Consoles Online = Corporate Control (Abuse)

It was only a matter of time before M$ got pissy about mods.

Sony did it in the past and Nintendo as well.

Right now though you can hack a Wii and use ROMs to make your own Virtual Console and since Nintendo's network is worthless for multiplayer you would be missing nothing if they made such a move.

My Wii isn't even connected to the network because I have no use for cryptic friend's codes for every damn game or overpriced ROMs.

XBLive is a great environment and truly the best of all the consoles as far as community, content, GUI, etc. You can play 360 without it but the experience is so drab that M$ is hoping they force you to be legit by denying access.

I think they are being smart as dev costs for games are higher than they've ever been (8 figures at times) and the ratio of people using mods for "true backup" versus stealing from torrents or friends copies is probably evidence the mods are for pirates not the "scratch conscious" frugal worry warts who want a backup for little Johnie.

Sony's current online is total crap and time will only tell is Home is an improvement OR a nightmare in poorly executed virtual reality style GUI marketing hype. If Sony can use online connectivity to prevent mods, they will.

I wouldn't be surprised if all three (M, S & N) block mods altogether and if all future generation of consoles will face this bleak reality.

And remember...

If they can exploit and abuse this newfound power

in the console arena -- they most certainly will.

Be honest folks, we like to "mod" so we can get stuff

free or save money on upgrades here and there.

No corporation likes that one bit or byte.

Re: "Why buy one then?"

Unfortunately, that's not true. It is illegal to modify a microsoft or sony console - lik-sang got stung for this. A few years ago (2002 I think?!) a London High Court ruled that you cannot modify a console to circumvent any kind of copy protection / other protection that Sony / MS put's in place, so I'm assuming it'd cover this too. That's How Lik-Sang nearly went down (before they did actually go down) as they were selling Sony & MS mods, which led to the big two to take the case to court, producing said verdict.

That said, it still sucks! :-P

Nice try...

I suspect along the lines of XBox Live will pop up to cater for modified systems some time fairly soon. Like how a tool was created to allow people to play online before Live launched for the original XBox (was popular in Australia since Live didn't launch for like a year or something).

Personally, I'll stick to a real computer and sane publishers.

Backups - yeah right...

The reason MS locks the XBOX, is the same that Nintendo locks the Wii, etc., Sega locked most of it's old machines. It is because they are subsidised, it costs far more than the shelf price to make them, at least for the first couple of years, this cost is recouped by the licence fees paid by the game manufacturers. It's like buying a cheap inkjet printer - do you really think they actually cost £30 to make, no, you make money for the manufacturer by buying their ink carts.

You should not have the right to 'back up' games, although I believe that you should be able to get a replacement of the media if you have paid for it in this model. Does anybody really buy the 'back up' claim?

Also how many people that are shouting about having a non-modded box are just spouting hot air? You've got no idea, I'd be supprised if all of them were guilty but I can't imagine that they're all innocent?

To sum up - if you want to have a few hundred quids worth of computing power that you can install your own software on, but something like err... A computer, not a games console. You can chip these to your heart's content - they're actually designed for it.

Not going to Work

Microsoft have a problem.

They have banned people with modded consoles but it is the console that was banned not the people. all people will do is wait for the next firmware flash or mod chip then buy a new console at less than £200.

Some people may think thats a lot but when you consider there are around 100 games at £40 each (in supermarkets) that would have cost them £4000 pounds they will buy a new console and mod it.

I happen to have two consoles one for upstairs and one downstairs overall the cost of two machines is not much more than the PS3 so i find it hard to believe that people who have modded their console would not do this.

Of course Microsoft cannot ban the users any more effectivley, all people need to do is sign up with a new account. some people may be peed off that they lose thier gamer score but to be honest what does that really matter apart from bragging rights with your mates.

Also if they are taking a Zero Tolerance view on modding consoles then surely they should apply that to PC's? ok the hardware isnt Microsofts but the Software is and there are many many programs and applications that are produced by people in their own home that modify the software is some way whether its a new skin etc. of course they would not be able to survive the backlash of this but lets not forget that it is supposed to be Zero Tolerance.

Oh and incidentally Microsoft tend to employ the people it finds have broken their systems and the reason behind this..... They are smarter than the people who already work for Microsoft! if these people did their jobs properly then there would not be any way to mod their products AND they would work properly in the first place. Most mods come from people trying to make their products work like they are supposed to, you know like Vista should be able to delete, copy and move without their system crashing.