Wii Update 4.2 Tries (and Fails) To Block Homebrew

marcansoft writes "On September 28, Nintendo released a Wii update, titled 4.2. This update was targeted squarely at homebrew, performing sweeping changes throughout the system. It hardly achieved that goal, though, because just two days later a new version of the HackMii installer was released that brings full homebrew capabilities back to all Wii consoles, including unmodified consoles running 4.2. However, as part of their attempt to annoy homebrew users, Nintendo updated the lowest level updateable component of the Wii software stack: boot2 (part of the system bootloader chain). Homebrew users have been using BootMii to patch boot2 in order to gain low level system access and recovery functions (running Linux natively, fixing bricks, etc). The update hasn't hindered this, as users can simply reinstall BootMii after updating (it is compatible with the update). But there's a much bigger problem: Nintendo's boot2 update code is buggy." Read on for more details. "Boot2 had never been updated in retail consoles until now. During BootMii's development, its authors noticed that Nintendo's code had critical bugs and could sometimes permanently brick a console by writing incorrect or unchecked data to flash memory, so they decided to write their own, much safer flashing code. Now, Nintendo has pushed a boot2 update to all Wii users, and the results are what was expected: users are reporting bricks after installing 4.2 on unmodified consoles. Nintendo is currently attempting to censor posts and remove references to homebrew. It is worth noting that the new boot2 does not attempt to block anything or offer any additional protection or functionality. Its sole purpose is to simply replace current versions which may or may not have been modified with BootMii. Another interesting tidbit is that Nintendo is not believed to have any method to repair this kind of brick at a factory, short of replacing the entire motherboard."

Comments

Why is that legal?

[Tei]

You have buy a machine, not a license. If you want to open it, and mod it on any way you want. Is just a tiny mountain of chips and transistors. You could break it in pieces and use it to fix your refrigerator. Any law that let the creator of the machine perpetuate this locking trough anti-user changes sould get a fine, and any law that help then do that, sould be reverted, and the legislators of these laws be kicked in the ass with a boot.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Techmeology]

It's legal because the same people who invented the DMCA invented other laws too.

Re:Why is that legal?

[selven]

First, we should kick out the laws that fine the CONSUMER for daring to mess around with his own legally-bought electronics.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Jaysyn]

The Wii has never been sold at a loss, I don't have one & even I know that.

Re:Why is that legal?

[rvw]

Because traditionally they make consoles at a loss. Would you prefer to pay $500 for a hackable Wii? It may seem like they are just spoiling fun but if they couldn't make money off games the Wii itself would never exist. Expecting non-hack users to foot the bill for the hackables isn't fair as well since some one has to pay to develop and manufacture them. Either you will or your neighbor or there won't be anymore Wii's. Ugly truth of the matter.

It seems almost like a socialist or communist (in US terms) concept. Isn't that illegal as well in the US?

Re:Why is that legal?

[Rik Sweeney]

Someone will have to confirm this for me, but I'm pretty sure that on the box of the original Xbox, it states that you don't technically own the hardware, but have been given a licence to operate it which can be withdrawn at any time (if you don't agree then don't open the box etc.)

Re:Why is that legal?

[Nitage]

Traditionally console are sold at a loss. The Wii breaks with that tradition.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Nursie]

I'd love to see that one tested in court...

Re:Why is that legal?

[selven]

You can already sue if your house gets blown up because of your neighbor. But modding Wii consoles harms nobody.

Re:Why is that legal?

[ciderVisor]

An AC modded +3 Insightful for spouting nonsense ? Wow, just....wow !

Nintendo has always made a profit on its raw hardware.

Re:Why is that legal?

[MrMr]

I think the better word for communist control of the population and rampant capitalism is probably fascism, and no, that's not illegal.

Re:Why is that legal?

[atheistmonk]

Kicked in the arse with a boot2, specifically.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Jurily]

But modding Wii consoles harms nobody.

That's what they said about Skynet.

Re:Why is that legal?

[N1AK]

So what you're saying is that they lie about the price

What you would prefer that instead of seeing $200 dollars on the sticker, it should say $500 TCO? They aren't lieing about the price, they aren't lieing at all, have you ever heard anyone at Nintendo suggest you could do more with a Wii than use the software they make available?

If I can give someone x for 1 year at a cost of y, knowing that the typical user will generate y profit per year for 3 years it makes perfect sense (and is not remotely immoral) to offer to discount the product).

Re:Why is that legal?

[Anonymous Coward]

You've overlooked a few things:

1) The Wii is not sold at a loss.

2) An awful lot of engineering design time is spent by console makers trying to lock down hardware. This time costs money, and is wasted since the hardware will inevitably be cracked.

3) Most people that buy the Wii have no idea how to hack the hardware, nor do they have an interest in learning to do so. Indulging a tiny fraction of the Wii user community that likes to tinker is NOT going to sink the entire product. In fact, if Nintendo would help them out by opening up the schematic and the firmware, they might actually sell MORE units...

Re:Why is that legal?

[FictionPimp]

Look at it this way. I bought a wii for homebrew. I then bought 4 controls, 4 nunchucks, 4 classic controllers, 4 game cube controllers, etc. Then I bought some wii games that I thought were neat (zelda, mario, etc). There are new games out there that I might buy (the new metroid re-release, etc).

I also buy virtual console games before using my downloaded roms because a lot of those virtual console games have been modified to fit my TV better and I want to support nintendo.

However, if this update bricks my system, or if any future update stops home brew, then I'm done. I'm not going to buy any more nintendo games, any more VC games, etc. So by preventing me from using homebrew, they cost themselves those precious sales.

Honestly, most of the games released for the wii are crap. I bought the wii for virtual console. A lot of the games I want are not on virtual console, so I have homebrew. Take that away and you have just enough of a breaking point for me to say "Fuck it" and just build a small pc to do the same thing.

Re:Why is that legal?

[eiapoce]

It's legal because the same people who invented the DMCA invented other laws too.

Until they push these insanities to the point that they get a revolution from the bottom.

Re:Why is that legal?

[FictionPimp]

And if you want to be able to buy virtual console games and use the features of homebrew?

Re:Why is that legal?

[zach_the_lizard]

Whether or not you sell my an item at a loss has nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that I now own that item, and am free to do whatever I want with it, so long as my use causes no direct physical harm to others. Modding a Wii does not cause any physical harm to anyone, so it should be OK. Or at least it would, if copyright/patent trolls didn't have the ear of legislatures.

If Nintendo sold Wiis at a loss (which they don't, IIRC) and discovered that everyone is now using them only for homebrew, they would jack up the price so they can remain profitable. I'm sure the other console makers would do the same.

Re:Why is that legal?

[noidentity]

Why should be illegal for someone to publish software for the Wii that modifies the Boot2 code? It seems you're arguing that it should.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Jaysyn]

Go away Mr. Shill, we don't need your kind here.

Re:Why is that legal?

[LtGordon]

Well clearly one of these things is a serious crime against property and deserves punishment. For the other, you'll have to find yourself new neighbors.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Jaysyn]

Are your fingers broken Mr Shill?  Here, let me Google that for you.

http://www.techradar.com/news/gaming/nintendo-makes-6-per-wii-490029

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2006/09/7752.ars

Now can you please go away?

Re:Why is that legal?

[LtGordon]

Ever heard of ink cartridges? Printers are much cheaper than they could be because they assume they'll make the money back with expensive ink cartridge replacements. For the longest time, if you bought a new computer they would practically throw printers at you.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Golddess]

I would argue that it is legal because you can choose to not install the update.


(Unless you want to play $RECENTLY_RELEASED_GAME.)

Re:Why is that legal?

[CarpetShark]

What you would prefer that instead of seeing $200 dollars on the sticker, it should say $500 TCO?

I would prefer that the console retailed for more, if that was its true cost, and the games retailed for less, and were more open for developers, if there are no real limitations on that. This way, people can judge the consoles on their merits (price vs. features), and get more games at realistic prices. It's not rocket science, to be honest.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Truekaiser]

That is correct. it's the only modern console sold at a profit due to the fact it's essentially a faster running gamecube. it uses the same hardware thus nintendo can still use the now cheap production methods that they used for the gamecube.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Jaysyn]

How about the DSi?  I thought Nintendo made a point to sell their consoles at a profit, unlike their competitors.

Re:Why is that legal?

[commodore64_love]

You mean from the top.

The people sit at the top level of authority, and that power flows downward to the state government, then the continental government. By revolting the people are merely taking-back the powers/rights that were illegally stolen from them by the lower levels.

Re:Why is that legal?

[TheCRAIGGERS]

That's what they said about Skynet.

No, that's what they WILL say about Skynet.

Wait, are you a killer robot sent from the future?

Re:Why is that legal?

[xtracto]

As someone else said before, why do you guys keep using typewriters to comment on /.?

More on topic, yeah, Nintendo has said that they won't sell the console at a loss (IIRC, neither the NES, SNES, N64, and GC where sold at a loss).

They profit from hardware sales and first party titles (they profit from third parties, but in a *much* lower scale than Sony and Microsoft).

I read about the 4.2 menu some days ago (@hackmii) what Nintendo attempted is interesting.

My thought was that this is in "preparation" for the release of the priced-down wii (for christmass season). It is known that Nintendo does minor internal updates (revisions) to the Wii system. Maybe the next revision will have a boot0 or boot1 that make boot2 unmodifiable.

But the guys at Team Twiizers are awesome, once you ignore the pubert-related dramas (with suicide notes and all that) they are a bunch of capable reverse engineers with a lot of time in their hands.

Re:Why is that legal?

[AvitarX]

I wonder if they put numbers on the Wii's that would make this difficult.

Re:Why is that legal?

[ciderVisor]

Because my impression is that "profit on raw hardware" as quoted ad nauseum has referred solely to the cost of components as purchased from manufacturers of the consoles.

Nintendo charges more for a retail console than it does to manufacture and distribute it. On my planet, that usually means profit-generating. I don't know anyone who's satisfied with a single Wiimote / Nunchuck combo, either - more profit. Wii Fit Balance Board ? Profit ! The Wii console itself is just the centre of a hardware-consuming monster.

The portable range from the original model Gameboy through to DSi ? Every single one sold at a profit.

Gamecube ? Oh yeah, that'd be sold at a profit too.

N64 ? SNES ? NES ? Yup, profit - kerching !

I'm beginning to detect a pattern.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Insanity Defense]

Because traditionally they make consoles at a loss.

Selling at a loss doesn't matter. What does matter is that it was sold. The company sold it and therefore no longer has legal rights to control it.

Re:Why is that legal?

[cwrinn]

... like Serial Numbers? :O That are tracked when they connect on WC24? :O That you register and are bound to your Wii Shop account? :O

Re:Why is that legal?

[drinkypoo]

What you're telling people to do is fraud, which is a felony. The serials won't match, so the switch can be detected trivially. Congratulations, you've incited people to easily-detectable crimes. Not very smart.

Re:Why is that legal?

[DaFallus]

I'm pretty sure Nintendo isn't forcing anyone to install the update. I've never had the Wii refuse to run a game I've purchased until I've installed the latest update. However, if you want to purchase/download things from their servers or use their multiplayer network then you have to play by their rules. I'll agree that it is pretty shitty of them if they released the update specifically to target homebrew activity but like I said, they aren't forcing you to download/install the update so I don't see how there is any lock-in. You just have to decide if using Nintendo's other services is worth the price of losing your homebrew channel.

Re:Why is that legal?

[commodore64_love]

Ahhhh I had not thought of that since I don't do the online gaming thing (and therefore don't register). Surely there's a way to deactivate the old Wii and move your account to the new one? Hardware does die and get replaced with new units, even just from normal usage. Surely Nintendo doesn't force people to start over with fresh accounts?

Re:Why is that legal?

[Razalhague]

no wai! :O

Re:Why is that legal?

[Yvan256]

For the longest time, if you bought a new computer they would practically throw printers at you.

Yeah, that happened to me. I had to go to the hospital, too.

Re:Why is that legal?

[bleh-of-the-huns]

The problem is, the law does not say you cannot mess with your electronics, the law says you cannot bypass security measures in place that protect the intellectual property of the item you are messing with.

That said, I agree the law is stupid, vague, and consistently abused to stifle innovation and peoples rights, but currently, it is the law, and while I would love for it to be repealed, the odds of that ever happening are very very slim.

Re:Why is that legal?

[gstep]

Beyond going online, isn't it possible Nintendo would know what serial number was on the wii that you suggest they ship to you?

Re:Why is that legal?

[Spazztastic]

>>>fraud, which is a felony.

Yes turning people's consoles into bricks IS fraud, and both the U.S. and EU governments should drag Nintendo into court and rape them for millions of dollars in punishment. BUT until that happens (if ever), we the people have a right to replace the consoles that Nintendo turned into trash, just the same as you have a right to shoot someone who stabs you in the stomach. It's called self-defense - protecting yourself from getting screwed.

Yes, but Nintendo has a defense that Average Joe Sixpack doesn't have -- a large team of attorneys and enough money to throw around to shut up anybody attacking them.

Re:Why is that legal?

[drinkypoo]

Look, I don't think it's wrong to do what you describe. If I did, I would have said so. I said what you did was stupid, which is another thing entirely.

If you were going to do something like this, it would be smartest to do it in person and with cash. The paranoid could buy in one store and return in another. This unfortunately shifts some of the load onto the retailer; if you bought your console at a big box store you can go and do this at the same kind of store with a fairly clear conscience IMO. After all, they should be helping you get the product replaced, because they sold it to you.

I promise you that my objection is not moral. It is logical :p

Re:Why is that legal?

[LordLimecat]

Nintendo isnt exactly obligated to provide updates that play ball with modifications, tho, are they?

Re:Why is that legal?

[KDR_11k]

Nintendo can transfer that data for you.

Re:Why is that legal?

[AmberBlackCat]

Wal-Mart has a good return policy and I don't think they check serial numbers...

Re:Why is that legal?

[KDR_11k]

What? Why would it be illegal to issue a patch for the system firmware? It doesn't even auto-update without you telling it to, if you don't want the patch you don't need it.

Re:Why is that legal?

[commodore64_love]

Actually your proposal is even dumber because you defrauded a store *in your own state* and *without the protection of Visa/Mastercard* to back you up, plus your standing *in their territory* where a security guard can grab you and drag you into a backroom for interrogation. My proposal which I did about a year ago when Sony bricked my HD Radio, and with no consequences, offers several layers of protection:

- interstate lines
- U.S. post office delivery confirmation ("Yes we returned the console")
- the law itself which states - if the consumer can provide proof-of-return, then the business must refund the money
- The credit card company

And if you used Paypal to make the credit card payment, then that's yet another layer of protection between you and the megacorp.

Re:Why is that legal?

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

Actually, whether or not a console is sold at a profit is irrelevant. If locking down makes the console manufacturer money, then getting rid of it will create a hole in their profits that they'll have to plug another way, probably, among other things, via a price rise.

Re:Why is that legal?

[LordVader717]

It's perfectly legal, because updating is voluntary and you have to confirm it every time. They say that it may brick modded consoles. This time they even explicitly say it deletes modified software. There's really no reason to be up in arms.

Re:Why is that legal?

[hezekiah957]

You know what happens when you thought? You make an ass out of you and... well, mostly you.

Re:Why is that legal?

[ProfessionalCookie]

Alternatively, stop after step 3 ;)

Re:Why is that legal?

[PitaBred]

The solution is to just not update your firmware. I don't like Nintendo doing this, but it's hardly forced on the users.

Re:Why is that legal?

[KDR_11k]

Then you update your Homebrew Channel before updating the firmware and get both.

Re:Why is that legal?

[TangoMargarine]

About your sig: Citation? (yeah, I know, offtopic)

Re:Why is that legal?

[Malevolyn]

So long as Nintendo's updates focus completely on piracy, instead of adding new features to the Wii, I'm going to continue pirating their games. I'm not ashamed to say it. Same goes for my DS. I may be part of the problem, but it doesn't seem like there's any way to be part of the solution. How many of the last major updates for the Wii have been focused primarily on preventing homebrew? All but one? The only one I can think of is the 4.0 update, which did try and stop homebrew, but also added the SD card channel support.

Way to go, Nintendo. We all must be criminals. Then again, I'm pretty bitter...

Re:Why is that legal?

[Sloppy]

turning people's consoles into bricks IS fraud

Legal fraud. Nintendo and their like have followed the rules of civility: they hired lobbyists to write the laws. If you want to counter their fraud with your fraud, then you need be civil too. Where's your legislation-writing lobbyist? Because without that, the only other tools you have at your disposal are your votes and persuasive words to get other people to vote too, and I think we all know how that works out: it's too much of a hassle for anyone to bother.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Chaos Incarnate]

You may have not had it happen, but there are games that do that. (They'll include the latest update on the disc when they do, though.)

Re:Why is that legal?

[DECS]

Because everyone knows that crossing "Interstate lines" essentially makes mail fraud unpunishable!

Oh yes, and PayPal, they're always on your side too.

Thanks for a good laugh.

Why Apple is betting on Light Peak with Intel: a love story

Re:Why is that legal?

[Chris Burke]

That is correct. it's the only modern console sold at a profit due to the fact it's essentially a faster running gamecube.

Yeah except they also sold the Gamecube at a profit (they have even stated such in official statements like shareholder meetings). They always sell their hardware at a profit. It's the foundation of their business model. It's why despite both the N64 and Gamecube being relatively unsuccessful products, they made tons of money off them. It's why Nintendo is still here today.

Unlike Sony and MS, Nintendo doesn't do anything but sell game consoles and games. They can't use a risky strategy like "sell hardware at a loss, hope you make it up with game sales" because if it fails they fail. They can't subsidize their games with profits from other sectors -- they don't have any.

Really, before MS got involved, it was standard practice to sell hardware at a profit. The "blades/razor" model was basically a myth that MS (and many gamers) believed. But both Sony and Nintendo came out last generation and cleared the air. This time, though, Sony wanted to compete with MS and adopted the same model. Nintendo ignored that, sticking with their traditional conservative business model.

Re:Why is that legal?

[thisnamestoolong]

Locking the console down and making it difficult to mod is totally legal and constitutional. It is a business move that I consider to be slimy, back asswards, counter-productive, unnecessary, and boneheaded, but it is totally legal, and the business has the right to behave in this manner. When they successfully lobby make this criminally prosecutable, I have a big problem. It is a huge violation of our liberty that a manufacturer can tell us what we are and aren't allowed to do with physical goods after we purchase them, for the sole intent of protecting their profits. If you feel that the profit margin is going to be too low, then get into another business, it's that simple.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Hatta]

Why would you need to swap Wiis? If Nintendo's update bricked your Wii, they are responsible for the damage they inflicted on it. If they don't, take them to small claims court.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Grimbleton]

They absolutely do. One scan of the standard UPC barcode, one scan of the serial barcode, on all sales of serial-protected merchandise.

Re:Why is that legal?

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

Despite what you may think, it's completely legal to tinker with your own equipment.

What's not legal under the DMCA is redistributing the methods of circumventing copyright protections.

Re:Why is that legal?

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

uhm.

No. Consoles traditionally aren't sold as loss leaders. The Dreamcast was sold as a loss leader, so was the XBox and the PS3. Generally though, consoles are sold not as loss leaders but with razor thin profit margins with the rest of the company's profit made off of game licenses, SDKs, etc.

It's tough to prove either way with out solid documentation about how much a console cost per unit, and how much it sold for at retail. I can tell you this though, Slim PS2s aren't loss leaders, not after the PS2 has been on the market for 9 years.

Re:Why is that legal?

[fikx]

Are you implying Skynet went.....odd AFTER it was modded?
guess I was wrong about the modders of the world becoming the resistance and humanities hope....

Re:Why is that legal?

[Torodung]

No, no. The ink cartridges were expensive in HP printers because the print heads were a consumable part of the cartridge. The printer itself was cheap because the most expensive part of the hardware was a consumable part. It had to be cheap, because you're always buying print heads (if you don't refill).

