Hackers and the Rest of Us

How does the PS3 hack really effect those of us who aren't hackers or interested in hacking?

[deadreckoning666]

"As for me, I like the PS3 and am happy to pay for games and content without ripping off the people who created them for my enjoyment."

Me too. I'm happy to pay for new games and support good devs. I'd never pirate a full-fledged PS3 game, but if a custom firmware came out in the future that would let me create my own dynamic themes...I'd be all over it! As long as your not making a profit from another person's hard work, then hacking isn't a bad thing. Too bad the N4G Sony disciples think "piracy" and "hacking" are the same thing.

@Nitrowolf2- Yea, I hate glitchers, ESPECIALLY on Uncharted 2 multiplayer. There are countless times that I've stayed frozen while people from the other team sniped me..and it always happened in the SAME spot.

[Nitrowolf2]

I don't have an issue with it either. And like you said if a CFW came out that enabled more stuff i might go ahead and try it out, but for the enjoyment of the online community i hope Sony finds a way to keep them offline. Pirating is bad, but having them play online is worse. Imagine playing a game online and they are using hacks/cheats that were made due to this exploit. Keep them offline and i will be happy.

Piracy =/= Hacking. although Piracy can be obtain by hacking they are not the same. But as i said in other post the majority of users will most likely be drawn in to this if they can play backups/pirated games.

I am however really hoping that not only this push Sony to try and block these people, but to also push them in the FW department to add new features.

[fail0verflow]

No issues?

What do you think about cheaters with aim-bots, wall hacks, inifinite ammo, no relaod guns, and god mode in every game? Bacause THAT WILL happen, there's no reason why it can't now. And don't assume Sony can ban a console pirates have a full control of, it's not a Xbox 360 case, it's way different here. Anything Sony use to recognize the particular console and ban it, can possibly be changed now.

And don't say glitchers and explioters already exist, they do but regular cheaters is a WAY worse thing.

[GrieverSoul]

The problem with this is that hackers cant keep it in their pants! This is was a bragging contest on who could crack the PS3. If they want to get more out of their consoles, then they should keep it to themselves. I see no problem with that.

But exposing this thing like they did it clearly shows they want to get recognition. OK! You guys are good! *claps* - End of story! ... NO!!! They want to make homebrew!! Seriously, some people praise the XMBC and PSP homebrew but honestly, 99% of people who altered their console was for the purpose of pirating games. I admit I did that too when I was younger and a bit unaware of my actions. Now, I see the damege it can do! The Dreamcast died because of that! My favorite console was "hacked" in days after released and SEGA coulndt get around it and the console died because the software was easy to pirate. No one did homebrew for it!! And dont get me that crap about playing older SNES or Genesis games... please people! You can already play them for more than 15 years on your PC! Hell, I have a Pentium 2 at 233mhz that can run it, why do I want a X360 or a PS3 to run these games. They will look like crap!!! The PC has smoothing effects you can do to improve its visuals.

In the end, I just want these guys to admit they want free games with their consoles.

[Nitrowolf2]

@fail0verflow
wow
it's like you just read one word in my comment

@ GrieverSoul

i have download limits here so no point for me, but anyway that is also what i don't want seeing. I don't want to see the PS3 slowly begin to die out with developers turning away from it and lack of support considering it's doing so well with right now. I don't understand why someone would want to wait hours just for a download but like i said i hope Sony finds a way to keep them offline or better yet just patch the who;e up (if they can).

[deafwing]

NUFF SAID, following pulled from article:

"A funny part of this has been the people saying, “Sony and all the developers did this to themselves. The games are too expensive and they were just taunting us by adding an OS function to begin with.” These same people probably blame Ford for making shiny trucks… “I can’t help but steal them, it’s their own fault.”

[Deathstroke]

You should never pirate a game

Unless it comes from Namco Bandai, Square-Enix or Crapcom.

There are probably a few others I forgot to mention but those main 3 that should be priority targets just because of their stupidity this gen.

[Dart89]

You forgot activision lol.

[mikeslemonade]

And that is why I hacked my Wii. Even though now I'm buying accessories for it that are ridiculously overpriced. Nintendo doesn't deserve my money ahahahaha!

[ThanatosDMC]

I love Crapcom though... mainly for Monster Hunter series, Megaman, RE1-4, and DMC (RIP Dante) but damn, they've been screwing my beloved games for quite a while now.

Megaman Legends 3 on the 3DS, DmC with black haired methhead Dante, Megaman X7, Monster Hunter Tri going to Wii, Nero, LP2, Chris Redfield punching rocks and being able to take a super human punch to the gut, etc.

