Greg on Games

Today I have some news on Sony and the future of the PSP console. First in PSP news is the PS3 Store

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Today the 2.17 firmware for the PS3 was released. It is a useless update that you do need to download and don’t want to download if you want homebrew and an iso loader on your PS3. Because the update patches all of the exploits that Team ICE found in games such as Motorstorm and Resistance: Fall of Man. So I recommend not updating, unless you really need to go online right this second.

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Here is the update for the PSN across the world. There are some Rock Band songs from Nine Inch Nails and some videos. There’s not much of anything else.

North America

Add-on Game Content

PAIN

Rock Band

*Note: If you previously purchased any of the following Rock Band tracks, newer versions are now available. Visit the PLAYSTATION Store and re-download them from your Download List free of charge. Online play/leaderboards/rankings are not affected by this. You won’t be punished for not downloading them again, however, as these bug fixes have no effect on gameplay.

GUITAR HERO III: Legends of Rock

“Don’t Speak”, “Excuse Me Mr”, “Sunday Morning”

Game Videos

Movie and Blu-ray Disc Trailers

PS3 Themes
PAIN

PS3 Wallpaper

PLAYSTATION Store for PC
Game Videos

Australia and Europe

• Game Trailer
  • Conflict: Denied Ops - Dev Diary #4
  • Haze - Boss Speech

Japan

• Game Add-on
  • Minna No Golf 5
    • Yukino
  • Dark Mist
    • The Depths of Darkness

• Game Trailer
  • Gran Turismo 5 Prologue
  • Armored Core 4 For Answer

• PS One for PS3 / PSP
  • Mahjong from Athena
  • Umjammer Lammy
  • Baroque Syndrome
  • Bowling from Nihon Bussan

• PSP Theme
  • My Stylist

Hong Kong

• Game Trailer
  • Assassin’s Creed - Cello

• PSP Theme
  • My Stylist

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Today the PSN was updated, but sadly there’s nothing to be excited about. Here’s the list:

United States/Canada
Games/Demos:
-PixelJunk Monsters demo
-Jet Moto 3 (PS1) - $5.99

DLC:
Rock Band tracks - $1.99 each:
-Garbage - “Why Do You Love Me?” (master)
-Stone Temple Pilots - “Sex Type Thing” (master)
-Weezer - “El Scorcho” (master)

Trailers:
-Bionic Commando: Rearmed
-Conflict: Denied Ops - “Developer Diary 4″
-MLB08 The Show - “Replay Vault Tutorial”
-MLB08 The Show - “Pitcher Batter Analysis Tutorial”
-MLB08 The Show - “Stolen Base”

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United Kingdom
Games/Demos:
-Lost Planet (online) demo

Trailers:
-Assassin’s Creed - “Developers Diary - Altair”
-Conflict: Denied Ops - “Launch”

Other:
-Devil May Cry 4 wallpaper
-Sport theme
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Japan
Games/Demos:
-50% off of:
-Lemmings
-Super Rubadub
-Super Stardust HD

DLC:
-Toy Home - 2nd Gear expansion - 500 yen

Trailers:
-Bionic Commando: ReArmed
-Devil May Cry 4 - “Interview”
-Lost Planet - “Trailer 2″

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Today I have some news on Sony and the future of the PS3 console

Well first, there is a rumor going around the PS3 about the In-Game XMB and the gamer accomplishment system. A guy named sonyguy32 released six pictures of what he claims to be the In-Game XMB with Warhawk playing in the background. It also shows an accomplishment on the bottom middle. I think this is very possible because the GDC 08 is going on. Here is a link to the picture of it: Click Here

Second in PS3 news is Universal Studios is switching from HD-DVD to Blu-Ray. Also Paramount just switched to Blu-Ray.

Third in PS3 news is Logitech announced their official Driving Force for Gran Turismo 5 Prologue wheel. It is said to bring the look and feel of a real steering wheel. You can even control the brake bias.

Fourth in PS3 news is Team Ice has released their 1.2 version of the PS3 Hack Pack. It now includes: RADTools, Home Beta Exploit EU, HDD Format SELF, Customize your XMB Version 2.0, Motorstorm Exploit US, Resistance Exploit US, Motorstorm Exploit Fix, and Resistance Exploit Fix.

Fifth in PS3 news is Devil May Cry 4 reached more than two million copies in sales.

Sixth in PS3 news is that Red Faction: Guerrilla is connfirmed to come out sometime in 2009 for the PS3, Xbox 360, and PC. It is going to be open-world for the first time. (Is the Wii ever going to get any serious games?)

Seventh in PS3 news is a pack of three Call of Duty 4 maps are coming out soon. Each map is different. One of the maps is going to be wide-open, another is going to be indoor, and another is going to be a different than all of the previous Call of Duty 4 maps.

Eighth is Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) is planning to add new content to US version of Gran Turismo 5 Prologue.

Ninth in PS3 news is Q-Games has released the names of two more Pixeljunk games. They are called PixelJunk Eden and PixelJunk Dungeons. Q-Games is the game studio behind PixelJunk Monsters and PixelJunk Racers.

Tenth in PS3 news is the release date for Sid Meier’s Civilization Revolution has been confirmed for June 6, 2008. It is coming to the Xbox 360, PS3, and DS.