Back in the day, you could buy an Epson and refill the cartridges, or get them replaced more cheaply and one color at a time, but if your print heads clogged, you were in for an expensive repair. So in the end you wound up paying the labor bill for print head failure. I'm not sure if that's still the case, or if they went to consumable print heads as well.

I never did a TCO to find out which strategy was better, but it definitely isn't a scam to get people to buy overpriced items, it is a maintenance strategy.

Oblig. bad car analogy: It's like replacing an oil filter with every oil change. You could have a less expensive change with just a refill, but it isn't a good maintenance strategy for the vehicle.

--
Toro

Re:Why is that legal?

[brkello]

Where is Nintendo suing people for modifying the box? If you don't want the update, keep it off the network. For a typical user, these updates are good as they add features and (usually) fix bugs.

Typically, what homebrew means is there are a group of enthusiasts who want to write their own software for a cool piece of hardware. This is a good thing. Of course, many people use this to allow them to run pirated games on the console. Game companies don't like that. Unfortunately for legitimate enthusiasts, the majority of the people use it for unethical purposes. So it makes sense that a company wants to break that functionality.

Slashdotter hate this, because they believe in fair use and other consumer protections. But they tend to forget that these things wouldn't exist if people can not make a profit off of them and companies should be able to protect themselves from illegal activities. For Nintendo, it seems less of an issue since they profit off of their console sales. Despite this, Nintendo (for some strange reason) has the most Slashdot support even though they have a track record as messed up as Sony or MS. Other consoles are sold at a loss expecting to make it up in software sales. Piracy is much more of a threat to that model.

What I am trying to say is that we should try to be more fair minded about this. Freaking out and saying what Nintendo is doing should be illegal is a bit ridiculous. They are just trying to protect their investment. If you want to mod your box and run your own software, don't update the firmware. And even if you do update the firmware, it won't be long before it will be hacked so that you can run homebrew again anyways.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Kagato]

Even back in the 90's when I worked at Circuit City we had to scan the serial numbers of the physical machine. I don't know if that got reported to Nintendo or not, but you had to scan the code to make the sale. There's a reason why the serial numbers appear on the outside of the boxes. I think back in the day Sega even had a cut out in the packing so you could scan the serial off the console directly.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Chris Burke]

Can you show me a calculation to that effect, which includes costs incurred at the planning stage?

Because my impression is that "profit on raw hardware" as quoted ad nauseum has referred solely to the cost of components as purchased from manufacturers of the consoles.

It's based on "operating profit", which includes the cost of materials/components, and also includes the ongoing expenses of running their factories, paying their employees, etc.

It does not include things like R&D costs, constructing or tooling their factories, and other things that are from the "planning stage".

This means that Nintendo is not "in the black" after selling exactly one Wii, or that the Wii project as a whole is necessarily profitable as of right now today. However what it does mean is that every single Wii they sell pays for the cost to make that Wii, with some money leftover that contributes towards chipping away at those already sunk costs, and that therefore the Wii project as a whole could be profitable for the company based solely on selling a sufficient amount of Wii hardware.

Contrast this with Sony and the PS3. At least initially (I'm sure costs have gone down, though I'm not sure they're sold at a profit yet), every single PS3 they sold put them more in the red. They could never sell enough PS3s to make the PS3 project profitable, because it was sold at an operating loss.

That's the difference, and what people mean by "the Wii is sold at a profit". For Nintendo, every Wii made and sold and every piece of software sold contributes towards paying off the R&D and other fixed costs and making the company profitable. For Sony, every PS3 made and sold only costs them more, and thus they depend on the software sales to pay not only for the fixed costs, but also for the losses from hardware sales.

In short: A company that sells hardware at an operating profit could hypothetically make a net profit if they sell enough hardware. A company that sells hardware at an operating loss can never make a net profit solely by selling hardware. Nintendo is the former.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Kagato]

Please refer to Nintendo's corporate filings. R&D and S&M are included in the cost. The wii also essentially sold at the same price point for years even after several hardware revs. Each of those revs further reduced costs. You are aware that Nintendo, dispute not selling as many games as they would like, has made record profits? There's a reason why they could drop the price $50 and still float positive. And it's not because they were making a couple dollars per machine.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Missing_dc]

If I recall correctly, the serial # barcodes are printed on stickers for convenience.

Re:Why is that legal?

[shutdown -p now]

You mean from the top.

No, he means "from the bottom". Your conjectures are nice, but they're purely theoretical, and he was referring to the existing pyramid of power as it is. In it, people are squarely at the bottom, for all the "inalienable rights" that they have.

Always worth keeping in mind that USSR under Stalin had the most liberal constitution in the world in its time, with freedom of speech and assembly and free elections, and "flow of power" from people to everything else, enshrined into it.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Kerrigann]

You may have trouble with that concept, the same as a vagrant has trouble with the concept of loitering or peeing in public, but the laws are there to protect business models

Why the animosity here? Modding is not something which infringes anyone else's rights. We're not talking about breaking copyright, we're talking about *changing bits in a piece of hardware that you own*

You may very well be right about the legality of such a thing, but there is a reason you can't sign a contract to take away certain inalienable rights. EULAs are a one sided, non-negotiable contract, but IANAL... I'd just *like* them not to be enforceable.

However, there are very few that I've seen claim such a strong moral high ground against *changing bits in a physical device you own*. I have a lot of problem seeing that as any different morally from rewiring your car.

You think very highly of ownership of land and property, how is this any different? How would you feel if I wanted to sell you a piece of land that with an agreement that says the specific way trees are arranged on this land is my personal intellectual property, and any change to the arrangement of such trees is a violation of our agreement, at which time you will relinquish the rights to the land.

I own a wii... and I've put the homebrew channel on my wii. I've *never* pirated a wii game, but I have set up the homebrew wii SDK and am currently writing software for it, because I think it's an awesome piece of hardware and I'm glad I gave Nintendo my money.

I suppose I'm an evil, contract breaking vagrant peeing on poor Nintendo's property now.

  I guess I just can't wrap my brain around the concept that wanting to tinker with something to create something new is *selfish*.

Re:Why is that legal?

[FireFury03]

When you buy a computer, you're not buying just a device; you're also licensing software that makes that device work. So no, your first sale doctrine doesn't really apply because you're not just using a purchased item, you're buying hardware attached to a software license.

Nope. When I buy a computer I do exactly that - buy a computer. No software or anything. I then install the software of my choice on it.

However, even if that wasn't the case, you're still wrong - at the time of purchase, computer vendors do not present you with a licence agreement to sign. You hand over some money and you get a computer which may or may not have some software on it. At that point, you have _purchased_ everything that is in the box. You might even have an invoice to prove it (I've never seen an invoice that says "Licence to use Windows XP" - instead it will just have "Windows XP" as a line item). At this point, you can do anything with the bundled software that is allowed by copyright law - you have not purchased a licence, you have purchased a copy of the software (note: a copy, not the copyright, so you are still bound by copyright law).

Now, some of that software may have a technical limitation that requires you to agree to an EULA before using it, and that EULA may grant you waivers to the existing copyright law, or rescind rights that you already have such as the right to resell it (although it is debatable as to whether such clauses have any legal foundation in many jurisdictions). You do not have a legal obligation to agree to that licence - you can either choose not to use the software, or you can choose to bypass the licence by technical means without clicking the "I agree" button.

In any case, even if you were to agree to an EULA, proving this in court would be problematic since there is no signature on a bit of paper. The vendor cannot prove that it was you who agreed to it - the "I agree" button may have already been clicked by someone in the shop before you even saw the machine, or your child/dog/neighbour might have done it.

In essence, EULAs are a scare tactic rather than a legally enforceable contract - the vendors hope to scare people into complying with the EULA even though they probably can't make you.

It's very different to take those same devices, and use the existing software against its license to do something you want to do with it in order to violate the deal you got when you bought it.

That simply isn't the case. When someone buys an iPod, games console, CD, DVD, game, etc. they go into the shop and say "I want to buy this", and over some money and get handed the item in return. At no point in that transaction are they told "I'm sorry, you can't purchase that item but we can sell you a licence to use it instead". You are not bound by a licence agreement unless you actually agree to it, so no one is "violating the deal" since the deal was that you bought the *item* (not a usage licence) and thus you can do anything with it you like (subject to various statutory restrictions such as copyright).

Re:Why is that legal?

[ravenshrike]

The citizenry did not, however, have guns.

Re:Why is that legal?

[DECS]

Ever heard of a neighborhood housing covenant? You buy a house, but recognize that you can't paint it Day-Glo orange or park a car on your yard. Why? Because it does impact your neighbors, even if it is your yard.

"Changing bits" on some software you licensed the use of is not usually legal. I can't "change bits" of Linux and resell it as my own work, just as you can't change bits of Windows or iPhone OS or Wii firmware and use it against its licensing agreement.

As I said, to people who don't share the same financial interests, laws might not make any sense. If you're a vagrant, you might think the world is your toilet because you don't respect property.

If you are a freetard, you think the world's code is your playground because you don't respect intellectual property. No difference. It comes down to respecting licensing.

If you want to take a Wii and write unique software for it, Nintendo will try very hard to stop you because they want you to be a consumer of their games. If you want to edit the firmware to allow you to pirate games, Nintendo will try to stop you because they want gaming revenue. If you want to call yourself a homebrew hacker, fine, but 90% of "homebrew" is really just piracy. Nintendo doesn't care about the 10% making their own games, it cares about the majority who hide behind homebrew in order to undermine sales of commercial software: one solution wipes out both.

I'm not personally offended by your desire to want to do those things. I've slept in places I wasn't supposed to, I've used software I've failed to pay for, and I've violated various licenses and trespassed and have occasionally resorted to schwarzfahren when I lacked train tickets... and plenty of other more egregious things.

But there is a gulf between realizing that you're doing something sketchy, and in hypocritically laying out a pretentious defense of illegal behavior on the basis of either "not recognizing the law" or citing some legal foundation for doing something that is simply not legal.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Goaway]

Too bad it turns out the people with guns are the ones that are the most happy to hand over their rights, just so long as they get to keep their guns.

Re:Why is that legal?

[commodore64_love]

>>>Your conjectures are nice, but they're purely theoretical

Not at all. I don't know about your country but in the U.S. the "people are at the top" principle is the foundation of this society. To say otherwise is to believe the lies of the politicians, and thereby make yourself a serf and them the ultimate masters. Don't just voluntarily become a serf.

Re:Why is that legal?

[commodore64_love]

>>>we had to scan the serial numbers of the physical machine

Good brief. You're wrong. That's a BARCODE not a serial number. All barcodes are identical across all Wiis, and therefore worthless for identifying individual machines.

Re:Why is that legal?

[KC7JHO]

Actually you should just do it the RIGHT way and send the bricked one with an RMA, only took them a week to put in a new MB and have my system back to me in good working order. I payed to ship to them, they payed to ship back to me. Provided me with tracking number and web site I could track the machine through their service department and everything. Give it a try before you attempt something that will get you arrested.

Re:Why is that legal?

[shutdown -p now]

Not at all. I don't know about your country but in the U.S. the "people are at the top" principle is the foundation of this society. To say otherwise is to believe the lies of the politicians, and thereby make yourself a serf and them the ultimate masters. Don't just voluntarily become a serf.

How many corrupt government officials have you shot in the last month?

Re:Why is that legal?

[Kerrigann]

See, changing bits in the linux kernel *and distributing it* *and claiming it is your own* is an ocean of difference. We're not talking about that.

When you sleep in places you're not supposed to, you're infringing on someone else's physical rights.

When you ride a train without a ticket, you're using up resources you're not paying for.

There is a good reason copyright, patents, trademarks are treated differently, and also much differently than physical property, so stop confusing the issue.

I know you've heard this argument before, because you use words like "freetard". Stop trolling.

What I'm doing might be legally sketchy, but I, and most of the world, certainly doesn't think of it is as morally sketchy. To me it's about the same as saying that playing a cd with too many people in your house so it counts as a public performance. Might be legally sketchy, but only because of *a failure of the legal system*.

You seem like a good, moral person... probably someone who makes a living selling creative works. I want you to keep on doing that, I'm glad you do. I'll make sure that if I copy your works, I compensate you fairly.

If you then tell me it's illegal for me to run your code through a debugger, or reverse engineer your file format... well, that sounds like it's *you* who is the one infringing on my rights.

Of course, we don't know, because the law in this area is so vague and uncertain that we're all violating it somehow. If you develop software, congratulations, you've violated someone's patent.

I know you've heard this before, just know that you can be a "freetard" and not a thief at the same time, okay?

Re:Why is that legal?

[khellendros1984]

There's the UPC barcode on the box itself, and an opening in the box, where the serial-number for that specific console is visible. Most stores have to scan both of those in order to sell the console. It's a fairly standard practice, as was previously mentioned.

Re:Why is that legal?

[fyrewulff]

Good brief. You're wrong. That's a BARCODE not a serial number. All barcodes are identical across all Wiis, and therefore worthless for identifying individual machines.

Bzzt. All Nintendo consoles have a window in the box for scanning the actual serial number of said console. This is what he was talking about scanning.

FYI, back in the day when I called Nintendo up to replace our launch GameCube, they were able to tell me exactly where the GameCube was bought, and verify it was still under warranty, with no need for me to provide a receipt.

This system is now used also for Xbox 360s and PS3s, but the entire system was invented by Nintendo.

Re:Why is that legal?

[cwrinn]

Ever considered asking Nintendo? "Hey, I updated to 4.2 and my Wii won't boot... No, I don't have a mod chip... No, I don't have any homebrew.... So, can you help me?" Consider for a moment how customer friendly Nintendo was when Wii Remotes were being thrown at TV screens. Not only did they replace the Wii Remotes, but they replaced the TVs and reimbursed for some medical costs as well. And then they quickly released "fixes", for free, in the form of reinforced wrist-bands and protective coverings for the remotes.

Re:Why is that legal?

[IcyWolfy]

No, the serial number on the dreamcast, as well as the serial number on the WII are encoded in a scannable bar-code for cashiers to record the serial number of the unit (barcode and text are printed on both the box, and the unit for most consoles)

Re:Why is that legal?

[EtherMonkey]

Actually your proposal is even dumber because you defrauded a store *in your own state* and *without the protection of Visa/Mastercard* to back you up, plus your standing *in their territory* where a security guard can grab you and drag you into a backroom for interrogation.

[blah blah blah]

Escalating the dumbness scale:

- interstate lines

That makes you guilty of Interstate Wire Fraud under 18 U.S.C. Â 1343, a crime investigated by the FBI and prosecuted in a United States Federal Court. Not a trivial offense.

- U.S. post office delivery confirmation ("Yes we returned the console")

Congratulates, you've now committed Mail Fraud, which is the parent of Interstate Wire Fraud, and carries the same penalties.

- the law itself which states - if the consumer can provide proof-of-return, then the business must refund the money

What specific law are you referring to? There's no law I'm aware of that requires a business (or any other entity) to refund your money for the return of something other than what they sold you. Furthermore, a business is able to stipulate terms limiting or forbidding the return of merchandise, impose penalties and fees or other conditions.

There is no legal right to a refund.

- The credit card company

That is the federal crime of Bank Fraud, also described in U.S.C.Title 18. A credit card company will not just accept your word for a dispute. They will also contact the merchant and decide on the information and evidence provided by the difference parties, and always with respect to the law. If the merchant responds that you returned a used, out-of-warranty, non-functional item in place of the new item you received, they will very likely rule in favor of the merchant.

And if you used Paypal to make the credit card payment, then that's yet another layer of protection between you and the megacorp.

PayPal protection only applies for items purchased from eBay. Otherwise, PayPal doesn't want to get involved.

And now, if anyone participating in this discussion actually takes your advice, you are both also guilt of conspiracy to commit fraud.

Re:Why is that legal?

[EtherMonkey]

Wal-Mart, like all the nationals, have started focusing on this type of fraud and now take the following actions for high-ticket items:

1. They call someone who regularly works in the returned item's department to inspect the merchandise, including matching the serial number of the item to that printed on the box;
2. If you don't have a receipt they will only give you store credit for the lowest price that item sold recently (I forget how long);
3. They maintain a list (and share it at least regionally, if not nationally) of all returns and make note of any "issues," such as apparently old merchandise returned, no-receipt returns, other signs of abuse.
4. If you are flagged as a repeat abuser your return "privileges" can be terminated and you won't be able to return anything else at any location.

I know this first-hand because I have an ex-wife who is now banned from returning anything to both Wal-Mart and K-Mart. I've seen her get turned-away at a K-Mart.

Re:Why is that legal?

[EtherMonkey]

However, if this update bricks my system, or if any future update stops home brew, then I'm done. I'm not going to buy any more nintendo games, any more VC games, etc. So by preventing me from using homebrew, they cost themselves those precious sales.

You and people like you are less than 1% of 1% of all Nintendo's sales. As much as this might offend your your delicate sensibilities, your saying "Fuck it" to Nintendo will get as much attention as a gnat fart in a hurricane. And still you won't get your money back.

Re:Why is that legal?

[MrMr]

Sure, just like the catholic and anglican churches are opposites.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Jesus_666]

You mean a Wii from the bottom, of course.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Jesus_666]

Are the guns you're allowed to have any good against the army? That's what you have to face if you seriously want to revolt.

Re:Why is that legal?

[xouumalperxe]

protecting yourself from getting screwed.

Wouldn't that only apply in cases of attempted rape?

Re:Why is that legal?

[FictionPimp]

It's not about revenge, it's about if it is worth it for me to pay for content when it is this hard to use it?

It is actually easier to violate copyright.

This update had no other purpose but to attack homebrew users. It gave no benefits to normal users and it may brick their system. This is a lose lose deal for everyone involved. If it bricks my system, I'll eat the cost I've spent to nintendo, but I sure as hell am not giving them any more money.

Re:Why is that legal?

[TheSpoom]

Yes, but if you think that Nintendo doesn't check the serial number when a unit is returned (and sold, for that matter, whether at retail or online; at retail they scan the serial number through a window in the box), you're insane. Your scam (and it is a scam) won't work, regardless of how evil Nintendo is toward homebrew.

Re:Why is that legal?

[sortius_nod]

Quite eloquent.

When you break it down like that, it really does make sense. It's not just guns, you can replace it with anything, but it is mostly guns in the US by the seems of it.

Re:Why is that legal?

[TheSpoom]

There is zero chance of that passing muster in a courtroom. They just slapped that on there to discourage people from prying.

Re:Why is that legal?

[mattack2]

You were successful in 'returning' your (now ex-)wife.. heh.

Re:Why is that legal?

[walshy007]

you're also licensing software that makes that device work.

No.. you are purchasing a copy of the software with the hardware, you cannot create new copies because of copyright law, but this is not licensing.

By your logic, if you had a book you would be unable to scribble notes in it and modifying it's pages because that would be 'infringing it's license' eula's are shaky things to rely on in court, and blizzard even went so far as to successfully determine that copying WoW into ram is copyright infringement than try to rely on their eula possibly having it invalidated. Besides, most consoles don't even have eula's they are plug and play no bullshit (at least the wii is).

Re:Why is that legal?

[taylortbb]

Yes, of course, that's why the Homebrew channel doesn't let you play burned games. That requires a modchip, and in the case of modchips you're probably right. Though I do think that consumers should have the right to make a backup copy of their media, a right which would supersede DRM protections. If I buy the argument that I'm licensing a game, then the physical media is meaningless to my license. If however I am purchasing the physical media, then I should have the right to edit it and copy it. I know which of these two publishers would prefer.

And BTW, the Wii doesn't even have enough internal memory for 1 Wii game, much less 150. WiiWare doesn't count, they're more like minigames.

Re:Why is that legal?

[sjames]

You are correct, but honestly, bricking people's consoles and not replacing them is also criminal even if they would probably never get dragged into a trial for it. If enough of this sort of crap happens, there will be a great deal of "self help" out there until the law starts being enforced more evenly.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Mr2001]

Good brief. You're wrong. That's a BARCODE not a serial number. All barcodes are identical across all Wiis, and therefore worthless for identifying individual machines.

No, he's right. Look at the serial number sticker on your Wii. See the long, skinny bar code next to it? That encodes the serial number. It is not identical across all Wiis.