Also, i just posted this on another article but this is what piracy does to our games using the PSP as a prime example:

---
Dissidia: Final Fantasy
5,281,223 downloads worth 30,631,093,400 yen ($335 million)

Phantasy Star Portable 2 –
4,665,510 downloads worth 22,394 million yen ($245 million)

Dynasty Warriors Strikeforce –
2,072,942 downloads worth 9,950 million yen ($109 million)

Monster Hunter Freedom Unite –
1,820,282 downloads worth 8,322 million yen ($91 million)

Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII –
1,223,881 downloads worth 7,098 million yen ($77 million)

Mobile Suit Gundam: Gundam vs. Gundam Next Plus –
1,1187,341 downloads worth 7,100 million yen ($77 million)

Tales of the World Radiant Mythology 2 –
1,131,319 downloads worth 5,603 million yen ($61 million)

http://www.siliconera.com/2...
---

Hacking =/= Piracy; but Hacking -> Piracy

[Orion]

I don't support piracy at all, but that statement leads to confusion. For example, with Dissidia the company didnt LOSE $335M, because most of the people won't just buy it paying. Yes, of course there are some losses, but these numbers should be taken with caution. There's a big difference in downloads when something is "free" to when it's not...

I hope Sony has something to do against this hack. If not, we normal costumers might have problems... Paid PSN? :S More restrictions in the PS3? Developers less interested in the PS3 now that's not safe? :S :S

[ThanatosDMC]

No they didnt lose $335M but they did lose possible sales. If it wasnt pirateable (is that word?) and all those downloaders really wanted the game, then maybe they'd get a portion of that money that they could have made.

Even 50% of that $335M is huge for a PSP game.

[MultiConsoleGamer]

PSP all over again.

[Balt]

I don't want to spend hours downloading games I can pay for myself. I don't want to steal anything. I just want the ability to arrange my xmb the way I want to do it. Hide icons I don't like or need. Delete games off my trophy list I have no desire to ever obtain a trophy for. I want to be able to install my games to the HDD and boot from there without the hassle of popping the disk in.

These are the things I want most. I don't game online, so I don't care to hack an online game for infinite health. I don't even like gaming much, so if I don't think they're worth buying -- Why would I think they're worth stealing? It's not worth my time to do so.

But I do want some OS features and XMB features to come about from this. I'd love so functionality because Sony isn't giving it to us. They spend all their time patching holes with these updates rather than giving us features we could use.

It's lunacy.

[Man In Black]

If you don't like gaming, why are you on this site?

[ReservoirDog316]

Click on his name and read his bio. Yeah.

[Marked]

LUNACY.....

IMO, lunacy is someone hanging around a forum to hate mongar while gathering "info" to support his eagarly negative views. Then when he feels he's got what he needs to convince the faceless masses, he trys to publish a "Documentary" based souly on his predisposed opinions.

And you say a hobby is a waste of time. Just think if people didnt have gaming, you wouldnt have the the chance to glorify yourself through hippocritical gratification.

A final tip.... being angery (documentist) or a rule breaker (hacker) does not make you inteligent and sophisticated.... it make people look like an A-hole.

[antz1104]

From your "bio":

"I'm not a gamer and I don't "game" a lot of games. Games made today area waste of time, energy and money. They are pointless."

Then what the hell are you doing here? For being pointless you spent enough time on your bio on the videogame site.

[bananlol]

I dont think its for real, he/she/it is just doing it because they think its funny. If it had been for real then the investigating journalist wouldnt have stated his "mission" in his bio because that would have compromised the quality of his results.

[blackburn5]

Never modified a system ever. Not my PS1, not my PS2, not my DS, not my PSP and now not my PS3. It won't affect us now but it will have long tern negative affects on us gamers especially the ones who get punished along with the guilty.@ Balt. That is exactly the kind of ignorance I always talk about. Do you prefer that Sony not patch things that are wrong or try to stop the hackers? Did you ever consider that Sony could have been giving us better updates by now if they didn't have to spend time making patches and updates to stop these lowlife?

I still don't understand the stupidity of it all. You people say we shouldn't cheer on Sony because they are a corrupt, faceless corporation, But every second you are cheering on the hackers as if you know them personally ,have them over at your house for dinner and know that they aren't just some childish, antisocial scum that are just looking for attention? Sony is probably no saint either but I rather the devil I know then the devil I don't. So spare us the 'Sony deserves this' BS speeches please. We all know why you all really encourage this and it's not homebrew and the other OS. Why don't you all stop lying to yourselves?