Eleventh in PS3 news is LittleBigPlanet is going to include lip-synching voice chat feature.

Twelveth in PS3 news is Ninja Theory game studio (who is responsible for Heavenly Sword) is working on a new project that is “better than Heavenly Sword.”

Thirteenth in PS3 news is that Free Radical Design (the game studio who made some of the Timesplitters and other games) says that the delays on Haze were a good thing. They say that they added a lot of cool things, but can not say what they are right now.

And last, Sony’s Jack Tretton says that 2008 belongs to Sony.I believe this to be true, because Blu-Ray sales are going to sky-rocket, the PS3 sales overtook the Xbox 360’s numbers of sales. Also Sony is putting 203.5 Million Dollars into funds to learn about, and make medium and large displays of organic light emitting diode (OLED). If Sony can make OLED screens the same or bigger size as LCD or DLP screens, then OLED will eliminate the LCD.

Here’s a video of David Jaffe giving his opinion on Blu-Ray and other things.

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Today I have some news on Microsoft and the future of the Xbox 360 console.

Well first, Microsoft is possibly going to dump their HD-DVD disc format (due to small amounts of sales) in favor of Blu-Ray. Toshiba is already dumping it. Also, Microsoft may release an external and or an internal Blu-Ray drive for the Xbox 360. If this happens, the Xbox 360 will most likely win the console war, since it is almost winning right now, this will boost sales lf the Xbox 360 and Blu-Ray discs.

Also, Microsoft claimed that the Red Ring of Death (aka RROD) is gone due to the new falcon chip, and better manufacturing in new Xbox 360 consoles. But here is a video of a new Xbox 360 console dying, and at a terrible and embarrassing time, because it was at the Microsoft Booth at GDC 08.

Here is the video:

And Microsoft Dreamspark was released for free. The Dreamspark is a free gaming development tool to help students develop almost any game they can think of.

A Magic the Gathering game will be released for PC, Mac, and Xbox Live Arcade.

And finally Gears of War 2 is confirmed to come out during November 2008.

Here is the trailer:

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Today Dream On by Aerosmith was released….for free! This is for a limited time so you should hurry up and download it.

In other Guitar Hero news, Guitar Hero: Aerosmith was announced recently, and is scheduled to be released on June 30, 2008. It will let you play follow the story of Aerosmith’s rise to fame.

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It seems Team ICE is hot on trying to find any possible Sony PlayStation 3 exploits and the team already has several tricks up its sleeves. According to QJ.NET forums user snap006, the team agreed to release the ELF2SELF tool that it uses to run ELF files on the Sony PS3.

ELF2SELF is an exploit that utilizes Resistance: Fall of Man and Motorstorm to run ELF files. As snap006 explained, “The tool allows us to run ELF files via RFOM/MS exploit on the PS3 which can potentially lead to the first ‘Hello World’ on the PS3 if our cards are played right.”

Not long after Team ICE made the .TIFF exploit public, the group released yet another Sony PS3 hacking tool. Does this mean we can expect the first “Hello World” on Sony’s console faster than most would expect? We’re sure to keep tabs on this, so watch this space for updates!

Source

You should visit www.ps3hax.net for downloads and updates on this.

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We hinted on this in previous PS3 Dev postings, but now it deserves a post of its own. We have successfully obtained the decrypted ELF file from an encrypted SELF that we ran, then dumped using the PlayStation 3.

As you can see in the image below, there is an ELF file, totally decrypted from the retail game disc! This removes BOTH the disc layer of encryption on the EBOOT.BIN, as well as the file layer of encryption.

In other recent PS3 Dev news, we have managed to successfully downgrade a PlayStation 3 without utilizing a previous flash dump backup of the console. Normally to downgrade your PS3 you first need a copy of the original firmware (made with Infectus). However our method does not need any flash backup, as it uses the PS3’s updates to downgrade for us.

Keep in mind it’s still a work in progress, but expect additional details on this project as they become available. Look for more information coming this week!

Source

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Recently Team ICE discovered that they could crash a Sony PlayStation 3 using a well-crafted .TIFF (Tagged Image File Format) file loaded in the Sony PS3’s XMB. And the team has released that same .TIFF to the public yesterday, targeted at Sony next-generation consoles running on firmware version 2.10, regardless if it’s PAL or NTSC native.

Similar to past revelations, this .TIFF exploit does cause an overflow, only this one wrought havoc on the Sony PlayStation 3’s heap data area. Some have also noted that the file released contains the words “Tavis Ormandy” in hex code - a misspelling of Travis Ormandy, a member of Google’s Security Team, we speculate - which somehow links this to the .TIFF jailbreaking of the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch, though coincidental.

Team ICE calls it a heap overflow and will permit other aspirant hackers on injecting simple code if they know the backend number and what calls to make. However, they didn’t attempt to test the full potential of the .TIFF exploit because they lack the resources to do so.

But the team made it clear that PlayStation ISOs cannot be played with this exploit - at least not yet. They say that hackers might need Sony’s PlayStation 3 Software Development Kit (SDK) to expand upon this latest exploit and see how far they can push with homebrew development.

Source

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