You're thinking of the UPC, a more squarish bar code printed on the outside of the packaging. That one is identical for all Wiis because it identifies the product, not the individual console.

But the packaging often has a cutout so the serial number bar code on the console can be scanned from the outside (or a sticker with a copy of the serial number bar code). I don't have my Wii box handy, but I know the Xbox 360 box has one of those cutouts.

Re:Why is that legal?

[sjames]

You do know it's already fully legal to mod your toaster right?

Re:Why is that legal?

[DECS]

No, you are not "you are purchasing a copy of the software with the hardware." You rarely ever buy (obtain full rights) to software for obvious reasons.

Modifying software is nothing like annotating a book. Also, books don't have EULAs. You can scribble on your copy of Word, but you don't have any rights to modify the software, and EULAs are notorious for insisting that this is the case, again, for reasons that should be obvious to anyone with an IQ over 80.

Again, you can refuse to recognize intellectual property, but that's no difference from communists refusing to acknowledge property rights. Might be a fun way to live your early 20s, but it's not legal in any sense, and you're only a simpleton for thinking that whatever you want to be the case is "legal," just because you think its a good idea (and because it doesn't financially impact you).

It doesn't matter if you click or read an EULA. It's there.

Also, news flash: content is protected automatically, You can't buy a CD and play it in your restaurant for your patrons without violating its license, even if you opened the package with your eyes shut while chanting "I don't believe in intellectual property rights."

-

Ha, marked me "flamebait." Grow the fuck up Slashdot. Start with a basic education in subjects other than "I want to believe this to be the case because the idea pleases me."

Is this site getting increasingly retarded, or am I just growing old enough to find teenage gamers tiresome?

 

Re:Why is that legal?

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

If you feel that the profit margin is going to be too low, then get into another business, it's that simple.

That, or recoup profits some other way.

Companies won't mind giving in to our demands so long as we're prepared to pay the price.

Re:Why is that legal?

[fbwhrdpmtajg]

It's because a lot of people fuck it up and try to get a warranty replacement rather than taking personal responsibility.

Re:Why is that legal?

[walshy007]

You rarely ever buy (obtain full rights) to software for obvious reasons.

Of course you don't get full rights, but you still obtain a full legal copy of the software... this is the basic thing of copyright, to limit the copying of things.. nothing else... trying to pull licensing shit is relatively new.

Again, you can refuse to recognize intellectual property,

I dislike the term intellectual property, as what we HAVE are copyrights, trademarks and patents, and using that term makes people confused and believe whatever you want them to. I recognize these things, but you seem to have taken the bait hook line and sinker from them... spoiler, companies will try get away with things and make claims that they have no legal right to if it is to their advantage, nothing new.

Modifying software is nothing like annotating a book. Also, books don't have EULAs.

Eula's are very rarely tested for a reason, they can claim lots of things that basically aren't even legal, some of it can be enforcable, but the majority usually isn't.

Is this site getting increasingly retarded, or am I just growing old enough to find teenage gamers tiresome?

For the record, I am not a teenager, hell I don't even have a single pirated item on any of my computers, but you sir seem to basically seem to believe anything the big companies say is legal.. which seems more questionable, if you do not question things and look into it yourself, and have independent thought, how will you ever know if people are lying to you?

Re:Why is that legal?

[DECS]

Licensing isn't really new. It might be "new to consumers," like people who have never encountered the idea that businesses pay more for things like ASCAP and per seat licensing than they do.

Software is a modern product concept. Ownership of somebody's created work (software, music, whatever) requires some concept of licensing beyond simple possession, just as ownership of land requires more than occupancy.

And yes, everyone seeks to frame things in their interests. Obviously companies will do what they can get away with. But the idea that individuals have some unassailable god-given right to modify software because they possess it is a rather foolish and naive idea. I'm not against modding your Wii/iPod/PC or whatever, but I don't pretend that it is protected by law.

Laws are designed to protect the assets of people who control wealth. They are not there to protect people, except those laws that are put in place within 25 years of the last revolution.

 

Re:Why is that legal?

[walshy007]

Eula's basically come under a form of contract law, "we will let you have this, if you abide by x, y and z" the big problem is establishing if there was a 'meeting of the minds' in such a contract.

If the contract is overly lop-sided or the details are illegal (example you can say, 'you will own your first born child') doesn't necessarily mean the courts will uphold it when they sue you for not abiding by the terms, it's quite probable in those circumstances for the contract to be voided.

I'm not against modding your Wii/iPod/PC or whatever, but I don't pretend that it is protected by law.

In my country (Australia) so long as it is not solely for removing copy protection (if it adds other useful functionality like homebrew and/or region unlocking) it is perfectly legal to modify any console any way you like.

But the idea that individuals have some unassailable god-given right to modify software because they possess it is a rather foolish and naive idea.

If you own it (and in this case it being a single instance not copied of "it") you can modify it. Unless of course you have a signed legally binding contract saying you can't.

Cars being a perfect example, when you purchase a vehicle the manufacturer still owns the designs and trademarks of the vehicle, but you are free to modify it without their consent. I fail to see why people consider software any different from this... perhaps it is because it is so easily copied, granted you would be unable to make a backup of this software, or redistribute it at all. But I'm sure for your own personal use that wouldn't bother most people.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Grimbleton]

Depends on the item. Some have a window in to the actual item's barcode, some have a sticker. I can't cite examples as it's nearly 3am and I'm passing out.

Re:Why is that legal?

[Riachu_11]

That requires a modchip.

Actually, the Wii can be softmodded to play burned games or games off a hard drive.

Re:Why is that legal?

[geminidomino]

For the record...

Yes, of course, that's why the Homebrew channel doesn't let you play burned games.

True.

That requires a modchip

Not true, at least as of 2 weeks ago.

Re:Why is that legal?

[dstech]

"The people who claim they are doing homebrew, versus those who actually do is statistically non-existent."

I'm non-existent? Man, what a downer.

DRM

[Techmeology]

DRM DRM DRM DRM DRM DRM DRM.
This is to updates as DRM is to using stuff. It's all a big commercialistic manipulation attempt. People don't like to be manipulated. Thus it fails miserably. There's also that warm fuzzy feeling when the hacked version solves bugs too:D Bonus "learn your lesson" points if they have to replace the bricked consoles (which, under most consumer law, they should).

When will they learn?

[Mr0bvious]

It costs them a lot of money to try and stop modding etc, when they will fail every time.

Waste of time, money and reputation.

Re:When will they learn?

[Jaysyn]

Especially reputation.  Nothing like making yourself look incompetent over & over again.  I'm looking at you Sony & Nintendo.  You need to tell your shareholders, to sit down, shut up & enjoy the easy money.

Re:When will they learn?

[sopssa]

Well they dont really fail. Sure, someone finds a way around it. But it gets harder to get the homebrew working again. I updated to 4.0 before and didn't know you couldn't get all the homebrew working again. I tried to downgrade a few times, but it failed always (and I followed the guides closely). Then I just forgot about it and didn't try again.

So in that case they won. And I'm pretty computer knowledgeable person myself, it would be even worse for someone who isn't.

Re:When will they learn?

[Mr0bvious]

It seems like your motivation was low to get it going, which leads me to suspect that they were not losing a great deal of money to your use of homebrew? If not, somewhat of a moot win.

Re:When will they learn?

[jgtg32a]

Sounds like you broke the first rule of updating software, is this update going to break compatibility with something else?

Re:When will they learn?

[daid303]

Only thing they had to do was change the title ID. And work around a few protections that didn't seem to work that well. They all did it in less then a day. Only the bannerbomb exploid no longer ran, but there where already 2 other exploits to run homebrew. And there is word going around that bannerbomb will be trival to fix for 4.2.

Nintendo actual risks bricking 5% (just a random number) of the Wiis they have out there. For 1 day of no homebrew. Don't forget that the hackers (twiizers) love working on these patches, they just want to take the system apart to make it do whatever they want. They don't want to pirate or cheat, they just want an open system to toy with.

Re:When will they learn?

[Sloppy]

You need to tell your shareholders, to sit down, shut up & enjoy the easy money.

In Soviet Russia, shareholders tell YOU!

Um, what I mean is, I'm amazed that all these companies that go out of their way to reduce their own profits by adding DRM and other bad-faith shit, don't ever have their management sued by shareholders. There's gotta be a point where telling potential customer after potential customer, "fuck off we don't want your stinking money," adds up to directly acting against shareholder interest.

Re:When will they learn?

[xtracto]

It costs them a lot of money to try and stop modding etc, when they will fail every time.

Waste of time, money and reputation.

Hey, this update and subsequent homebrew fix comes just in time for the new release of Wii64 Nintendo64 emulator in the Wii.

Good job these guys are doing.

Re:When will they learn?

[Jaysyn]

Blah blah blah, I can't find anything wrong with the message so I will insult the messenger.  Whatever, shit for brains.

Re:When will they learn?

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

But what about possible benefits of *slowing* modding etc? Or discouraging others from choosing to mod? It doesn't have to work perfectly to have an effect.

Besides, I've never thought of Nintendo as a company who condoned homebrew. To what reputation are you referring?

Re:When will they learn?

[westlake]

Waste of time, money and reputation.

The Wii is a casual - family-oriented - gaming platform. Wii Fit an instant hit among young women.

This is how Nintendo builds its reputation and sales and it needs the modder about as much as a car needs a fifth wheel.

The geek has no sense of scale.

His place in the overall scheme of things.

Re:When will they learn?

[sopssa]

I did do the same thing, and it worked to for some steps - but apparently I had some incompatible version of some subsystem and it didn't work (I had homebrew before updating to 4.0 too).

I did too lots of searching and spend a few nights with it. Asked lots of people. No luck :)

Re:When will they learn?

[marcansoft]

"Incompatible version of some subsystem"? Are you talking about the message from the HackMii installer that tells you that you have "no vulnerable version of IOS"? If that's the case, then it's almost certain that you installed one of those "piracy packages" that wreak havok on your system software, effectively making none of the internal IOS versions trustworthy, breaking some compatibility, and generally making a huge mess of your Wii. Since the HackMii installer is an installer, and we like to play it safe (unlike most of the people responsible for warez tools), it refuses to work unless it knows exactly what kind of environment it's running on. This works for the vast majority of people, since it is quite flexible as to what IOS it picks to work with, but some of the ridiculous warez packs out there patch all versions of IOS, making them all untrustworthy, and therefore the installer refuses to work.

Of note, downgraders are also stupid and dangerous and can cause some similar problems (as well as brick your Wii). If you don't want to update, don't update in the first place. The HackMii Installer is supported on all system software versions currently, but if you want to regain some kind of lost functionality of the Nintendo software that came with an update, you're really on your own. The only semi-supported downgrade mechanism is to make a full NAND backup with BootMii before the upgrade and then restoring it, but doing that often is not recommended because it isn't resistant to newly developed bad NAND sectors.

Honestly, if 4.0 permanently broke homebrew for you, you must have definitely done something unsafe. Safe things include installing HBC/BootMii/DVDX with the HackMii installer and running any standalone homebrew software from SD or USB. Unsafe things include any kind of warez/"backup" loaders, any kind of system patches, downgrades, installing "cIOS", etc. Unfortunately the unsafe things are all too popular, especially on piracy-oriented forums.

Nintendo's Response

[Rick Richardson]

Hello,

Some of you have reported problems with your Wii console after updating to the Wii System Menu 4.2. The symptoms most people are describing usually occur when the Wii has been modified. However, some of you also mention your system has never been modified.

We'd like to help get your system working properly again. If you're experiencing problems with your Wii console after downloading Wii System Menu 4.2, and you believe your system has not been modified, please give us a call. If we find that you have a normal system and the update caused your system to not work, we'll repair it at no charge.

Please call our Customer Service Department at your earliest convenience, 1-800-255-3700. We are open 6 AM to 7 PM, Pacific Time, 7 days a week.

Thank you,
NOA_Tech_Jane

Re:Nintendo's Response

[rtfa-troll]

Sounds like a scheme to get sued

There fixed that for you. Honestly, doesn't that sound like they just admitted they knew this update would damage people's systems? Can you say class action? The warning they give does warn about save games being lost, but doesn't seem clear to me about systems being completel missing Or did I miss that somewhere?

Re:Nintendo's Response

[AK Marc]

Saving a game is a modification to the software. So anyone that's ever even set up a Mii has modified the Wii from it's shipping state. "Unauthorized modification" would be a separate issue.

Re:Nintendo's Response

[Midnight Thunder]

I think they probably just have a policy in place, in which if they break your console they take responsibility. This is what I would expect from any company. Now, refusing to repair a console where the software has been modified in an unauthorized way, well that simply depends on their licensing and local laws.

Re:Nintendo's Response

[tepples]

Saving a game is a modification to the software. [...] "Unauthorized modification" would be a separate issue.

And the messages that go out with all Wii Menu updates since 3.3 refer specifically to unauthorized modifications.

Re:Nintendo's Response

[LordVader717]

29/09/2009

Wii Menu version 4.2 is now available for your Wii console. To update your Wii Menu to the latest version, please select the Update button at the bottom of the screen or select the System Update option in the Wii System Settings.

This update provides behind-the-scenes fixes that will not affect features but will improve the overall system performance.

Because unauthorized modifications to save data or program files may impair game play or the Wii console, updating to Wii Menu version 4.2 will also check for and automatically remove such save data or program files.

**Please note: If you've updated your Wii Menu after 9/29/09, you may not need to update again.

Thank you for updating your Wii console!

Nintendo

Re:Nintendo's Response

[ELitwin]

I disagree with your basic premise. Modifying application data is not the same as modifying application code.

Re:Nintendo's Response

[AK Marc]

I agree with you 100%. And I assert that both are modifications of some sort, and you seem to agree with me since you use the word "modification" for both.

Re:Nintendo's Response

[clone53421]

Yes, but if the console modifies itself (save-games) can that void the warranty? You (or any other third party) didn't modify anything, it did.

Are the save-games (application data) even part of the console, for the purposes of the warranty? You're not allowed to modify the console, but is the application data part of it? I'd consider the console to be the software+hardware, not the data.

Dear Nintendo,

[Narcocide]

Please stop making me cry.

Sincerely,
Your loyal non-modding customer.

P.S. Please spend all this time and effort addressing the cheating hackers plaguing the Mario Kart Network instead.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Rick Richardson]

P.S. Please spend all this time and effort addressing the cheating hackers plaguing The Conduit instead.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Anonymous Coward]

We often look at the past with rose-tinted sunglasses.

When we were children, some of us grew up with Nintendo. The NES gave us incredible gameplay. We fell in love with the company.The SNES brought even more to the table. Many of us are also plagued by the Tetris theme, thanks to the Gameboy.

Unfortunately, the reality is much more bitter. Nintendo has done some pretty rotten things since the very first version of their system. Whether it was the 10NES lock-out chip, their censorship policies, their anti-competitive attitude (which landed them fines in the European Union in 2002 thanks to how they ran their business from 1991-1998), Nintendo has a long track-record of "doing evil". We only never realized it because, at the time, most of us were children and only cared about getting that next fun game.

Compared to the way things were then, all of this is unsurprising.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Ogive17]

Well at least they're not Sony or Microsoft... :)

Compared to those two companies, Nintendo is still an angel!

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Kartoffel]

THIS.

Why all the effort to fight homebrew, instead of the rampant online cheating? They don't need to lock the platform down, just some freakin' checksums would be a step in the right direction.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Arimus]

So was Azrael and look where he ended up...

Think while MS and Sony are demons, Apple, Nintendo, Google are all well along the path to being fallen angels.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[TJamieson]

Game Genie. They tried to sue them into the ground more than once, iirc. For something that merely redirected or altered memory contents.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[daid303]

Note that the cheating is done trough Homebrew software. And thus blocking homebrew could help in stopping cheating a bit. But stopping homebrew is like trying to stop the sun shining, the people who are working to hack the Wii are smart and persistent. And those people don't do it for the cheats or the piracy, they just want an open platform to toy with.

Cheating in online games is always hard to beat, but the current state of the Wii is like early counterstrike and UT. The games are not build with cheat protection in mind, and thus the cheaters can run free. Times will change, but Nintendo is not known to change fast.

It's a real shame that Homebrew is being (ab)used to cheat online and to pirate games.

-Daid (writer of the Guitar Hero clone GuitarsOnFire for the Wii homebrew)

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[marcansoft]

Because they fail at securing internet protocols. At this stage they probably just can't do anything for older games. Remember, their software architecture does not allow for [b]any[/b] kind of updates to already released games, and that includes the internet protocol stack.

Everyone need to keep in mind that software architecture-wise, the PS3 and Xbox 360 are light years ahead of the Wii. It's not that Nintendo doesn't do anything, it's that they can't because their architecture is very limited and they clearly didn't have much foresight when designing it.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Aklyon]

people who are working to hack the Wii are smart and persistent.

and they can update much, much faster with their lack of bueracracy.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Blakey Rat]

But disabling nodded consoles *is* addressing cheating- if you haven't nodded your console, you have no tools to cheat with.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Arimus]

And argueably with their 'do no evil' motto the evil they're doing is even more tainted than the usual corporate evil...

MS you know are going to be bastards... so you make allowances and only actions over a certain point are evil.
Google you expect to be the good guys.. so you don't make allowances and any mild infraction becomes evil.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[ookaze]

We often look at the past with rose-tinted sunglasses.

When we were children, some of us grew up with Nintendo. The NES gave us incredible gameplay. We fell in love with the company.The SNES brought even more to the table. Many of us are also plagued by the Tetris theme, thanks to the Gameboy.

Unfortunately, the reality is much more bitter. Nintendo has done some pretty rotten things since the very first version of their system. Whether it was the 10NES lock-out chip, their censorship policies, their anti-competitive attitude (which landed them fines in the European Union in 2002 thanks to how they ran their business from 1991-1998), Nintendo has a long track-record of "doing evil". We only never realized it because, at the time, most of us were children and only cared about getting that next fun game.

Compared to the way things were then, all of this is unsurprising.

I don't know the details of the european fine part, which I don't doubt was evil, as region locking is mainly due to the european part of Nintendo.
But every other move they made have a reason that is everything but evil, and that was made to fight against evil.
Looking at the Nintendo past with blinders won't lead you anywhere either.

Nintendo launched the NES after the big videogame crash involving Atari.
Nintendo single handedly revived the videogame industry with the NES. In order to not repeat the great crash, which was caused by everyone putting tons of crap in huge quantities on the market (like ET), they limited how many games each company could release each year on the market, so that only the best quality games are put out. Keep in mind that now that they stopped doing that, as they are still demonized by ignorant AC like you for this, the very same problem was seen in holidays 2008, as the good games were lost among all the crappy ones.

The censorship policies and their paranoid attitudes is following their discovering of how western business were doing business, with things possible like Atari suing them without any reason, just to slow them down, and it worked. They don't want to ever be in a position to be attacked like this again, and just seeing the launch of the Wii shows clearly why they're right to be paranoid. The announces of lawsuits or potential lawsuits are numerous: people breaking their TV (despite the countless warnings) or harming their friends, people hurting themselves, people bricking their console, patent trolls on their controller, ...
If not for their paranoia, Nintendo would be dead by now.

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[CandyKisses]

I agree with Narcocide.

So, as someone with the homebrew channel installed

[Nursie]

What's the best course of action here?

I don't have BootMii installed at present.

Also why are they doing it?

[Nursie]

I'm not aware of it even being used for piracy. I have the Homebrew Channel installed and it's great fun to play a few things on, plus occasionally turn the Wii into a media player.

IIRC it can be used to play out-of-region games. Which is a GOOD thing.

What exactly do they have to gain here?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Bert64]

They want to enforce region locking, or they wouldn't have implemented it to start with...

Region locking hurts legitimate users, and is used to screw them out of more money... Region locking should be illegal. It does absolutely NOTHING to benefit the consumer.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[CODiNE]

I'm not aware of it even being used for piracy.