[TBM]

this doesnt affect me as i don't care about modding my system.

[Chucky2003]

Seriously wtf is with this PS3 and pirates,since the day 360 ,WII launched they pirated games and nobody made such a big deal out of it now every article you see its about this,everybody should get over it,eventually this was going to happen,it won;t affect anybody except SONY,by selling more consoles,if a game will be really great you will still buy it because it will deserve to be in your collection,look at Witcher on PC,sold if i'm not mistaken 2 mil

[leonlion]

hope the hackers concentrate on hacking the xbox 360 now.

[caseh]

Good example it would appear, hacking is that bad that the xbox 360 was hacked years ago yet its multi-platform games still outsell the PS3 release despite a very small difference in userbase.

Seriously, people need to stop acting as if this is going to destroy the industry and bring about world war III. Its been going on since the days of the ZX Spectrum for christs sakes!

[antz1104]

Yeah not a great example.

Playing games that others have hacked isn't fun. Try jumping into a TF2 match on 360 where everyone is floating and there are turrets behind the walls in spawn points.

Its not going to destroy a console, but it can ruin certain online games.

[A LIVING LEGEND]

imagine the possibilities ...
None.
I duplicated a library card one time,we stole alot of books.They said it couldn't be done.
Library eventually closed,still have some of them books.

[gamerz]

KaKaRoTo did NOT use a linux enabled ps3 as this article incorrectly states. He used an application on a linux pc to extract files from a ps3.

Also, I laugh at the following: A funny part of this has been the people saying, “Sony and all the developers did this to themselves. The games are too expensive and they were just taunting us by adding an OS function to begin with.”

Haha, no one is saying any of that. They say things that use some of the same words but with a completely different meaning.

[A LIVING LEGEND]

Hacking/piracy is easily justifiable until you are a victim of it.
The Robin Hood of technology is not so noble,unfortunately it is us who pay in the end for his selfish endeavors.

[GhostofHorizon]

I see where you are headnig with this analogy, however comparing hackers to Robin Hood couldn't be any further from the truth.

In 2010 we saw lots of developement studios close their door, I'm not saying it's because of hacking or anything. It just shows that they don't always make profit in the first place. Let alone bask in the riches like some people seem to assume.

I have no problem with hacking whatsoever. Even if one studio is forced to close because they just can't manage to get enough money to sustain themselves, that's a real shame.
Talented people losing jobs just because you are selfish to pay $20 for a game. Say bye-bye to that sequel. This is just tiny minority of the cases, nothing on grand scale but uneccessary just the same.

[GhostofHorizon]

Yeah.. games are really expensive.. you can find tons of great games for $20 especially during the Christmas season. Bayonetta was like $9, Darksiders was $15, Saboteur was $9, Resonance of Fate was $15.
It's "expensive" is rather a rather lame excuse at best.

[TronEOL]

I think it's pretty obvious what hacking the PS3 will mean for us non-hackers. Examples:

- OtherOS taken away by the fact that hackers were trying to hack the PS3. I don't care how you swing it, PS3 was being hacked through OtherOS, Sony has the right to remove it, then troubling those who used it FOR Linux and not hacking purposes.

-Trophy rewards. Sony DEFINITELY won't ever put a price on Trophies now since the PS3 is hacked, it means many people will have "fake" trophies.

-Every users safety. If the PS3 is opened up to hackers, what's stopping them from giving out virus's, or stealing your information? Fantastic.

-More frequent useless security updates. We don't want to have to wait for our PS3's to update one or two times a month because hackers are being total inconsiderate pricks and won't leave our console alone.

-Piracy. Developers need to sell games to make money so they can make BETTER versions of these games rather than pulling a Call of Duty. Money pushes the industry forward and this industry needs tons of it.

-New features won't come as often. Like previously mentioned, if their engineers are focusing on killing off these hackers, these hackers are also slowing the process of CROSS GAME CHAT and other brilliant features we want. We don't effing want Nintendo games playable on our PS3 (Homebrew), we want REAL indy games, such as Pixeljunk games or the vast amount of PS mini titles, and cool features like CROSS M-Effing GAME CHAT. You want Homebrew? Play LittleBigPlanet 2. You can make GOOD LOOKING/PLAYING GAMES THERE.

-Next console's price. We'll be paying next generation for a higher prices console with higher hacker-protection. I don't want to pay another 50 dollars or so above the original price because hackers are previously mentioned title.

