia capabilitys of their consoles it seems the future might not be gaming related after all..