Well it is. I was at a buddies house, he had a USB HD plugged into his Wii, all kinds of games on it. Apparently the Mario Galaxy he downloaded had a few bits flipped somewhere in it's image so he played it all the way to the last few planets and then couldn't finish it. Some of the games he actually owned so... I think it's great to be able to back up games to a HD and play off them. When you share the Wii with someone and they get up to play Wii Fit every morning... and I'm working my way through Zelda. Swap swap swap.

Also he had this media center software running on the Wii, sorta like having XBMC or something. Then he uses his iPhone to change the tracks, watch movies, etc... pretty sweet.

Nintendo should just sell a media center channel and let millions of Wii owners plug HDs into those babies.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Eraesr]

What a preposterous comparison. If I wanted to import a crate of Coca Cola from the US, then I'm damn well able to open the bottle _and_ drink it's contents. I don't see how region locking protects the average user either. Technically speaking, there doesn't have to be a difference between a NTSC-U or PAL release. It's also a "problem" that PC games or even Nintendo DS games never had to deal with. There's no region locking on either platform. So why would it be necessary for the Wii? If Nintendo is truly worried about me putting an NTSC disc in my PAL Wii, then at most they could show a message telling me that I'm attempting to play an NTSC disc and that it may differ from a PAL release of the same game. "Do you wish to continue? Yes or No?" The only real advantages to region locking are for the producer of the product. They can put up different price points for different markets and prevent consumers from tapping into a different market (region).

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[AK Marc]

I grew up in Texas. There are a lot of Mexicans there. One thing that some Mexicans missed is Coke with sugar. Despite the television adds to the contrary, it corn syrup isn't indistinguishable from sugar. So I've been in markets that sold the Mexican Coke next to the American one. There was no confusion. If there was, you read the ingredients and you'd know the difference. Coke may sell different stuff in differnt places for regional taste, but they don't (and can't) sue people that resell it. But for some reason, you think doing that with software makes sense?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[lyinhart]

I'm not aware of it even being used for piracy. I have the Homebrew Channel installed and it's great fun to play a few things on, plus occasionally turn the Wii into a media player.

IIRC it can be used to play out-of-region games. Which is a GOOD thing.

What exactly do they have to gain here?

Wii Disc Dumper can be used to rip ISOs, which can be run in Dolphin, the Gamecube/Wii emulator: http://www.dolphin-emu.com/faq.php?cat_id=1 So that could justify Nintendo's concern about users running homebrew software, but I don't think the Wii's target audience (i.e. "casual" gamers) know about such things. And besides, it's not like there's many Wii games worth pirating. Like I actually must have that copy of Celebrity Sports Showdown.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[RiotingPacifist]

They don't release pirated software but they do release tools that can be used to play coppied roms from a USB drive, and the main thing i've seen them used for is emulators which must require "illegal" roms for the snes/n64 games you play.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[adycarter]

There is a difference between PAL and NSTC-U releases, its usually support for the extra languages needed for Europe, same applies to DVDs which is why frequently region 2 discs have a lot of extras removed compare to their region 1 versions, the space is needed for alternate audio/menus etc.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[zach_the_lizard]

I agree totally that region locking hurts legitimate users. However, I disagree that it should be illegal. I think it should be perfectly legal to mod/hack/whatever a way to play DVDs from another region, the manufacturer be damned. They can have all the fancy DRM they want, but I believe that breaking it should be perfectly legitimate. The DMCA disagrees with me, however. Now they can use that to extort money out of people for playing DVDs. "Pay us $LARGE_DOLLAR_AMOUNT or we'll take you to court."

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[superslacker87]

Coca Cola has different flavors around the world, often due to the preferences of the local consumers. If you imported Coke from somewhere else and resold it, and it wasn't clear to the consumer what exactly they were buying, they could very well think Coke wronged them when their drink tastes a little off.

Coca Cola tastes different everywhere else in the world but America because we use High Fructose Corn Syrup instead of pure cane sugar. The taste difference between the two is so much better when real sugar is used, but this is America where capitalism rules and the bottom line is most important. The bottom line is the following: HFCS is much cheaper to create and use than cane sugar.

If you get the chance to try a sugar-based soda and its HFCS equivalent, you'll be in awe of the difference. Taste for profit. I'd rather pay a few cents more for real sugar over HFCS.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[zach_the_lizard]

Really? Region locking is a *trade* issue? Region locking is a copyright issue, used by various large entertainment companies to force everyone to buy the same thing over and over and over again. It has nothing to do with trade.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[PhrostyMcByte]

I'm pretty sure they sell the Corn Syrup version in the US because we've got a huge tariff on importing sugar, not because of some sort of regional taste.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Urza9814]

It's not just a Texas thing - you can find the Mexican Coke in some standard supermarkets (specifically, Wegmans) even up here in central Pennsylvania. I bought some not too long ago - it was good stuff. And it's not just people who are used to having that kind who buy it. Clearly people are willing to pay a premium for it, and buy enough of it that it's worth keeping in stock. I'd imagine people would be willing to pay a premium for video games from other regions as well if it was possible to play them....

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[fireylord]

stop spouting rubbish mr shill

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[alen]

Coke is set up to sell syrup to local bottlers who actually make the drink and distribute it in their local area

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Cap'n.Brownbeard]

It's also a "problem" that PC games or even Nintendo DS games never had to deal with. There's no region locking on either platform.

Back when Quake II was released I had a copy that clearly stated on the disc "For sale ONLY in Australia". I literally had to change my timezone to install it. Please check your facts.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[xtracto]

Use of illegal Wii game copies is rampant (see Wiiso). You do not need a modchip and it is really easy to mod the Wii to make it play illegal game copies.

The guys at hackmii specifically reject such use, however every improvement they make for homebrew will be used by others (wanikoko, wiigator, etc) to ease access to playing illegal copies.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[commodore64_love]

Legislators like region-locking because it allows them to censor material.

For example North America (u.s.) could demand removal of nudity from a game (to protect the children of course). Without region-locking this law would have no power because people could just import the uncensored version from Japan or Europe. With region-locking the legislators' power trip stands, because you can't play any version except the NA-censored version. This is why you'll never see region locking made illegal.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[commodore64_love]

Oh sugar!

I wonder how Coke would taste without the sweeteners? I am sick-and-tired of buying products with sugar or corn syrup added. And if you buy the "no sugar added" version, they often use sugar alcohols which are no healthier than plain-old sugar.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[AvitarX]

Let's see.

Protectionism (sugar import tax) + Subsidies (US Corn) = capitalism?

Perhaps you meant America where "capitalism" rules

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Chaos Incarnate]

Not just "may differ from the PAL version", but "may not work with and may even damage your TV". If that did happen, a "Do you wish to continue?" screen probably wouldn't save Nintendo from a lawsuit.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Moryath]

It can also be used to play legal ports of games that have been open-sourced - for example, Doom and Quake have fabulous ports on the system (the Wiimote makes a very interesting interface for Quake).

But Nintendo doesn't want that, either. Nintendo has always had a bug up their ass about "piracy"; they claimed the "security" chip in the original NES (which was actually about stopping companies from Tengen from making cartridges and was the reason you got the "blinky blinky" power problem so often) was to ward off "piracy" (which back then meant "guys in brazil putting out copied cartridges in a little factory"). They stayed with cartridges rather than CD's for the N64 out of fear of "piracy" (and got absolutely stomped by the CD-using Playstation). They made the Gamecube drive spin backwards and use rinky-dinky discs with stupid little plastic blockers to stop insertion of normal sized discs, and didn't release the DVD-player combo unit anywhere but Japan, out of fear of "piracy."

Of course half the time "Piracy" is just a red herring; for instance, the "anti-piracy features" of the NES/SNES/N64 also ensured that companies had to use Big N's "licensed factories" to have the cartridges made, and Big N decided how many you got in each production run or if you could even publish in a given market at all (you had to meet their censor restrictions in the US, for instance). It got bad enough that a number of companies made fake-name shell corporations in the US just to get around the restrictions so they could get all their games published. Small wonder that they all jumped ship and Big N were pretty much left with just the Shovelware vendors for the N64/Gamecube days (and some of that still goes on today, seen the piles of "my god this crap just won't sell" marked for $10 per brand-new sealed copy in the Wii section of a Gamestop lately?) when Sony offered an alternative console, no content restrictions/censorship, and didn't care what production run they did as long as they used a black-colored plastic disc and paid their licensing fee.

They got lucky with the Wii when it actually sold, as opposed to the N64/Gamecube which were incredibly poor sellers, and they haven't realized yet that "piracy" is simply not a big deal. The number of people who do it are an incredibly small portion of the userbase, and you're never going to stop them: the best you can do is slow them down for a day or two. Meanwhile, my Wii isn't going to get updated through Nintendo, because I don't feel like losing the ability to back up my system, to back up the save files that they tried to block off (WHY, oh why, do they not want me to move my Super Mario Galaxy savefile to SD card?), and to play legitimately ported titles like Quake.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[TheCRAIGGERS]

It prevents confusion. You, as a knowledgeable consumer, don't give two shits. But different things are made different ways for different target markets. A consumer who didn't know better might buy a game with a colloquialism appropriate to one locality, which would be grossly misinterpreted in another.

Wait, you think they actually give a shit about changing colloquialisms from one locale to another? We're damn lucky if we get a translation from Japan to English that doesn't involve phrases like "ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US" and "Heaven's plot to destroy all minds." In other words, we're lucky if we get anything better than a babblefish translate, and you're arguing about them changing whole ideas to suit other nationalities.

Region locking is a trade dress issue, and it *protects* the average consumer. However, you, for personal use, may still import games.

Do you understand what region locking even is? Yeah, sure I can import video games for personal use, but if I can't play them on my region locked console I have a $50 shiny coaster. That sounds like same fine protection to me.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Kartoffel]

The Coca Cola analogy doesn't work.

If I get cucumber flavored coke from Japan and sell it in Europe, the bottles are still going to say "CUCUMBER FLAVORED" on them. It's clearly not regular Coke. People who don't like the flavor will have a disincentive to buy it. Nobody's getting fooled.

The average consumer needs protection from dangerous things: poisons, sharp pokey things, and electric shock. Consumers also need protection from getting dicked over by megacorporations. What consumers *don't* need is "protection" from a harmless yucky flavor. Sheesh!

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Kartoffel]

I think region locking works better with a Kool-Aid analogy.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Rockoon]

Excuse me so that I might interject.

Region Locking is definitely a trade issue. Its purpose is to offer the exact same product (the only difference being the region I.D. encoded within it) in different markets for different prices, because different markets can bear different pricing.

If one market will bear a significantly different price than another, but there is no region locking, then the lower price would dominate the higher one as independent importers would move the goods from one market to the other advantageously.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Rockoon]

Do you understand what region locking even is? Yeah, sure I can import video games for personal use, but if I can't play them on my region locked console I have a $50 shiny coaster. That sounds like same fine protection to me.

Sounds to me like you imported from the wrong region. That should have been a $5 shiny coaster.

THIS is the point of region locking. In some regions, that $50 disc is sold for the equivalent of $5. The region locking isolates each region so that shit like this can happen.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[VGPowerlord]

See also: The Half-Life 2 debacle (or at least I think it was HL2...) where Steam would refuse to activate a copy if you lived in a different region than the game was for.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[bleh-of-the-huns]

I grew up in South Africa, where all the sodas and what not were made with sugar.. then I moved to the US... go forward 13 years.. recently they released the Mtn Dew throwback, made with real sugar.. it was actually disgusting and tasted like artificial sweetners had been added..

My guess is that I have become so used to crappy HFCS that real sugar tastes bad.. or the fact that I never drank Mtn Dew in South Africa (very few Pepsi products there compared to Coke back then) and my first experience with Mtn Dew was with HFCS.

That said, I do miss my cokes with real sugar...

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[tepples]

They stayed with cartridges rather than CD's for the N64 out of fear of "piracy"

That, and CD-ROM load times were much worse than cartridge load times, especially before streaming was figured out. By the time of the GameCube, optical drives were finally fast enough to seek and read from an 80 mm disc in reasonable (for Nintendo) time.

They made the Gamecube drive spin backwards

Nope. They still spin counterclockwise from the laser's viewpoint, just like any CD or DVD. There are two differences between Nintendo optical discs and ordinary DVDs of the same size. First, Nintendo optical discs use a slightly different sector layout, analogous to the difference between CD-ROM mode 1 and mode 2 form 1. Second, there are six "pinholes" in the lead-in, whose sector locations are encoded in the burst cutting area.

and use rinky-dinky discs with stupid little plastic blockers to stop insertion of normal sized discs

Seek times over a 120 mm disc are slower than over an 80 mm disc.

Big N decided how many you got in each production run or if you could even publish in a given market at all (you had to meet their censor restrictions in the US, for instance).

Even in the era of WiiWare, Nintendo still maintains this iron grip. Teams of part-time developers with day jobs elsewhere need not apply.

WHY, oh why, do they not want me to move my Super Mario Galaxy savefile to SD card?

I don't know about SMG, but all Wii games that use Nintendo WFC set the no-copy bit on their save file to keep people from sharing the Friend Code data in the save file.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[VGPowerlord]

We used to have a huge tariff on sugar, that is. I believe it was lifted in 2006.

Coke gradually switched from sugar to corn syrup during the late 70s/early 80s. By the time New Coke came around, Coke products were made exclusively with corn syrup. Snopes has more details in its New Coke article.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[bleh-of-the-huns]

While your argument is somewhat compelling, it is not correct. More to the point, very few American release games are censored, the censored versions usually end up in places like china (skeletal images are a big no no), or Australia (I wont even bother with the long list of things they most likely censor), or Germany where Nazi images are banned (I think the same goes for France too).

The sole purpose of region locking is price fixing. As someone who has lived in a number of different countries, I can tell you it is significantly cheaper to import games, movies, music etc from the US to the country I was in (South Africa mostly, but I have lived other places as well). That includes taking into account import duties and the cost of shipping, as well as the exchange rate and the fees associated.

With region locks, you are forced to buy the over priced (by a significant margin too) products sold locally. As for who sets those prices, I could not tell you that, I imagine the production houses probably jack the prices up for their international partners, but thats just a guess.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[TobyWong]

I'd imagine people would be willing to pay a premium for video games from other regions as well if it was possible to play them....

Gamers have done this for a long time. I imported a Japanese PSP ver 1.0 before they were available in the US and various games via lik-sang.com. Of course Sony sued them out of business for having the audacity to sell their products across imaginary regional borders. I haven't bought a PSP game since then (but have played quite a few). How you like them apples Sony?

 

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

Region locking hurts legitimate users, and is used to screw them out of more money.

Say region locking were banned, and prices were fixed throughout everywhere? Do you think the companies would say "Oh well, it was fun while it lasted. Lowest price for all!", or do you think they'd start charging a higher price to recoup lost products?

Basically, region coding allows a company to distribute in multiple countries, while tailoring prices to the buying power of specific economies. Sure, some of the economically weaker countries will probably benefit slightly from banning region coding, but it comes at the expense of others.

Besides, region coding is a market problem. It's something that consumers can refuse. There's no lock-in; once the hardware's bought, it's bought, and region coding is typically no secret. Not to mention, there is a major region-free competitor to the Wii, so consumers already have a choice handed to them. The fact you don't like their choice is no reason to start banning.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[commodore64_love]

>>>price fixing

Okay so why don't the legislators do something? They just had a free trade conference of some sort in Pitssburgh - why don't they charge these companies with restraining free trade, and order them to stop using region-locking on their DVDs and Blurays?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[tepples]

I wonder how Coke would taste without the sweeteners?

It would taste like dilute phosphoric acid.

I am sick-and-tired of buying products with sugar or corn syrup added.

Then buy Coke Zero. It doesn't have sugar or alcohol in it.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[plague3106]

like when Congress mandated banks *must* sell houses even if the people could not afford them

That's a myth. What congress did is mandate that banks must loan to minorities, but no where do regulations force them to loan to people who are high risk. They did that because they turn around and sell the mortgage to someone else, who buys insurance against it to protect them if the borrower defaults.

If you want to claim that congress mandated banks loan to high risk people, please cite your source and preferably, the actual regulation / legilsation.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Jerf]

Mexican coke has been spotted at our corner convenience store in Ann Arbor, Michigan. If it's gotten this far, that pretty much proves it's not just a "Mexican" thing. There are Mexicans here, but they are a small minority compared to many other minorities here.

I'd imagine people would be willing to pay a premium for video games from other regions as well if it was possible to play them....

You don't need to imagine, I can tell you it's true. Import video game stores have been selling Japanese games for many years. If you look a bit, you can probably find one near you. And when I say "Japanese", I mean, the exact same discs you'd pick up over there, unlocalized for English. The localization situation has been improving, with more of the quirky exotics getting localized by companies like Atlus, but there's still a lot of good stuff that doesn't make it over for one reason or another.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[clone53421]

I wonder how Coke would taste without the sweeteners?

Just a hunch, but not too good?

I am sick-and-tired of buying products with sugar or corn syrup added.

Um, don't? but don't expect soft drinks to ever accommodate that wish...

There's always unsweetened iced tea.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Jaqenn]

I've been looking all over for a way to turn my Wii into a media center extender, but everything I've found is woefully incomplete. Can you ask him what he was using?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[KDR_11k]

It doesn't prevent confusion, the Wii acts like the disc is broken and someone who doesn't know about region locking would be more confused about that than about finding a game that doesn't support his language.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[KDR_11k]

That's not the kind of syrup we're talking about, in the US they use corn syrup instead of sugar in that syrup.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[KDR_11k]

The Wii's regions are NTSC-U (North America), NTSC-J (Japan) and PAL (Europe and Australia), where can you get 5$ games (not counting bargain bins) in those regions?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Darkness404]

Not necessarily. Unless the game is -really- good and not released in the west, I'm not going to get a Japanese game because I don't know Japanese. Japanese is primarily spoken in Japan which is only one country. English speaking nations have in general, pretty wealthy. Etc. Let a language problem rather than a tech problem solve it.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[KDR_11k]

The PC has no region locking (outside of some hackjobs used in some Japanese rape games) and yet people don't import the more-naked-boobies versions of games like The Witcher from Europe to the US.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Darkness404]

The typical person buys a console for the games. The PS3 lacks a lot of fun party multiplayer games that the Wii has. There is no equivalent for Super Smash Bros. Brawl on the PS3, nor Wii Sports, etc. Yeah, the PS3 wins in online multiplayer, more features, etc. but the Wii has some pretty fun games you can't get on any other console.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[LordVader717]

Oh come on! I know that Slashdotters will probably be more likely to some homebrew stuff than not, but acting as if all those Modchips and Card-Readers that are sold are so that people can spend their time trying homebrew apps and only play previously purchased games is delusion beyond belief.

This is solely about Piracy. It's not even about the region-lock. It's an attempt to slow down the piracy that is eroding markets.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[TheVelvetFlamebait]

Yeah, but sometimes getting what you want in a free market requires you to deprive yourself of what you really, really want, and start showing companies who's boss.

Other times, it's about prioritising and realising what you actually want, and exactly how much you are willing to sacrifice for it.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[PitaBred]

And people kill each other with steak knives, too. I just use mine to cut steak. Just because it can be used that way doesn't mean that HackMii doing anything illegal or even morally wrong.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Tsujiku]

Dump the ROMs from the cartridges yourself. It's a perfectly legitimate backup, and the emulators themselves are perfectly legal.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Anne Thwacks]

If I wanted to import a crate of Coca Cola from the US, then I'm damn well able to open the bottle _and_ drink it's contents. Here in the UK, where coke is insanely expensive, we often get grey market coke from Turkey, and other countries with Arabic writing on it. Not only its cheaper, it tastes better - I think it just has less sugar.

I am damn sure its illegal to remotely hack in to your Wii and brick it, making the false claim that this is an "upgrade". It is an offence under the misuse of computers act of 1990, which specifically bans this kind of activity. Send Nintendo management to jail for about the same amount of time as Gary McKinnon, I say.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[coaxial]

It's a subsidy on corn. There's no tariff on sugar.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Anne Thwacks]

I just use mine to cut steak

OMG, think of the children :-)

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Nursie]

"Oh come on! I know that Slashdotters will probably be more likely to some homebrew stuff than not, but acting as if all those Modchips and Card-Readers that are sold are so that people can spend their time trying homebrew apps and only play previously purchased games is delusion beyond belief."