I'm sure there are a million reasons why hacking the PS3 is a terrible idea, and goes against any gamer that is truly a gamer. Sony has every single base covered. Want to make "Homebrew" games? Make games/levels in LittleBigPlanet 1/2, want to make themes? Work for (even if for free) a Company that develops Dynamic Themes for PS3 (Since I know if anyone was able to make one, there would only be 1/1000 that were even PS3 HD Quality).

God damn, hackers really do need to lay off. If there is one single thing wrong with the gaming industry, it's them.

[Orion]

Great very intelligent post. Bubbles to you.

I'm also scared by the possibility of a near-future paid PSN á la XBL... only PSN accounts that are registered as payers would use the servers and thus the hacked ones will remain away from online... Now, this would be real S*** for the rest of us who only want to enjoy playing...

If Sony has no chance to counter-attack this hack, then we should expect a world of server-side features tied to our PSNs, nothing locally installed... "Thank you", hackers :(

[caseh]

People need to get off their high horses and stop preaching the 'hacking is baaaad' speech. I guess everyone who has posted here has never downloaded an mp3 or movie...

Piracy was HUGE on the PS1 yet the console completely DOMINATED the market and third party support didn't exactly suffer. Same goes for the PS2, the Dreamcast was also an epic machine for homebrew. Piracy no doubt hurt the Dreamcast but the real reason it failed is Sega screwed over so many 3rd party companies like EA pre-launch most developers abandonned it before it even left the stables.

Things have changed now though, the majority of games have online. Anyone whos familiar with online gaming on PCs knows how it works. Download it copied by all means...but you can't play online.

I for one am looking fowards to countless applications and emulators. As for PS3 games, I have over 60 games as it stands and I like the online aspect so it doesn't really phase me.

[Psychotica]

Yeah I downloaded an mp3...and paid for it

[caseh]

Congratulations, you are the saviour of the internets and indeed the music industry. I'm sure Justin Bieber appreciated your $0.79 purchase.

[Marked]

There is a huge difference comparing ps1,2 and 3. the difference is in the user base and availability or access to the hack and torrent.

How many people had internet in 1996, how fast was internet speeds and lastly.... can you think of one 35 to 40 year old that is hacking and DLing illegal files now because, these people would have been the ones with internet fast enough and the knowledge to pull it off 15 years ago.

Now on the other hand, how many teens do you know that illegaly download files..... info is more available to exploit software and the media, with their exposer, will be sure to subject everyone to the possabilities of free stuff that mommy wont buy.

[caseh]

You're kidding me right, the PS1 sold:

1.PlayStation – 102.49 million shipped, as of 31 March 2005 (2005 -03-31)[update] (Japan: 21.59, US: 40.78, Europe: 40.12)

Thats almost treble xbox 360 and ps3 sales to date...combined. I didn't know a single person who didn't have one of these things modded. And everyone just bought copies, it was easier.

How many people out there have blu-ray rw drives, cheap source for discs, the hdd space to store these games, an uncapped d/l limit, a connection fast enough to download most games within a reasonable time frame, a reliable source for these games etc etc etc. More variables than you realise.

Like I said above, Xbox was hacked a while back yet its multi-platform games outsell PS3...see Black ops for evidence. Everyone crying about piracy, its over-rated and companies have been bleating about it for close to 30 years...yet companies like activision still rape wallets. Go figure...

[Marked]

Well in your group you had many more people aware and willin to mod the equipment.... for me 2000 is much different then 2010. so no I am not kidding, your reply to me seems as if you miss understood what I was saying. Piracy is far more abusable now then it was back in 1996, when people were still niave to mods.

As for your black ops sales retort... please read my comment just below these for my feelings on that.

[Marked]

The thing that gets me. We all probably complain at some point about the lack of creative and innovative titles being released. Everything is a sequel or an imitation of a game that was successful.

Developers are not going to take a chance to develope a game that has a high risk, something that breaks the mold, if they dont have a fan base to absorb the cost.

What I'm trying to say is, the areas affected most by piracy//hacking are developers with games that are not on a day one list for consumers. These are the titles that will be DL'd and those are the developers and publishers that will suffer from the risks they took. We will suffer from piracy killing innovation and boredom from seeing the same 6 seguels released every year.

[GhostofHorizon]

Alan Wake suffered from this. It had no online component and was one of the most downloaded x360 titles in 2010.

There was a thread on NeoGAF that contained the download numbers and Alan Wake was in the top 5.

Hopefully pirates liked it because there's slim chance there is going to be a next one thanks to that.