I know nothing of modchips or card readers, so I'll take your word for it. I assume when you talk about card readers you're talking about the DS? I don't have a DS. I use the homebrew channel on the Wii to play Quake and Tyrian and do some other stuff the Wii usually won't let you do. I didn't even know you coul duse the homebrew software to play pirated games.

This is solely about Piracy.

What, Nintendo's actions or the Wii homebrew scene?

It's not even about the region-lock. It's an attempt to slow down the piracy that is eroding markets.

Well it's a total failure then, because it doesn't sound like it's done anything.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Torodung]

Give that man a dollar. No, forget it, give it to the corn lobby instead. Corn is King, brutha.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[JeffAMcGee]

There is a tariff on sugar: http://www.fas.usda.gov/itp/imports/ussugar.asp

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[RyuuzakiTetsuya]

What I want to know is, why do /.'ers shit all over the one console vendor who understands this and doesn't region lock their games?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[The MAZZTer]

PAL TVs use different aspect ratios and refresh rates from NTSC TVs. Games wouldn't play correctly (too slow or too fast, or glitchy/tearing graphics caused by incorrect refresh rates, and stretched or cropped graphics). Of course it's entirely possible for a game to be coded in such a way that it can correctly handle different refresh rates and aspect ratios, but I think older consoles were specifically limited to either NTSC or PAL modes in the hardware depending on region and you needed the appropriate mode games.

I am not an expert on this, but I'm willing to bet at least in the beginning that region unlocked TV-based games would have graphical problems when played on a "wrong region" TV.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[The MAZZTer]

Oh yeah addendum... because of different economies in different countries, companies will price games differently, IE based on how much that market is willing to spend on a game. If you could just import games from the cheapest place in the world you could be cheating people who worked hard on a game. If they end up not turning a profit on the game because of people who pirate or import they may not make a sequel. So support your favorite game developers! If you really don't think it's worth the price wait for it to go in the bargain bin.

Of course games that aren't even RELEASED in your region are a different matter.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Abcd1234]

I grew up in Texas. There are a lot of Mexicans there. One thing that some Mexicans missed is Coke with sugar. Despite the television adds to the contrary, it corn syrup isn't indistinguishable from sugar.

While that may be true, the odds are *very* good that the reason Mexican Coke tastes better to Mexicans (and American southerners) is because of the formulation, and not because of the sweetener. I say this as a Canadian who considers the American version far inferior to the Canadian formulation, which just so happens to taste very similar to the Mexican version save for one difference: like the American version, the Canadian version contains HFCS.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[almiki]

I haven't used my Wii in probably close to a year, but I had NES and SNES emulators. It's pretty trivial to download ROMs for literally every single game ever made, and play them for free. Nintendo wants you to pay $5 to play these old games.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[FireFury03]

THIS is the point of region locking. In some regions, that $50 disc is sold for the equivalent of $5. The region locking isolates each region so that shit like this can happen.

So let me get this straight - you think it's ok for vendors to prevent you importing their products in order to get them cheaper, but at the same time offshoring their workforce in order to get it cheaper?

They shouldn't be allowed to have it both ways - if a vendor wants to take advantage of the global employment market they shouldn't be allowed to restrict the global product market.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Kozar_The_Malignant]

Back when Quake II was released I had a copy that clearly stated on the disc "For sale ONLY in Australia".

Wasn't that the "Mutant Marsupial" version?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Lost Engineer]

Ah, the crux. Who bought up all the conforming mortgages, leaving only garbage products for investment banks? None other than our Government Sponsored Enterprises. Who gave tax incentives to *second* home buyers, thereby making investment (and speculation) in real estate *more* profitable than other forms of investment? Congress. Greed is not confined to the private sector.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[RiotingPacifist]

riight and how many people do you know that do that vs people that download the ROMS (or rent games and backup ROMS). I already said emulators are legal, but in reality 90% of their use is not!

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[plague3106]

Did I miss a memo somewhere that simply being a minority makes you poor? Racist indeed.

You're incorrect... all the bank has to do is show it applies its standard formulas it applies to everyone else and that's why a minority was classified as high risk, and the bank is scott free.

As homework, go look and see where most of the foreclosures are.... they are white middle class families living in expensive areas (CA, FL, etc).

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Psychochild]

Region locking also allows for licensing of content to different distributors. As a simple example, say I develop a game and get EA to publish it in the U.S., then later Ubisoft wants to publish it in Europe. Ubisoft will have to invest some effort in translating the game, so they want need to see a minimum amount of sales to recoup costs. This type of arrangement wouldn't be as appealing to Ubisoft if people could easily buy the other region's copies on the gray market.

Admittedly this is less of an issue as the larger publishers are more international and localization issues are being handled earlier in development. And, yeah, it still doesn't help the consumer. But, there is a real business reason behind this rather than just being mean to consumers.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[ejasons]

Here in Oregon, the Mexican sugar coke is sold by the case at most Costco locations.

I was recently at the Coke store in Las Vegas, and even there, they sold the Mexican coke! It was the first time I've ever seen Coke "corporate" acknowledge that there was a difference...

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[thaMANSTA]

Technically speaking, there doesn't have to be a difference between a NTSC-U or PAL release. It's also a "problem" that PC games or even Nintendo DS games never had to deal with. There's no region locking on either platform. So why would it be necessary for the Wii?

Uhh, PC games and DSes don't hook up to an NTSC or PAL television?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[LordVader717]

I assume when you talk about card readers you're talking about the DS?

Yes I am.

I don't have a DS.

That adds nothing ;-)

I use the homebrew channel on the Wii to play Quake and Tyrian and do some other stuff the Wii usually won't let you do.

Congratulations, you belong to a minority.

I didn't even know you coul duse the homebrew software to play pirated games.

Well, that's what most people use it for. They just don't blog about it on the internet.

What, Nintendo's actions or the Wii homebrew scene?

Nintendo's actions of course. I kind of thought the sentence that followed made that clear.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[kelnos]

It's likely not to work well for good quality stuff. It can handle DVD and ok-quality divx/xvid standard-def encodes, but the CPU in the Wii is just too slow to play any hi-def content. A 700-ish MHz PPC CPU doesn't get you very far for media playback these days.

Not sure if it's possible to make use of any graphics acceleration hardware to do decoding, but this certainly isn't implemented yet and I don't think anyone's working on it.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[mattack2]

The products are not *exactly* the same. They have different localizations/subtitles (for movies), possibly different extra features.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[UnknownSoldier]

> and yet people don't import the more-naked-boobies versions of games like The Witcher from Europe to the US.

Bummer.

I was hoping to get that.

*sarcasm*

--
No, I don't want someone to Tell-A-Vision of their propaganda.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[GaryPatterson]

As an outsider looking in, your system seemed to make it illegal to discriminate based only on ethnic lines or location. It was always (and still is) perfectly legal to discriminate based on ability to repay the loan, so no "poor minorities" were ever loaned money due to that law.

They were loaned money because the bankers became stupid and greedy, and their punishment was that a tiny fraction lost their jobs, but the majority got away with their stupidity.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[AvitarX]

I pretty sure the high default rates have more to do with the fact that the people doing the assessment on ability to repay were not the people taking the risk.

The market had created a first line of defense against bad loans that had only an incentive to write loans, not to actually assess (or even to help the buyer commit fraud, because you know, everyone does it).

nobody cared, because if someone managed to pay their mortgage for 6 months, they could sell easy, cover the real-estate agent, and not owe on the loan.

Of course these buyers could very well have been in the same situation, and eventually it all came tumbling down.

As someone who purchased a house with no money down, but one that was a very reasonable purchase for me, I am happy about how things were. But they would have loaned to me if I didn't have 2 renters lined up for my extra bedrooms, and that would have been a disaster.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[TSPhoenix]

Living in a PAL region I can say pretty much any TV made since 1990 supports PAL and NTSC signals, and the hybrid PAL60. I've played all 3 modes on a fairly old TV with no problems. Even Nintendo releases games without proper PAL support to PAL regions when it is convenient for them (Geist, Metroid Prime 2).

PAL Wiis support progressive scan, but only the NTSC-based 480p and not 576p like all PAL DVDs are (the hardware couldn't do 576p anyway). All our TVs support it so no big deal, a huge step up from the GameCube whose PAL titles were intentionally stripped of progressive-scan support, making them fairly useless on modern displays whereas NTSC GameCube games played on a Wii get the full benefit of 480p.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Rockoon]

So let me get this straight - you think it's ok for vendors to prevent you importing their products in order to get them cheaper, but at the same time offshoring their workforce in order to get it cheaper?

I didn't say anything one way or the other.
So let me get this straight.. you are looking for an argument?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[plague3106]

Um, yes, is is legal to discrimate based on ability to repay the loan. Would you loan someone money if you thought you'd never see it again? That's not really a great way to run a bank. I'm curious, would it be discimination to you to not hire someone lacking a degree in computer science for a programming job? Should i have to hire a black person even though they don't have the skills required by the job? Should I have to hire ANYONE that didn't have the requisite skills?

And while you're right that poor minotiries are not loaned money, neither are poor majorities. The discriminate that's the problem was banks not loaning to black people, even if they COULD repay the loan, or not loaning to a black family trying to buy a house in a white neighborhood.

As far as the "majority" goes, that's who's suffering most right now. Check out the sob stories on CNN about people losing their homes and jobs.. I don't think I've seen a single lower class family featured, they're all middle class. Especially heart wrenching was a story on CNN about a upper-middle class family that had to give up their landscaper, gardnerer and chef.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[plague3106]

Consumers spending what they can afford is good for the economy. Banks loaning to people who can't afford to repay is not. Yes, government did contribute to the economic meltdown; we just had 16 years of Bush & Clinton undoing much of the regulations put in place in the 1930s. Guess where the meltdown largely started? In the completely UNREGULATED mortage backed securities market.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[snadrus]

I'd bet that's a Canadian Coke. I visited there once and could even taste the difference in Heinz ketchup as it has sugar there. US manufacturers using sugar get my business instead of Coke or Heinz now.

These companies are asking to be replaced with "Natural Brew Root Beer" (Smuckers, actually) and unsecured games like "World of Goo".

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Bert64]

Extra languages are not *needed* for Europe...
Games sold in the US and Canada will almost certainly support english, and could easily have support for spanish and french too... And most of the people i know in countries like holland and sweden will play games in english anyway.

Having multiple language versions available is one thing, but preventing people from running foreign versions is underhanded. What if someone living in the US wants to play a game in german? What if people in europe don't want to wait for a local version, and can speak english anyway so don't care about the language?

And how about games that never get released in a particular region at all?

And the idea of consumers being confused by a foreign version is utterly ridiculous, even the most un-knowledgeable of consumers will notice that the packaging is written in a foreign language.

Funny someone mentions coca cola, a lot of smaller takeaways and restaurants have foreign branded cans of coke, where the writing on the can will be written in polish, turkish or german... I imagine they're imported because they're cheaper in those countries.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[Bert64]

The code in many games is capable of handling either, infact many games can handle multiple resolutions... The wii supports both pal and ntsc, and 480p... Other consoles support a lot more. And a lot of the games are coded through vendor supported libraries that won't care at all about the resolution.

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[misnohmer]

For all the good reasons to do hack your wii, there are those who do things which hurt Nintendo's bottom line. For example, those who use homebrew to download hacked versions of multiplayer games allowing online cheating, such as Mario Kart Wii. My kids for example stopped wanting to play any online games after hacked homebrew versions of the game showed up allowing people to cheat and make the races pointless (what's the point of racing with a guy who is always invincible, or has unlimited powers to nuke you with super homing weapons). So, I haven't bought any more multiplayer games since. Nintendo looses 2 ways here - one, through software piracy (let's not argue that one, many other threads on why "piracy doesn't actually hurt anyone") and two, people get a bad opinion about their online multiplayer service, causing less sales of multiplayer games.

Another way to think about this is like this: Nintendo has a service for their console. Modified consoles cost in terms of causing havoc or simply in terms of having to do extra work to make sure such consoled don't wreck things, so they should have the right to exclude hacked consoles from any service. If you want to modify your console, no problem, but don't use any Nintendo services from then on (including their update service) - problem solved! Would it make you feel better if they put a sticker on the box saying "If you hack this, we reserve the right to brick it upon any connection to any Nintendo service (including update)"?

Re:Also why are they doing it?

[RockDoctor]

So let me get this straight - you think it's ok for vendors to prevent you importing their products in order to get them cheaper, but at the same time offshoring their workforce in order to get it cheaper?

How many US employees did Nintendo sack?
No, seriously.
I was under the impression that Nintendo have always had the large majority of their manufacturing in relatively high-productivity/ low-cost countries with no-one but the minimum of marketing and legal androids in low-productivity/ high-cost countries. This may be different for the design teams, who may or may not be in the company's home country.
Wikipedia gives the company's workforce as being 4130 people. Perhaps you're mistaking "people who build Nintendo-branded hardware" for "people employed in any way, shape or form by Nintendo"?

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[L4t3r4lu5]

Stop buying Nintendo goods and services until they fix the issue. Tell them that, on the forums.

Hit them in the wallet.

one datapoint

[WillAdams]

installing 4.2 worked fine on my (unmodified) Wii.

William

Re:one datapoint

[MichaelSmith]

Yeah I am updating mine now. I wonder if we are slashdotting the nintendo update servers right now?

Re:one datapoint

[MichaelSmith]

Update completed. Power cycled it after the update and it came up okay.

Re:one datapoint

[marcansoft]

Oh, it's going to work fine for [b]most[/b] people, but the bricking rate is still going to be much higher than normal. The boot2 flashing code isn't completely borked (I've successfully used it to flash early versions of BootMii 10-20 times), but the fact of the matter is sometimes it'll botch. I'd expect a sizable number of bricks, much higher than for "normal" system updates.

Re:one datapoint

[marcansoft]

And once again I really need to stop going to silly forums and unlearn bbcode. Gah.

Re:one datapoint

[XMode]

OMG I didn't even notice till you pointed it out... I think I have a problem.

Update by choice or forced?

[Necroloth]

Is this update optional or once I connect ii to the net and it auto searches for updates, it won't let me carry on until it's updated?

Re:Update by choice or forced?

[zer0keefie]

It's optional, provided you don't want to use the shop channel. So far, that's the only time I've gotten complaints from my Wii about the update.

Re:Update by choice or forced?

[Lectoid]

The Homebrew Channel has an app for that.

There is an app or something that will update the shopping channel without updating the system. I have not ran it yet so I can't comment on how it works.

Re:Update by choice or forced?

[Aklyon]

it works.

What year is this?

[Waccoon]

No checksums before flashing? Really?

Even at launch I was hearing about bricking problems. Glad to see things are improving after taking in all that cash.

Re:What year is this?

[eddy]

I'm not sure how you think checksums magically protect you from buggy code. I'm sure the buggy code was both checksummed and signed.

Re:What year is this?

[Waccoon]

I would think that any code that handles flashing a chip that could render the system inoperable and require hardware replacement would be properly tested. Seriously, flashing is old hat and isn't rocket science, unless the hardware is intentionally complicated to try to stop hackers from dumping the flash contents.

Losing power while flashing is also a possibility, but really, is a backup ROM that expensive?

Re:What year is this?

[clone53421]

unless the hardware is intentionally complicated to try to stop hackers from dumping the flash contents.

Ya think? (We're talking about Nintendo... didn't I just hear about some guy who finally managed to dump the Gameboy Color ROM? and that was released when, 1998?)

And what if they also want to make it intentionally complicated to prevent hackers from custom-flashing the device with unauthorised firmware?

Never underestimate the ability of DRM to complicate things and cause headaches.

On another note...

[zlel]

The Refrigeration Industrial Artists' Association has decided that you will need to pay an "iFrigement use fee" if you put any food item with an energy content of more than 1000 kCal in your fridge. Your fridge comes with a Healthy Home Edition license - I'm afraid you need to upgrade your kCal licenses for your level of consumption.

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[Nursie]

That's easy, I haven't bought any for about six months anyway.

I meant, is there a way to avoid a bricking of the nintendo products I already own?

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[ragethehotey]

Just DONT accept the 4.2 update when the Wii asks if you would like to upgrade. Simple as that. Unlike the XBox 360 / PS3 they have no way to "force" you to take the update.

If you don't like it...

[OrangeTide]

If you don't like it, then don't download and install their free firmware updates.

You can get all huffy and jump up and down on your soap box all you want. But the reality is, you bought some hardware and it needs some software to operate correctly. You can choose to play games offline only, or you can choose to plug it into the internet and collect your free updates that maintain support with Nintendo's network while at the same time attempts to prevent you from using homebrew.

If you want to do homebrew games, buy something open, like a PC. Microsoft will even give you a free C++ compiler capable of doing full DirectX programming. And those Linux guys do the same thing, but the OS is free, compiler and debugger are not crippled and it's OpenGL or SDL instead for doing homebrew.

Re:If you don't like it...

[thejynxed]

The only problem is, that with the Wii, Nintendo has decided to make it as annoying as possible NOT to accept their updates. Basically it will pop up the annoying update screen at every opportunity - this means every time you navigate between windows, etc in the system.

It essentially harasses you until you click on 'Yes'.

Re:If you don't like it...

[OrangeTide]

I don't have this problem on mine. I suspect you're doing it wrong.

Re:If you don't like it...

[hairyfeet]

But do you have to "download and install" or is it pushed? I haven't owned a console since the Dreamcast (which my nephews still use to this day for the awesome emulators and homebrew) so I honestly don't know, but I have had to block updates to certain software at the firewall on my PC thanks to "crippledates*". So if this thing has the potential for bricking the console I think knowing whether it is something you have to decide to go get on your own VS getting it silently "pushed" or being locked out of online play if you refuse to "update" is a pretty important distinction to make.

*Copernic desktop Search is the first that comes to mind. Their "update" from V2 to V3 basically did NOTHING but cripple the living hell out of the software to force you to buy the pay version just to get back all the features you previously had. If it ever got a sniff that there was an update available it would nag the living hell out of you to update as well. Lucky for me I always back up my software installers and simply blocked the Copernic update channels at the firewall and rolled back to V2. If they would have offered new features only for pay users in V3 I would have probably bought it, as I find the software quite useful for searching documents, but paying just to be uncrippled was just too much asshatttery for me.

Re:If you don't like it...

[Jiro]

You're not required to install it, but Wii Shop (which is online) won't work unless you do, and games that come out after the update will probably require it to run.

Re:If you don't like it...

[Golddess]

While thejynxed appears to be exagerating, I suspect you've done something to your Wii if you've never needed to install an update to use your Wii (or you play only launch titles or titles released shortly thereafter). If a game disc contains a more recent version of the Wii software than is currently installed, it will not let you play that game until you update.

Re:If you don't like it...

[jasonmicron]

If you don't update your software and buy one of their latest games you're REQUIRED to update to the latest version of their firmware. You don't exactly have a choice.

Unless you just wanted to never buy a new game ever again for the Wii.

Super Mario Galaxy included a new version of the v3 menu I had to install before I could play it.

Your argument fails.

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[Eraesr]

Wii forces you to update as well through some (first party) games. Mario Kart or Wii Fit for instance won't run if you don't install the updates included on their discs. So if you don't stay up to date, you will lock yourself out of an increasing number of games for the platform.

Wonder when companies will learn...

[Globally Mobile]

that no matter how hard they try to 'break' someones ability to do something, those someones will quickly circumvent that 'break' in the system, if they wish to. Makes me flash back to the days of the T-shirts with the DeCSS code written right upon it, and all the controversy about them. Also the tshirts that printed with the PGP (probably also gpg)code that were considered munitions by the US government. Makes me chuckle, makes me sad. It's a mad world, to quote Tears for Fears (though I think I adore Jules version more). There are plenty of other examples, from recording a videotape to another, using analog methods (which to me seems one of the easiest and first methods to break most digital methods of 'breakage', though the quality does suffer, in many peoples opinions.)
I really don't forsee a day when people will quite hacking the 'breaks' in systems. Isn't that what they are there for in the first place? Why not spend all those research dollars into the improvement of the platform itself? Or finding new exciting artists? Etc...

Sitting on the fence

[Rik Sweeney]

We (Parallel Realities) have written a bunch of games and I was recently looking into porting these onto the DS and Wii via Homebrew, because I think people would enjoy playing them (on the move in the DS's case), so I'm all for Homebrew.

What I am against though is modding your games machine just so you can download the games off the web without having to pay for them, which I think is what Nintendo is actually annoyed about.

However, getting around region locking does mean that one can play games only released in Japan (or the US if you live in Europe). In this instance I could understand a gamer's frustration and why they might download it off the web (because they can't a company willing to ship overseas).

Re:Sitting on the fence

[Nursie]

It's not just that either - I go on holiday to various places around the planet. Sometimes I go into a music or games shop whilst I'm there and buy one or two things to take home.

Why should I not be able to play them when I get home?

And yes, some games (the original Katamari Damacy, for instance) are not released in some markets and as a result are hard to get hold of, even if you've soft-modded the console to play other regions.

It often seems to me that the benefits of a global economy are reaped by companies by employing labour and sourcing materials where they like, but they try their damnedest to stop consumers doing the same.

Re:Sitting on the fence

[Gramie2]

About the region locking: I used to live in Japan, and my kids have many Japanese games for the Wii. Now that we live in Canada, we were faced with not being able to play any games sold here. I got a chip that makes the Wii region-free, but to make Rock Band work, I had to replace the entire OS with the North American version (it can still play Japanese games, thanks to the chip).

We've never played games that we haven't bought or rented, so the only effect of trying to kill homebrew, to us, is to potentially destroy our machine (no, we haven't upgraded to 4.2).

Thanks, Nintendo.

Re:Sitting on the fence

[marcansoft]

FWIW, 4.2 is reported to completely kill modchip region-free functionality. If they've done what I think they've done (started to check the region on the TMD, which is cryptographically signed), region-free via modchip is dead and won't be coming back.

Re:Sitting on the fence

[querist]

I've never encountered this region locking problem, and I have an unmodified Wii. I've purchased games in Hong Kong for my kids (Mario Karts and Wii Sport Resort) and both play without any difficulties. The Wii was purchased in the US at a "Toys-R-Us". Which games are region locked?

Re:Sitting on the fence

[shoemilk]

I live in Japan. A friend of mine wanted to sell his Wii because he doesn't understand Japanese and couldn't play any games. He was unaware of the region lock when he bought it (he figured the DS wasn't why would a Wii be?).

I told him about the homebrew channel and that if he installed it, his wii would be region-free. He went home and did it and has since bought over a dozen games from the states. I don't understand region locking for anything and personally think it should be illegal.

Re:Sitting on the fence

[Yosho]

I've never encountered this region locking problem, and I have an unmodified Wii. I've purchased games in Hong Kong for my kids (Mario Karts and Wii Sport Resort) and both play without any difficulties. The Wii was purchased in the US at a "Toys-R-Us". Which games are region locked?

Those games you purchased in Hong Kong are most likely bootlegs that do not have any region protection on them. I'm sure that you're probably thinking, "But they can't be bootlegs, the packaging is really nice!"; well, there are plenty of bootlegs that have high-quality packaging nowadays. It can be tough to tell bootlegs apart from official discs nowadays; usually the only things you can rely on are copyright notifications being in the wrong place or having different manufacturing serial numbers from the real discs. In fact, it's harder to find official discs in Hong Kong than it is to find bootlegs.

Re:Sitting on the fence

[Yosho]

In this instance I could understand a gamer's frustration and why they might download it off the web (because they can't a company willing to ship overseas).

It's actually really easy to find companies that will ship overseas. NCSX and Play Asia are both big importers. Amazon.jp will ship to the US and accepts US credit cards, too, but you have to read some Japanese to use them. The only excuse for piracy is that you're not willing to pay, really.

Re:Sitting on the fence

[TSPhoenix]

Or that you aren't willing to wait.

My usual routine for DS games is to decide if I want the game, if so I'll buy it off Play-Asia and download the ROM and play that and maybe even finish it before the game arrives. I don't feel bad about downloading a game I have paid for. When it arrives I'll write my save file to the retail cart using a DS program called SavSender and keep playing.

They can probably recover at the repair depot

[sirwired]

It is highly likely that they can recover the box in the repair depot. You can flash chips without removing them from the board if the board designer was thinking intelligently. In my company's HW dev labs they re-flash bricked system boards all the time; they can also do so in the factory. If we couldn't fix RMA'd sysplanars, field flashing bugs would be a complete and total disaster.

SirWired

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

You tell me how they do that. Not software - the ROM bits have no recovery functionality. Hardware? Massive props for you if you can find any kind of JTAG or similar port on the board, because quite a few people have wasted lots of time trying and failing to do so. As far as we can tell, they preflash the NAND chips before soldering, and I'm not aware of anyone who hasn't just had their motherboard replaced after this kind of unrecoverable brick.

Here's a pinout diagram of the Hollywood with everything that's definitely not a recovery port marked. Let me know if you find any flashing/recovery functionality on the remaining pins ;)

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[Burpmaster]

You can flash chips without removing them from the board if the board designer was thinking intelligently. In my company's HW dev labs they re-flash bricked system boards all the time

Those boards weren't designed to prevent modding. No, I bet Nintendo has to replace the whole circuit board containing the flash chip due to their own paranoia.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[drinkypoo]

You tell me how they do that.

With an over-chip carrier socket. You put the system or perhaps the motherboard in a cradle, lower a lever, and contact is made.

That stupid answer is free, but if you want more, they will cost you.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

Their system doesn't appear to be designed to accept external driving of the flash. The Hollywood boots and tries to talk to it as soon as you power it on. External NAND flashers need to overdrive the Wii's outputs very hard to properly do their jobs. As far as we can tell, the control outputs to the NAND Flash do not have tristate capability (they always drive hard high or low, even when the system is uninitialized or idle). The NAND power rail is also the 3.3V Hollywood power rail, so it is impossible to power the NAND Flash without powering up the Hollywood.

Nope, pretty sure that's not how they do it.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

And what you're trying to say is...? Do you see a socket anywhere? I don't know about you, but we've never seen a repaired Wii with obvious signs of SMT reworking. Using a chip clip to program in-system is problematic and deinitely not the way the system was designed; see above reply.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[drinkypoo]

The NAND power rail is also the 3.3V Hollywood power rail, so it is impossible to power the NAND Flash without powering up the Hollywood.

See, I know very smart people are involved in trying to get over Nintendo, I am not a total dickhead so I assume some of them are smarter than I am. But one thing I know is that Nintendo knows more about Hollywood than anyone else except ATI. I would be surprised if they didn't at least have a way to disable Hollywood, if indeed it is not somehow involved in the recovery process.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

I don't know about their hardware engineers, but my opinion of their software engineers has been steadily decreasing. Call me a dickhead if they want, but they fail at almost everything they do as far as system programming. Their system architecture is archaic and they've locked themselves out of many of the features and improvements that their compatitors are able to add. They tried twice to stop a certain savegame exploit and failed disastrously - yes, there were critical bugs in the anti-exploti code, as small as it is. I've disassembled a lot of their code and the list of WTFs would span hundreds of pages. Their "secure" IOS security is dismal. They implemented a homebrew crypto layer and completely screwed up the very core of RSA verification, resulting in the very first exploit to run homebrew. They appear to have never heard of things called "code reviews". They're using a scheme of forking IOS for each minor addition that makes it very difficult to maintain security fixes in the future, nevermind that older games will never get new features or improvements. Then there's the hugely botched boot2 update that this article is all about, and which they clearly didn't test well enough (I mean, come on, we can find it with a handful of Wiis and some minor testing and they can't?). They have to resort to stupid hacks like copying SD channels to NAND to play them because they never even attempted to develop an even slightly sane storage layer for IOS - access to everything goes through different APIs. The division of functionality between ARM and PPC code is chaotic: the USB stack is in IOS, the Bluetooth USB device driver is in the PPC but the Keyboard/mouse drivers are in IOS, the Bluetooth stack is in the PPC while the TCP/IP stack is in IOS, half of the SD driver is in IOS and the other half in the PPC, the NAND filesystem driver is in IOS but the FAT filesystem driver for SD is in the PPC, etc. The WiFi drivers are notoriously unreliable (Broadcom is probably to blame for that). They left in DVD-Video mode code and functionality that is what enables softmods - and when we tried to report it to them them before Wii piracy via homebrew existed, they harassed us and refused to let us speak with an engineer! Softmods, predictably, came later, when other people discovered that code.

As for their hardware engineers, they at least have horrible power management inside the Hollywood to blame for the WC24 heat issues causing GPU failures. The software guys also helped, though, by making IOS have a busy-wait idle thread. IOS uses 100% of the Starlet CPU during idle mode, while the fans are off and the system is slowly getting cooked.

Again, feel free to look for a flashing mechanism too, but our experiences and attempts, evidence from people who send in their Wiis for repair, and our generally bad opinion of Nintendo's engineers all point towards there not being one.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[cruelworld]

Um, using ICT test points for JTAG is standard operating procedure. And 100% the repair lab has an ICT fixture for repairing/troubleshooting the boards. With ICT you could even use the un-tented VIAs, which again is standard procedure for modern DFT practices.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

Good luck breaking the massive ground planes that connect every ground together.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

And again, I'm saying we've looked for JTAG all over the place and can't find it. The Wii has a gazillion test points, yet none of them seem like candidates for JTAG. There's a set of 8 cutely arranged testpoints going straight to Hollywood, but those turned out to be a debug GPIO port (I've used it to drive an LCD display and the like). Everything else is spread around the board, and we've gone and mapped almost all of the Hollywood ball-out with no success. About the only thing I'd imagine they could have pulled off to throw us off would be to spread the JTAG testpoints around the board using traces buried into the inner layers, but I doubt they're that smart.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[MemoryDragon]

I cannot really talk about the internals, but from the outside I agree, just look at the absymal track record in virtual console regarding LCD screens. Old games often do not work due to their display modes. The solution simply would be add scalers to the dreaded things.
Well guess what Nintendo fixed some games by simply shifting the display mode around others they never fixed. So half of the virtual console games I bought cannot be played on a newer tv the other half can be enabled with an undocumented key combination on the wiimote.
This was the main reason why I hacked the wii open, I finally can play Sonic which I bought because the homebrew emulator can scale!

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[MemoryDragon]

Besides that we are talking about Nintendo here, they are currently learning what this internet thing is ...

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[DeadCatX2]

I'm not even going to pretend that I know enough about Wii hardware to give you suggestions, but for your entertainment I shall muse...if I understand correctly the problem is Starlet fails to boot when boot2 is corrupted and thus won't turn on Broadway and we get screwed.

What if there was some other way to access the bus that's attached to the NAND and issue commands to the NAND without going through Starlet? Bushing's diagram leads me to believe that there could be a remote possibility that a backup-boot-loader could check for the existence of a file on the USB/Wifi/SD (but not the drive or GCN cards) and try to flash that into NAND.

Maybe boot1 could do some check for external files?

It's a long shot, but if you saw any activity on any of the peripherals attached to the AHB bus with a broken boot2, it could be an attempt to load a backup image for flashing.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[DeadCatX2]

In order to flash a bricked Wii, you need BootMii installed as boot2. This Nintendo update over-wrote boot2 for everyone, BootMii or otherwise, so anyone who runs it no longer has BootMii as boot2. If you could perform the update without overwriting boot2, you would keep BootMii and thus the ability to flash your NAND.

But the problem is that when Nintendo goes to overwrite boot2, they don't validate the checksum and some percentage of the installs will botch. And if boot2 hangs, there's pretty much nothing else left to do, because boot2 starts everything else.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

Neither boot1 nor boot0 have such capability (yes, they've been dumped - in fact, you can turn on boot0 easily using a register, it isn't locked out). The only possibility that I can see is that there might be an hidden "alternative" boot0 ROM with the ability to load code from some external bus, and this special boot0 ROM is turned on by some specific hardware event during startup. However, USB/SD/anything like that is out, since it's too complicated, and GCN peripherals are out since, although they can be talked to from Starlet, they require an initialization sequence to turn on (boot2 does this normally, not boot0). It might be able to load code bitbanged over the GPIO port though, or something of that nature. I don't think this possibility is very likely, though.

If there's actually a method to program the flash in-system assuming it contains no vlaid data to begin with (that means no boot1 either), I'd say it would have to be one of these:

• JTAG port able to take over Starlet execution at boot
• Some form of direct hardware access to the NAND controller via some form of special I/O sequence
• Some ability to power down the NAND outputs and then clip onto the chip (I don't think this is likely)
• An alternate hidden boot0 capable of running external code

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[DeadCatX2]

I'm honored with your reply. ^_^

I did some research and you're right, bad NAND = no boot1.

I also saw the decompiled boot0. It's pretty slim so I imagine someone would have seen something by now if anything was there to find. My guess is that if Starlet hangs then all is lost. It seems weird, though, for them to dump the error code out of the debug port in the panic subroutine, but have no way to use this knowledge to fix a problem.

However...AHB allows multiple bus masters. You wouldn't need an alternative boot0 if you had some masked silicon that could bus master the AHB if Starlet hangs. The question is would the alternate bus master load Starlet code and then reboot it, or just have some facility to write directly to NAND? I'm not familiar with the initialization routines for getting the various devices up and running without boot2, but you don't seem excited about the prospect.

Has anyone considered whether there's some bootloader (not ARM-based) that loads boot0 from the ROM mask into Starlet's memory for execution? Or does Starlet have a bus that reads directly from ROM? Maybe it could load an alternate boot0 under some condition. Pure speculation.

JTAG would be ideal, but I read in other posts that you haven't seen it yet. Fear of piracy could lead them to forsake this entirely, but this seems stupid, but then again they seem entirely prone to severe stupidity... (strncmp signing checks? flashing without checksums? seriously!)

Does Hollywood have multiple power rails? I know some FPGAs have, for example, 3.3, 2.5, and 1.2 V rails. You can indefinitely postpone the boot process by holding one or the other of the rails low. So if Hollywood had another power rail, and the regulator for that rail had a shutdown pin, there could be some dirty tricks that could keep Hollywood from booting up, and thus prevent it from driving the NAND control pins, while still powering the 3.3V rail for the NAND. I doubt this is something Nintendo would have planned, though, and there's no telling if Hollywood might be sensitive to how various voltages ramp up.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[DeadCatX2]

Did some reading of boot0. I guess the mask ROM is memory mapped to 0xFFFF0000, so there doesn't need to be a non-ARM bootloader to load Starlet's memory.

Does Starlet automatically jump to 0xFFFF0000 after Power-On Reset? Seems weird, cos I thought most processors start at address 0 after POR. I see that 0xFFFF0000 vectors to _reset, which jumps to j_boot0_main, which jumps to boot0_main, leaving no opportunities for vectoring anywhere else, unless something else vectors to 0xFFFF0000 first instead of jumping there after POR.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

boot0 is read straight from ROM. When you set the boot0-enable bit, boot0 overlays a part of what normally is Starlet SRAM. You can't write to it. This is pretty typical embedded system behavior (ROM overlays RAM during boot, gets disabled later on). If you later disable boot0, whatever was in the RAM it overlayed is retained, so it isn't getting loaded into RAM. Boot0 is disabled by the boot2 ELF loader (strangely enough - boot1 could easily do that task), which is how it was originally dumped (modified boot2). Later we found out that you can just reenable the thing whenever you want later on.

Keep in mind that the bus master stuff is already used all over the place: the PPC bus bridge is an AHB master, and so are most peripherals, since they need to be able to DMA data to RAM. While it is possible for there to be some kind of debug master, there's still the issue of how it would talk to the outside world. It would indeed be possible to have some sort of sequencer able to talk to the NAND registers and RAM (to write to NAND), but it still needs to talk somehow.

Indeed, Hollywood has multiple power rails (of course). We haven't tried sequencing them in odd ways, so it might be something to watch. Still, I have a hard time believing they latch onto the chip for programming - especially since they have tons of testpoints! There are no testpoints for the NAND pins. There's still the issue of the NAND output drivers being just drivers. If they're plain CMOS outputs in the silicon (which would be the obvious way to implement drivers like this, since there's no need for tristating), then they simply will not have a tristate mode: as soon as 3.3V is up, they will drive either high or low.

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[marcansoft]

The ARM926EJ-S vectors can either be at 0x00000000 or 0xFFFF0000, depending on the VINITHI configuration line for the processor. Obviously, it's set in this particular hardware implementation. This can be switched at runtime, but the vectors actually stay there on the Wii always, since this is an area of address space only accessible to the Starlet (0x00000000 is actually the beginning of MEM1 and PowerPC territory).

Re:They can probably recover at the repair depot

[DeadCatX2]

Man, I love this stuff. Thanks for chatting with me.

I bring up the bus master stuff because the Cypress FX2 has an embedded 8051, and the 8051 has an I2C bus, but Cypress put some extra logic in the silicon that checks the I2C bus for an EEPROM during boot, and if it finds an EEPROM, it checks a byte, and if that byte is correct, it loads the EEPROM contents into memory.

I was considering maybe there's another logic block that's not on the Wii hardware architecture diagram, that could check for the existence of external storage, and if it found such storage, it could dump the contents to SRAM or NAND. There would be no way to know if this was what happens, except that there would be some brief activity on the peripherals of a dead-boot2 Wii, as the alternative logic interrogated for external storage.

As far as multiple power rails, I can almost assure you that's not how they would do it, because that's quite a dirty way to program a flash chip. If they did do it that way, wouldn't the chip clip leave some subtle marks on the pads or pins of the chip?

I guess I'm just too used to FPGAs. You're right, they wouldn't bother making an ASIC's output tri-state-able if it was never going to be an input. ...maybe they do just pitch the motherboard on broken ones. Some marketing jerk might have done a calculation showing it's cheaper to discard then pay someone to repair.

Two words: Virtual Console

[gmarsh]

I'll fess up. I've got a SD card in my Wii with old NES games, and I run Homebrew Channel and FCE Ultra on my Wii.

Mind you, I own most of the games (SMB games, Mega Man games, TMNT2, etc) on NES cartridges. I do have an old NES, but I just can't be arsed to drag the thing out, wire it up to my TV and spend 10 minutes wiggling cartridges until they work. And I couldn't be arsed to buy games I already own on Virtual Console so I can play them again. Even though they're only $5/game, it's a principle thing.

But not everyone has a closet full of old video game equipment to use as lame justification. And Nintendo is probably losing a good bit of money because of kids telling their friends how to exploit the Wii and install FCE Ultra so that they don't have to buy the Virtual Console games. So, I kinda understand the whole anti-homebrew thing from that direction...

Re:Two words: Virtual Console

[Lumpy]

Losing money... how the hell do you lose money on a game that you made your billions off of 10 years ago?

A pirated copy of Super Mario World on a Wii is ZERO dollars of lost money to Nintendo. Z-E-R-O. It is a lost sale, but it has no loss attached to it as it has been paid for and profit made from it, It's actual cost to the company is $0.00US as it's simply a rom dump. All the old games are a cash cow that leaks 10,000% profit from every sale. They would have eliminated the piracy if they priced them sanely. $1.00 each and everyone would be filling up their Wii with old games. They chose to make them overpriced to simply feed their greed and by doing so they fueled a piracy market for them.

And yes kids a game like Super Mario World is only worth $1.00... They made a crapload on it off the snes, then they made a crapload off it by releasing it for the GBA. They plan on making another crapload off it on the DSi and Wii.. Free money falling from the sky for them.

Re:Two words: Virtual Console

[Golddess]

It's actual cost to the company is $0.00US as it's simply a rom dump.

[citation needed]

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[FictionPimp]

They force you if you want to use the virtual console. Buying VC games only works if you have the latest release.

coke with suger

[Anonymous Coward]

Regional tastes have nothing to do with it.

American sugar producers lobbied and got a protectionist tariff on sugar that increased the cost significantly which made it cheaper for all the soft drink companies to switch to corn syrup. Elsewhere in the world sugar is cheap enough that it can be used with out driving up the cost of the product prohibitively.

My sister went to Korea some years ago and the coke there also was made with sugar. It's pretty much only in the US that corn syrup is used. Heck, in South America they use sugarcane as feed stock for the ethanol plants to produce fuel for cars.

Re:coke with suger

[xtracto]

That, or the fact that The USA has high subsidies for corn.

As a Mexican, I also prefer Sugar-sweetened Cola. I have tried the Corn-version of the drink and it tastes weird. I also read somewhere that cane-sugar is more healthy than corn-syrup [citation needed].

Re:coke with suger

[PitaBred]

Are you sure it was sugar producers? Seems more like something the corn producers would lobby for, to get some subsidies.

Re:coke with suger

[xtracto]

lol :) offense not taken, in fact as a Postdoc dong simulation research in Germany I was laughing at the idea....

mhmmm maybe that is more profitable!

Re:coke with suger

[Ardeaem]

in fact as a Postdoc dong simulation research in Germany....

How's dong simulation in Germany? I've heard the US is years behind Europe in that field...

Re:coke with suger

[SleazyRidr]

No, it was the American sugar producers who wanted tariffs applied to imported sugar so it wouldn't be any cheaper than sugar grown in the USA. That and the corn subsidies work together to make corn syrup cheaper than sugar.
 
(This isn't a statement of fact, merely the most likely scenario given the information I have to hand.)

Re:coke with suger

[VoltageX]

Here's the citation
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/healthreport/stories/2007/2104024.htm

Fructose actually is a hepato-toxin; now fructose is fruit sugar but we were never designed to take in so much fructose. Our consumption of fructose has gone from less than half a pound per year in 1970 to 56 pounds per year in 2003.

Re:coke with suger

[adolf]

Go look around. Even here in Ohio, every decent-sized grocery store (except for Wal-Mart) has imported Mexican Coca-Cola on its shelves, made with real sugar. It's stocked next to the tortillas, not the other soft drinks.

Maximize utility, please.

[yamfry]

I just don't understand why a company would expend those kinds of resources to do something that provides nobody with a positive benefit. Nintendo really needs to reallocate some of the resources they're spending trying to stop people from modding their system into investing in good games. Maybe then then my Wii would serve a purpose other than dust collection.

Re:Maximize utility, please.

[ThePhilips]

I just don't understand why a company would expend those kinds of resources to do something that provides nobody with a positive benefit.

Nintendo sells SDK to publishers. Publishers might get pissed that they fork money to Nintendo over something that anybody can get off the net for free.

I haven't heard any other remotely justifiable reason.

Nintendo really needs to reallocate some of the resources they're spending trying to stop people from modding their system into investing in good games.

Well, they haven't yes made a single game with e.g. "Hyper" prefix. Rest was already sequelled, hashed, resequelled and rehased countless times to death.

Some people (me including) question whether Nintendo is capable of coming with something at all. WiiSport* seem to be an exception - Nintendo hadn't expected it to succeed at all. So they do not know what to do with the new accidentally acquired audience nor with piles of money they earned unexpectedly.

Re:Maximize utility, please.

[RobDude]

I am a computer programmer by trade, but I don't have any real experience in the 'gaming' world. But, I have looked at the SDKs and tools made available by the wii HomeBrew community and....while it's really cool and impressive that a small group of people took it upon themselves to build all this....it's also kind of crappy compared to other SDKs.

I have to assume that the wii SDK is many, many, many times better than anything freely available.

I'm not trying to knock the home brew community at all, in fact, I'm really in awe of what they've done; but look at the games home brew games that are out there through the Home Brew Channel. Poorly done ports of games that are open source (like doom and quake that both play poorly on the wii) and originally done games like 'pong' and 'animation of a fire'.

So yeah - maybe to some suits upstairs at Nintendo are upset over it...but mostly...I don't see it as threat.

Re:Maximize utility, please.

[babyrat]

I just don't understand why a company would expend those kinds of resources to do something that provides nobody with a positive benefit.

Clearly Nintendo thinks there is a benefit to doing so. Perhaps you or others can't see what that is, but if there were no perceived benefits, they wouldn't be doing it now, would they?

Re:Maximize utility, please.

[bluefoxlucid]

Zelda, Metroid, Mario, you know, the franchises. These are decent. Zelda and Metroid are starting to include some slowly forming solid storyline, becoming more dramatic as time goes by and trying to establish a continuity. Mario's just a toy mostly. They've got a handle on Smash Bros. (one on N64, one on GameCube, one on Wii) and Mario Kart (same, but start with SNES and include DS), because these aren't pump-and-grind cash sluts like Pokemon and only need one rubber-stamp formula clone per console.

Nintendo needs a solid RPG is what... like Final Fantasy or Star Ocean. These are games that have no continuity, but they just write a fresh story up and come up with some unique game mechanics. They're trying with Zelda and Metroid, and doing a good job of it; but with the strong series continuity, it's hard to work a new story element in. In both cases, they've created and destroyed elements of the entire universe for a story arc-- with Zelda, they cut off access to the Twilight Realm (and the newly introduced character Midna, though Zelda occurs over a huge time span anyway) in the same game they created it; while in Metroid, they destroyed all Phazon after that story arc.

Mind you in the case of Zelda, you could always find a new way in/out of the Twilight Realm (Zant/Ganondorf found a way out other than the destroyed path); while in Metroid... Phaaze was a living planet that reproduced, in a very distant part of the galaxy; why would it use wormholes both exclusively to seed distant worlds, and to only seed worlds in a certain sector very close to each other? This seems stupid, it has to be older than just 50 years, and has probably created others before. Still, the story will eventually become stale...

This is the reasoning for both Zelda's wide spread and immortal antagonist and Final Fantasy's reluctance to continue a story. Telling the same story over and over is boring. Each scenario follows the only format we like: good guy, bad guy, conflict (do you want to play an RPG about working together for a greater good with no particular evil in the world? Dragon Warrior Monsters?). The characters and events develop in interesting ways, which makes Tales of Symphonia totally different from Final Fantasy 6 and Star Ocean. We can revisit occasionally, when we have a useful extension of the story to tell; but we can't grind out the same story, same land, same people, again and again, just busting shit up.

Re:Maximize utility, please.

[ThePhilips]

I hate to give the example, but nothing better comes to my mind.

Check out the Japanese anime. You would find that lots of them are similar - yet all of them are different. There are piles and piles of good stories - and interesting worlds with intriguing characters.

Why the hell Nintendo (and people like you) can't get over the Mushroom Kingdom/etc is beyond me. It's not like there was a shortage of good writers there.

Right now Nintento franchises - pretty much all of them - look like a continuation of an endless soap opera with the same setting, same characters and same story. Worst part for gamers: same game play. Yes, they revive fond memories of childhood. No, I want more new memories: I do not like to be stuck at the same place and same time forever.

Re:Maximize utility, please.

[bluefoxlucid]

Brand loyalty. The franchises based around a character rather than a name. Final Fantasy can tack on to anything done by Square, most often cited Final Fantasy Mystic Quest; whereas something like The Legend of Zelda is tied to its characters and setting, the world it's in. We think of Hyruel, or of the Galactic Federation of Planets and space pirates and Samus Aran, or of Mario and the Mushroom Kingdom when we think of these games. They can't hand us anything new without an entirely new franchise (see: Golden Sun, Wii Sports/Fit).

Look at what Nintendo publishes. They don't have an established formula brand like Final Fantasy; they establish characters and worlds, and use them. They deviated and made an awesome RPG called Golden Sun; if they make another one, it has to be called something other than Golden Sun (or be a continuation of the interrupted story, as with the new Golden Sun). They can't just keep slapping Final Fantasy on unrelated games (not that this is a bad formula; it's just a built-up brand loyalty over a name, so the marketing's easier).

Think about it. I might miss some random RPGs like Arc the Lad or Star Ocean. But if I don't have every single Final Fantasy, I'm missing a progression in a non-connected series. If Nintendo has a bunch of random non-branded games, you're not missing anything; but if you miss a Zelda game, you're missing a Zelda game. That can be quantified, and that's the draw they don't have; they don't want to establish any such thing at the moment, so we don't have $GENERIC_RPG_SERIES_BY_NINTENDO showing up all under the same name, or any sort of fighting/racing/whatever games on this same strategy. Pushing new-name products is also hard (Nintendo didn't expect the success of Wii Sports, they expected it to be a bundle package that people barely played, but it took off and now they have Wii Play/Wii Sports Resort following up on the buzz all over the net).

How About Punkbuster Instead?

[Kartoffel]

How about some anti-cheat measures? Playing online Mario Kart is still fun, but it is less fun when there's some griefer with infinite red shells.

Re:How About Punkbuster Instead?

[Tsujiku]

Why on Earth would they let the client control its own inventory in an online game?

Re:How About Punkbuster Instead?

[Yosho]

Why on Earth would they let the client control its own inventory in an online game?

Because it's less work for their server, which has to coordinate matches between thousands of players at once, and they didn't even think that some players might try to cheat. It's a pretty common symptom of console game developers making online games; they're simply not used to having to think about security.

Re:How About Punkbuster Instead?

[Clomer]

I agree. I used to play Mario Kart online a lot. Several sessions a week, at least.

The cheating started slowly at first. And initially, I wasn't even completely sure if it was, in fact, cheating, or if the people playing were just getting lucky. I wasn't seeing anything that couldn't be legitimately explained through the game's normal mechanics, even if I was seeing suspicious behavior more and more often. The kicker, though, happened the last time I played, which was about a month ago: someone pegged me with a red shell right off the starting line. Well before we reached any items on the course.

I didn't stick around. When that happened, I knew for a fact that there was cheating going on. I immediately powered off the Wii, and I haven't been back into online Mario Kart play since.

I would pay money to get an update to Mario Kart Wii that removes cheating.

Re:How About Punkbuster Instead?

[tokul]

How about some anti-cheat measures? Playing online Mario Kart is still fun, but it is less fun when there's some griefer with infinite red shells.

Ask your game manufacturer why number of shells is counted on client and not on server.

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[master5o1]

I'm more worried about when they'll force me to upgrade by way of "this game requires the latest system menu update" blah blah. Will my launch date Aus/NZ Wii with Boot2v2 and the forced update mean that I will be bricked? Probably. Quite simple, this is bad. I'm just hoping that Team Twiizers or some other respectable homebrew developer(s) can release something that will sufficiently upgrade one's Boot2 to Boot2v4 so that when it comes to a forced upgrade by way of game DVD it doesn't use Nintendo's shitty upgrade code that (as said in TFA, Summary, etc) would likely brick my Wii.

I'm glad that Marcan got this on slashdot. I was reading all about this for the last 6 hours :| Had nothing else to do, why not :|

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[chuckymonkey]

Just buy the game, put it somewhere out of the way and download the ripped version. Or you could even rip it yourself. Little extra effort, but you get to do what you want with something you bought.

It's not about the users

[gr8_phk]

The purpose of the "DRM" stuff has nothing to do with homebrew and possibly nothing to do with copy protection. It's to make sure companies have to pay Nintendo to get their games on the machine. If you can run whatever you want, then nothing is stopping you from running commercial software that isn't giving it's cut to Nintendo. They're not trying to stop users, they're making sure they get paid for commercial titles.

Re:It's not about the users

[tepples]

They're not trying to stop users, they're making sure they get paid for commercial titles.

That'd be OK, but they're also making sure that all titles are commercial. Unlike with Apple's app store, there isn't a way for part-time developers to release an app for free through Wii Shop Channel.

I don't get it....

[Anonymous Coward]

Why are so many companies so upset over the concept of modding their equipment? The worst that will happen is that more software will be created to use it meaning more reason to buy it meaning more sales for Nintendo (Or Sony, Microsoft, XXX...). I have never completely grasped the need companies have to close off their hardware to people who just want to write software for it... (Are you listening Apple?).

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[loutr]

I bet these games are still playable in a pirated form though...

I'm getting sick of this cat and mouse game. Can't they just realize that piracy will always be around, move on and try to compel people into buying games instead of pissing them off ?

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[syousef]

Wii forces you to update as well through some (first party) games. Mario Kart or Wii Fit for instance won't run if you don't install the updates included on their discs. So if you don't stay up to date, you will lock yourself out of an increasing number of games for the platform.

Just don't buy a Wii. Or any other machine that forces anti-customer upgrades.

Alas

[MonsterTrimble]

Although I applaud the BootMii people and their work, sadly I cannot try it out on my Wii.My wife would kill me.

Re:Alas

[Errtu76]

There's really no risk if you do exactly (!!!) what they say in the installation guide(s). I use bannerbomb in combination with the hackmii installer and all is fine.

Re:Alas

[marcansoft]

For what it's worth, I've yet to hear any report of a Wii being bricked by the HackMii installer (or any other prior versions, including the old standalone Homebrew Channel installer). So far, as far as we know, 100% of the Wiis bricked via "homebrew" have in fact been bricked via either dodgy piracy tools (the people behind them seem to go for insta-releasing to become famous, instead of actually doing that old thing called QA and Testing and doing things like checking error codes) or by people doing stupid silly things like modding their System Menu.

Wii without the discs

[chrysrobyn]

My Google skills have obviously been waning. I did some searching for a way to play Wii games without the discs and never came up with anything. Is Hack Mii the best way to do this? I honestly don't care about homebrew, but my kids destroy optical discs. Heck, last week, my son tried to put Lego Batman in the drive while Wii Fitness Resort was in and now the optical drive itself is dead (go AmEx extended warranty!). Will Hack Mii allow me to take titles I bought (I own over 20) and drop at least a few commonly used ones to a USB drive, preferably flash?

I looked around Hack Mii, and there's a certain vocabulary that's already assumed. I think I'm most interested in WiiTools / Wiiso, but WiiUpdateManager seems relevant too. Can anybody tell me if there's a simple app I can run (after installing Hack Mii) to image off a disc to a USB stick or an SD card?

Re:Wii without the discs

[chrysrobyn]

Frustrating answer, but thanks for the googlebait quotes.

Re:Wii without the discs

[Blakey Rat]

Christ.

People: when you use that font iPhones can't read your fucking post! Yes I know it's Slaahdots fault for having shitty CSS, but could you please stop going put of your way to make your posts less readable? It's a gigantic pain in the ass.

Re:Wii without the discs

[clone53421]

What font, and why are you blaming the CSS?

Re:Wii without the discs

[Blakey Rat]

Try viewing his post on an iPhone. I don't have a PC handy so I have no clue what it's supposed to look like. And if it's not a CSS rule makig the font unreadable, that's an even bigger WTF.

The real point is, just hit reply and start typing. Slashdot looks shitty enough without posters tinkering with the fonts.

Re:Wii without the discs

[marcansoft]

I didn't use a single tag in that post. I'm not sure what you're talking about. I think you're confusing a bad Slashdot/D2 vs. Safari interaction with people messing with fonts.

I'd test it but my iPhone's screen is currently cracked.

Re:Wii without the discs

[clone53421]

It looks no different from any other post on the PC, and I don't have an iPhone to test it with.

Re:Wii without the discs

[Blakey Rat]

Eh, you're probably right, even though I have Slashdot set not to give me D2, it always seems to "sneak in" somehow. God this site is fucking buggy.

Apologies. I thought you were doing like the guy further up the thread and setting your post to the typewriter font. (Which is also unreadable on iPhones.) I should have replied to his post.

Re:Wii without the discs

[RobDude]

"Waninkoko has released a new build of his SD/USB backup loader for the Wii. This loader will allow you to play backups from an on screen menu using a USB mass storage device or SD card."

^^^^ That should get you on your way. I'm a big fan of not having to use physical disks to play games and when I heard the USB hard-drive would load games faster than the physical disks - I totally wanted to do it.

It didn't work for me though. When I ran it - it didn't recognize my USB drive. The advice I was given was 'Umm, try another USB drive' but I only have the one. Lots of people have more luck.

All of the HomeBrew stuff is....well....buggy. The back-up loaders work pretty good; but not perfectly - so some games don't work and some games fail at certain spots. So, it can be very frustrating if you don't sort of enjoy the headaches and searching the web and trying different things to get the game to work.

Re:Wii without the discs

[marcansoft]

You're confusing homebrew with warez. Homebrew usually works pretty well, and HBC has a near zero chance of bricking your console. Applicaions vary in functionality and robustness, but they're safe since they're just applications that won't modify your console.

Loaders, on the other hand, besides typically illegal (they like to ship around chunks of IOS), are very dodgy and unreliable. System modification is required to install loaders, so it's an inherently risky activity. About 50% of the reports of permanent bricks I get from people are due to using Waninkoko's stuff. Stay far away, he never learned what that 'int' thing before function prototypes is for.

Re:Wii without the discs

[RobDude]

Homebrew is home-made software. Homebrew for the wii is software for the wii that wasn't produced by an officially licensed source.

When someone writes a 'loader' that loader is a homebrew application. Whether or not it is available via the homebrew channel.

The homebrew applications I've used (media players, and emulators) were all quite buggy and have locked up my wii many times. The usb loader I've got also seems buggy as it fails to recognize my USB drive. But either way, nothing about a loader requires warez...you can own the software legitimately and want to run it from the USB.

Re:Wii without the discs

[marcansoft]

Although there have been endless debates about the true effect of piracy on sales, they're all irrelevant. Reality doesn't mater, coporate opinion matters, and coporate opinion is (of course) that piracy harms sales, and that piracy must be eliminated. Blatantly associating homebrew with piracy is a great way to get targeted more often. We're not out to help Nintendo or hurt them, we just want to do our thing and we don't want to have anything to do with warez.

Nevermind that the people behind piracy tools are freeloading idiots who love to violate source licenses and produce tools of incredibly poor quality. I wouldn't touch their tools with a 10 foot pole, and I certainly don't want to be associated with them.

Re:Wii without the discs

[marcansoft]

At Wiibrew we usually use the term Homebrew for homebrew software, excluding tools developed by and for pirates. I am well aware that those tools can and are used by people with legitimate backups, but that is a minority usage and associating homebrew with those tools gives homebrew a bad name. This is why such tools are not allowed on Wiibrew.

By referring to software stability I was referring to stability affecting system safety. Sure, lots of homebrew is buggy, but it's safe. Piracy utilities on the other hand do nasty stuff to your system all the time, they're buggy, and they brick lots of people's Wiis. I'm talking about safety-critical bugs here.

Re:Wii without the discs

[RobDude]

I can understand the desire for 'more ethical' homebrew developers to separate themselves from the 'less ethical' homebrew developers.

But, it's an awfully subjective scale.

I can download emulators for lots and lots of consoles from the HBC that will let me load console games from my USB device (or my network share) and play that game on my wii.

I don't see much distinction from that and an application that lets me load wii console games from my USB device and play those games on my wii.

In either case, those things can be used to play games that people don't have a legal right to play...or they can be played by people who own the game/have paid for the game - but don't want to.

And, in either case, you have to take very, very specific, non trivial tasks to get your wii to run them. It's quite clear that Nintendo did not intend any of those things to be on the wii and the steps required to do those things have the potential to brick your wii/void your warranty.

So to me, don't see a difference between the HomeBrewChannel that lets me download/install a program so I can play SNES games off my USB drive than the USB Loader that lets me play WII games off my USB drive.

Re:Wii without the discs

[marcansoft]

I think there's a significant difference between a tool that lets you play games on their native console using possibly slightly more convenient methods while enabling all sorts of piracy, and a tool that imperfectly emulates an older console and lets you play games that you may or may not own. I also consider that people should have the right to emulate their old, store-bought games on a Wii without having to rebuy them as Virtual Console. Being able to play older games on a Wii is a significantly larger advantage than being able to play Wii games (that already work) from DVD-R or USB.

It's a line, you have to draw it somewhere. Wiibrew draws it there.

Re:Wii without the discs

[CandyKisses]

I have never had any issues with the Homebrew Channel. I think the only issues I ever had were with warez, like marcansoft said. As far as updating is concerned, I just avoid it all together on the Wii. The updates are usually just to install another way to make the system mods and hacks fail. I learned my lesson the first time I updated after utilizing the Twilight hack. :-\

homebrew

[Errtu76]

I can understand why Nintendo doesn't want Homebrew to be installed, but to target it specifically when releasing an update that should be fixing bugs instead of introducing ones? Anyway, i'm still running 3.2 with homebrew and don't see any reason why i should update my Wii. All the games i bought (yes, that's not a typo) are running fine and i can also play nice homebrew games. I'm not a fan of "if it aint broken, don't try to fix it" but this time i agree with it though.

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[marcansoft]

If Nintendo aren't idiots, they'll ditch the idea of putting boot2v4 on discs. They can still throw the rest of the 4.2 update on them with no ill consequences to unmodified consoles.

Re:Arbitrary code?

[marcansoft]

If they don't like it, they're idiots. They make a profit on Wiimotes, why would they be against using them on computers?

Region locking can help consumers

[langelgjm]

The only real advantages to region locking are for the producer of the product. They can put up different price points for different markets and prevent consumers from tapping into a different market (region).

Depends on how you look at it. If the manufacturer can't price discriminate between different market segments, they will price the product beyond the reach of a lot of people who might want it. In that case, region locking can actually help the (poorer) consumer, since they will be able to purchase a product that otherwise would have been too expensive for them. Meanwhile the manufacturer avoids the risk of arbitrage.

At least, that is how it's supposed to work in theory. In reality region locking is used for a lot more than price discrimination, and it's just pointless and annoying when the product isn't even sold in multiple regions.

Re:Region locking can help consumers

[tepples]

If the manufacturer can't price discriminate between different market segments, they will price the product beyond the reach of a lot of people who might want it.

Anyone know why the version for the most expensive region isn't just marked for "all regions"?

Re:Region locking can help consumers

[Rich0]

Meanwhile the manufacturer avoids the risk of arbitrage

Which is exactly why this practice should either be banned, or outsourcing to low-wage nations should be banned.

Manufacturers want laws that:

1. Make workers with different income levels completely interchangable.
2. Make products sold to people with different income levels completely non-interchangable.

Anybody else see an inconsistency?

Re:Region locking can help consumers

[Reservoir Penguin]

Are you saying that dvd's sold in poor regions are sold at a loss, like a charity? If not, and they are still making a profit then why not offer the same low price in first world countries? being greedy is not a virtue.

Re:You lose, I win!

[Jaysyn]

Your = you're

How old?

[tepples]

Anonymous Coward wrote:

Kids and CD/DVDs do not mix very well! Sure you can rant and scream at them, not to mess the discs up but they will sooner or later.

How old are these kids? I have younger cousins who visit my house every other weekend, and I just didn't let them touch game discs until they were old enough to understand "you break it, and I'll put away the Wii". That works even on a new console that hasn't yet been cracked for homebrew and piracy.

Updated failed on me last night

[drinkypoo]

Good thing I guess, since I have HBC installed. Before I tried the update I updated HBC and DVDx; since then I have installed BootMii IOS version but HBC doesn't seem to want to load it. (the new HBC is faster, though, that's nice.)

Anyone know why IOS BootMii might not show up on HBC?

they convinced me

[amoeba1911]

I had a modded Wii and I was prolifically downloading Wii games for free from all kinds of pirate sites at Nintendo's expense. It all changed as soon as this patch came out, it suddenly turned me from being a dirty pirate to a legitimate customer! My pockets which had previously been devoid of anything other than pocket lint are now somehow filled with cash that just materialized out of thin air. I use that money to buy games legitimately, giving the company the profits it deserves. Their share prices have quadrupled in the past 3 hours. The company is worth more than Microsoft now. Hot Japanese anime girls are waiting to blow all of the company executives who came up with this wonderful anti-piracy patch that fixed everything.

This is what they've been waiting to hear... let's lie a little bit so they can feel good about wasting millions of dollars on this patch.

Re:they convinced me

[bluefoxlucid]

Better question: Why haven't they DMCA'd WiiBrew?

Re:they convinced me

[DNS-and-BIND]

Telegram from the real world: if you don't have any money, then you're not Nintendo's customer and they are not sad at all to see you go. In my business, I get people who just aren't in the category that I serve. They ain't my customer and it's not a good idea to spend any time or money on them (and in business, time is money.) It's a cold, cruel world out there.

PS Nintendo executives don't watch cartoon shows. Try golf instead.

How to get around Disc Channel's update requiremen

[tepples]

How to get around Disc Channel's update requirement

If it's bricked and they Nintendo can't recover it

[nedlohs]

short of replacing the motherboard...

can they tell a modded Wii from an unmodded wii once it has bricked?

WiiSCU

[tepples]

You're not required to install it, but Wii Shop (which is online) won't work unless you

...use WiiSCU to update only Wii Shop Channel and Wii Shop Channel's IOS files, not the Wii Menu.

MAME

[sorak]

I suspect that region locking is the big fish, but you could put several emulators on a hacked wii. This could cut down on the money they make from people buying classic games from the Wii store.

Wii vs. Mac mini?

[tepples]

I have the Homebrew Channel installed and it's great fun to play a few things on, plus occasionally turn the Wii into a media player.

But how is a Wii console better than a Mac mini or a slim PC running Windows for these tasks?

Re:Wii vs. Mac mini?

[Nursie]

Umm, it's far, far cheaper and I already have one set up under the tv.

I don't want to go spending more money when I already have something with a tv output, an optical drive and wireless networking. It doesn't do it better. It does it at the same time as being a wii and for no more money.

PAL60

[tepples]

Not just "may differ from the PAL version", but "may not work with and may even damage your TV".

Then PAL games should run in 60 Hz if they detect an NTSC console. A lot of video games can already run in a 60 Hz variant of PAL. A few games, such as the Metroid Prime games for GameCube, can only run in PAL60. The only noticeable differences are the color subcarrier frequency and phase, and that's only for composite and S-Video, not interlaced component, progressive component, VGA, DVI, or HDMI. As far as I know, if you try displaying a PAL60 signal on an NTSC TV, you'll get a perfectly formed black-and-white signal. So why can't a game designed for PAL60 run in NTSC, other than artificial market segmentation?

Re:PAL60

[TheThiefMaster]

The game only chooses 50 or 60 Hz. As far as it is concerned, there is no PAL/NTSC.

It's not like it makes any difference to the texture formats etc.

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[L4t3r4lu5]

Disconnect it from the web and enjoy the product at its prime?

If this patch bricks both hacked and stock Wii's, you're entering a lottery with the update no matter what you do.

When does it brick?

[stillnotelf]

I didn't understand from TFA - when does the bricking occur? I have no homebrew (and no interest in it). I installed 4.2 last night, and the console worked fine at the time. I haven't turned it back on since playing immediately after the 4.2 update (although I assume the update caused a reboot). When does this bricking occur? Only immediately after the update? Or is there a small chance of it occurring every time I turn the Wii on from now until they fix it?

Re:When does it brick?

[daid303]

It doesn't have to brick, but the boot2 update software from nintendo is not failure proof. There is a small chance that it fails during the update and then you're left with a useless Wii. If your update was successful then there is nothing to worry about anymore.

Re:When does it brick?

[stillnotelf]

That's what I was hoping! Thanks!

Re:Maximal ignorance exposed and explained.

[VGPowerlord]

You are totally clueless.

Operating profit per console of $6, for a console that costs $250 is 2.4%. Operating profit is calculated before interest costs and taxes. Depending on Japanese taxes this might be (let's be very generous) a contribution of 2%. If you can put money in the bank and receive 0.5%, then a risky gamble of 2% return, or less than that when dividends are taxed, is idiotic. Hence, following those rules Nintendo would not have been able to fund production in the first place because nobody would have given them money. And all of that assumes Nintendo has zero debt incurred to fund production. In fact, it also ignores that projects that succeed must cover the cost of all projects that fail.

Wait, you're calling this guy clueless? Have you ever noticed the price trend in technology components?

Nintendo made $6 per Wii... in September 2006. Technology prices fall rapidly, so it was certainly higher than that in 2007, 2008, and 2009. Nintendo managed to keep the Wii the same price for three years, before finally dropping it to $200 five days ago.

For comparison, Microsoft was losing $71 per unit on the $399 Xbox 360 in at launch in 2005. By the end of 2006, the same model was now at break-even.

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[Spykk]

Simply update your copy of the homebrew channel. The latest version will not be removed by 4.2. Nintendo simply looks for a channel with the homebrew channel's ID to decide what to remove. The latest version has a different ID.

Colour me naive then

[Nursie]

Because I just use the homebrew channel for quake and media playing.

Re:How to get around Disc Channel's update require

[Golddess]

That counts as "doing something to your Wii".

Re:If it's bricked and they Nintendo can't recover

[daid303]

Only if they rip off the flash chips to read them, but that would be lots of work. But maybe they will rip them off to recover your VC/WiiWare games. And notice the HBC at the same time.

Re:Could this be why my Wii acts wierd ?

[RobDude]

There are options in the wii system menu that let you turn off 'wiiConnect24'

Re:You lose, I win!

[Jaysyn]

The more you guys bitch about it, the more I fall in love with it. :D

Re:If it's bricked and they Nintendo can't recover

[marcansoft]

They just reauthorize those games online on your new console (via the serial numbers). When the system is totally bricked you lose your saves. They only notice homebrew or warez when they get "bricked" consoles that display an error message (which indicates System Menu operation), which they can usually fix by reinstalling stuff with their rescue mode DVDs and a small "flag" tool inserted into a memory card slot to put the menu into recovery mode.

Re:You lose, I win!

[hezekiah957]

You remind me of Flawless at the Rock Band forums; a huge dickhead who manages to stay enough within the rules to avoid a ban. And now that The Price Is Right is over, I'm going to go accomplish something today. Have fun finding someone else to argue with.

Re:Maximal ignorance exposed and explained.

[DECS]

Microsoft also set aside that special $1,150,000,000 fund for repairing those loss leader Xbox 360s. Across the less than 12 million units it had shipped up to that point, that means the company dropped nearly another $100 per unit. Return rates were over 50% at one point, and are still fairly high.

Compared to that scale of money loss (and Sony's expensive effort to promote BluRay via the PS3), Nintendo's tiny Wii hardware profits look phenomenal. But they're still very thin margins and depend upon software licensing deals to make it worth doing.

--

Why Apple is betting on Light Peak with Intel: a love story

Re:Could this be why my Wii acts wierd ?

[Beardo the Bearded]

That means there's a message waiting for you. It might be a system update, it might be an incoming email from a friend.

Usually it's Nintendo advertising something.

I'm confused...

[Mysticalfruit]

Has anybody had to send a Wii back to NoA and then been told "You've got to pay for us to repair this?"

I'm suspecting that if you called them and said "I started the update for the latest firmware, and now the Wii won't turn on, your update broke our Wii!" That Nintendo would likely do the right thing and replace/repair your Wii.

Now, if they don't, I think someone should go to the media and tear them a new one in the court of public opinion. Just remember how quickly Microsoft changed their policy when the nightly news started reporting "Xbox 360's are breaking all the time and MS isn't fixing them!!!"

With that all said, I'm glad I haven't updated my Wii and now I won't!

Re:I'm confused...

[marcansoft]

Nintendo has been known to ask for 210 EUR (that's over current retail price now!) to repair a Wii that they've determined had homebrew installed, even if it was in warranty. They can't really tell if the console is completely bricked, though, only if enough of the software is functional to let their rescue discs boot.

Re:You lose, I win!

[Jaysyn]

Was I arguing with you?  You were the AC asshat above?  Well good on you for growing a set & abandoning the cowardly AC moniker!

Price of a Wii vs. a PC

[tepples]

If you want to do homebrew games, buy something open, like a PC.

I recommend this option too. But it has one drawback: The PC you already own is likely to have Voodoo3-class integrated graphics and more importantly isn't within a cable's reach of your TV. Buying a Wii, an SD card, and a copy of LEGO Indiana Jones ($259) is cheaper than spending $429[1] on a new slim PC with a gaming video card and an SDTV adapter, and I gather that more people already own a Wii than already own a spare slim gaming PC.

[1] Dell Inspiron 537s with Pentium E5200 CPU, ATI Radeon HD 3450 graphics, WLAN card, and Windows Home Premium, for U.S. market.

They are no better than Crapple

[kimvette]

They're no better than Crapple. After the OS 3.1 update release removed tethering (even from officially unlocked phones) the issue has been getting hot on Apple's discussion boards. The thread keeps shrinking as people continue to discuss the issue. Apple is no better than Nintendo when it comes to not wanting to deal with user issues, but choose to instead censor them and ignore them.

Maybe Apple and Nintendo should merge. It's a marriage made in Hell! :)

One big problem I see is Nintendo is pushing out buggy software and then demanding $85 to fix it on out-of--warranty devices. Let me repeat: they are pushing defective software out, in effect vandalizing customers' product, and then requiring those customers pay $85 to fix their f$#&-up. How the hell is that not extortion?

How to fix your Wii for FREE

[MasaMuneCyrus]

(1) Delete all homebrew and uninstall Bootmii
(2) Update
(3) If Bricked, e-mail Nintendo
(4) Nintendo will ship you a box to mail your bricked Wii back to them
(5) When Nintendo finds no homebrew, they will send you a new Wii for free
(6) Reinstall all homebrew, Bootmii on brand new Wii
(7) ???
(8) PROFIT

Of course, if you Wii is already bricked with homebrew on it, you're out of luck. But then again, why in the world would you update your Wii with homebrew on it without checking to see what the new update does first?

Re:How to fix your Wii for FREE

[commodore64_love]

Step 4 is where you procedure falls apart. Nintendo is not going to give you a new Wii. They'll just say "too bad so sad; it's not under warranty" and leave you with your brick.

Re:Could this be why my Wii acts wierd ?

[kimvette]

Much like the myCube, that light confirms that it's off. ;)

Three words: Clean your cartridges

[tepples]

I just can't be arsed to drag the [NES, Super NES, or N64] out, wire it up to my TV and spend 10 minutes wiggling cartridges until they work.

You can spend an order of magnitude less time wiggling if you spend one minute with a cotton swab and a bottle of rubbing alcohol. With a properly cleaned cartridge, it shouldn't take more than 30 seconds to start, which is about how long it takes to line up the Sensor Bar, navigate through the Wii Menu, and start the VC channel that you bought.

Re:You lose, I win!

[rtufano]

Holy shit. How old are you Jaysyn, five? Instead of spamming "I WIN, YOU SUCK" etc etc, why not come up with a rebuttal for his argument? You're just doing yourself a disservice and coming off as sociopathic, immature and unintelligent. Instead of name calling and all of that bullshit, why not come up with a rebuttal?

Re:Maximal ignorance exposed and explained.

[Chris Burke]

Operating profit is also a defined accounting term, which uses current costs by definition. Operating profit does not take into account costs before the relevant period. Hence, all those designers, marketers and engineers whose jobs it was to design a winning console which eventually ended up in the shape of the Wii? Yeah, previously incurred costs are by definition not included in an operating profit calculation. So thanks for linking to the site, it just shows how clueless you are.

Yes, obviously.

Nobody is saying "The Wii is sold at an (operating) profit, therefore the Entire Wii Project is profitable, and Nintendo has made a profit off of Wii sales".

No. What "sold at an operating profit" means that if they sold enough Wiis, they could pay off the previously incurred costs of R&D and factory tooling etc. Because selling a Wii pays for making the Wii and then some.

Selling at an operating loss like Sony does (or at least did at launch) means you cannot pay off previously incurred costs, because selling the PS3 does not even pay for making it.

That's the difference, that's what "operating profit" means, and that's what people mean when they say "The Wii is sold at a profit".

And because Nintendo always sells their hardware at an operating profit, they were able to make a net profit off of even relatively unsuccessful projects like the Gamecube and N64. The Virtual Boy, on the other hand, was most likely not a profitable project, but I guarantee you the VB itself was sold at a profit and thus could have been profitable based on hardware sales alone (if anyone had bought the POS).

Re:You lose, I win!

[Jaysyn]

His argument?  What argument?  Saying that the Nintendo doesn't make a profit on each & every Wii sold isn't an argument when Nintendo has publicly stated on several occasions that the opposite is true.  He's just ranting along in a true moron fashion.

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2006/09/7752.ars

"We will make a profit on the entire Wii proposition out of the boxâ€"hardware and software," according to Fils-Aime."

http://www.nforcershq.com/nintendo-wii-system-and-games-markup-details/

"Nintendo has stated that it will make a profit on every system sold, which is not the modern day norm where the system is the loss-leader. So clearly, Nintendoâ€(TM)s cost to produce, package, and ship the Wii is less than $237.50."

http://www.forbes.com/2008/11/28/nintendo-wii-wii2-tech-personal-cz-cs-1201wii.html

"But here's the winning point: Unlike its competitors, Nintendo has figured out how to make money from its console sales. Sony loses money on each Playstation sold. Microsoft might just break even. But every Wii brings in $6 of operating profit for Nintendo, says David Gibson, an analyst at Macquarie Securities."

Operating Profit = Operating Revenue - Operating Expenses

There is no argument.  The jackass you are defending is stating that somehow a profit isn't a profit.  I rebutted this before he even posted.

A 5 year old with a ~200k UID would be a neat trick however.

Re:Maximal ignorance exposed and explained.

[Jaysyn]

Thank you Chris, you phrased that much more succinctly than ever could.

Re:Maximal ignorance exposed and explained.

[Jaysyn]

Aw, give him a break.  Like he said, he's unemployed & still in school, i.e. has no real-world experience with stuff like this.

I'm glad they did the NES lock-out chip

[JimTheta]

The Atari 2600 crashed because anyone and his brother could create shitty games, which ended up flooding the market and leaving stores with tons of unsold inventory.

Nintendo's licensing policy that limited publishers to 5 games per year was a wonderful thing, and the lock-out chip was a necessary evil to make that happen. Did crap still come out? Yes, but much less of it.

Sure, Nintendo's done some dirty stuff (the Game Genie litigation was definitely uncool), but the lockout chip is not something I can hold against them given the era and circumstances.

Re:You lose, I win!

[hezekiah957]

And a ~200k UID not taking every opportunity to crow about it would be even neater.

Plus, I'd think that a 5 year-old would be able to realize that not all Anonymous Cowards are the same person. My first post in this discussion was 29606017. I am, and have been, perfectly aware of the fact that the Wii isn't sold for a loss. Oh, and calling people asshats? Mature.

Re:You lose, I win!

[Jaysyn]

Oh, and calling people asshats? Mature.

Are you fucking kidding me kid?

a huge dickhead who manages to stay enough within the rules to avoid a ban

Do as I say, but you'll whine & moan if I give a taste of your own? Fuck you buddy.

Re:You lose, I win!

[hezekiah957]

Obviously, I was referring to Flawless there. Try again.

Who knew Slashdot could be useful?

[Snarky McButtface]

For some reason I updated my wii today only to find my beloved homebrew was missing. Thanks to Slashdot, I was able to find everything I needed to fix the issue easily.

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[sincewhen]

you will lock yourself out of an increasing number of games for the platform

But don't worry, you can download a hacked version of those new games from the internet!

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[SirAdelaide]

My Wii isn't on the internet and has never wanted to update. All the games have worked from the shop without wanting to update anything, including Wii Fit and Mario Kart.

Holidays? Lots of people live abroad some years.

[PMBjornerud]

It's not just that either - I go on holiday to various places around the planet. Sometimes I go into a music or games shop whilst I'm there and buy one or two things to take home.

Why should I not be able to play them when I get home?

I have lived in Japan, US and now reside in Europe. The idea that I should be required to have separate consoles (or DVD players) to play games for the different periods is utterly ridiculous.

Re:So, as someone with the homebrew channel instal

[taxevader]

That's not entirely true. Simply install GeckOs onto the Wii, insert the disc with the needed update files, and GeckOS will install just the needed IOS files, nothing more. You can then run the game just as if you'd fully updated your system.

I'm still on 3.2 and every single game works, even the ones 'requiring' a system update.