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RUMOR: 3DS finally hacked?

D

Durante

Member
Dascu said:
Doesn't sound like a corporate shill to me. Being worried about software sales on a platform and how they may be negatively impacted by large-scale piracy is something that ultimately hurts the consumer. No?
Click to expand...
I don't really agree. As a consumer, I don't really care if games are released on a different platform. In fact, if that other platform isn't region locked, I'd prefer it.

Or is your argument that these games are only either going to be made for a piracy-free 3DS or not at all?
 
D

Dascu

Member
Durante said:
I don't really agree. As a consumer, I don't really care if games are released on a different platform. In fact, if that other platform isn't region locked, I'd prefer it.

Or is your argument that these games are only either going to be made for a piracy-free 3DS or not at all?
Click to expand...

That they are not made at all. Or at least not in the same form; Take a hypothetical original and creative, but perhaps niche game concept that does not get greenlighted for the platform that it is designed for, because that platform has poor software sales (due to whatever reason).

Just to be clear: Nintendo is a bunch of ass-dicks for still region-locking their systems. I welcome hacking attempts to get rid of this nonsense and I wish it would send a message to Nintendo to drop it. If Nintendo noticed that many of the demand behind system hacks is for largely non-harmful purposes such as importing, then maybe they should just offer that functionality from the get-go instead of getting hackers to do it and unlocking a lot more potential nastiness with it.
 
D

donny2112

Member
duckroll said:
Other people pirating a game has no impact on me, and there is nothing I can do about it,
Click to expand...

It's the ease of piracy that ultimately affected DS sales. As has been said, there's piracy on 360 and PS3, as well, but those have to go through some complicated hoops to get to work and no online play (I think), so the impact is probably not a huge deal on the bottom line. Steam is probably the main reason PC games are seeing a resurgence, and that's basically a form of online DRM, since mostly the games are bought through Steam. Steam's position is to make their service so useful to the end consumer that the "worth" of pirating the game goes way down, IIRC. (Edit: Would be great if Nintendo could somehow incorporate a DRM "service" to allow region-free gaming, but they don't tend to be that forward-thinking. :p )

The part I replied to wasn't about damning all piracy but rather the massive ease in which DS piracy became where regular people could buy 100s of pirated game without any technical know-how. Ubisoft pointed out huge YOY DS software declines in Europe in 2009 or 2010 that they attributed directly to that ease of piracy impact. That definitely had an impact on platform support. Yes, it may have meant less Animalz games from Ubisoft, but just because Ubisoft is the one that said it doesn't mean they were the only ones that noticed the huge decline. Therefore, my concern is about that DS-level of ease of piracy taking place on 3DS and not the prevention of piracy altogether.

No, what we say on an online forum doesn't directly impact whether that massive ease of piracy comes to 3DS or not, but if we limited what we discussed via online forums to only things in which our discussions mattered, we wouldn't have a forum. ;P
 
E

Eusis

Member
Dascu said:
That they are not made at all. Or at least not in the same form; Take a hypothetical original and creative, but perhaps niche game concept that does not get greenlighted for the platform that it is designed for, because that platform has poor software sales (due to whatever reason).
Click to expand...
This probably depends on the choice of platform: I imagine a lot of 3DS games would be roughly the same on Vita for example, being portables with touch screens. In fact in some cases like, say, MML3 they'd probably be better owing to the second analog stick. At the same time a clearly portable design thrown onto something like PC might still work but wouldn't really be the same (Why I don't want Half Minute Hero 2 JUST on Steam).

There's also the issue of the policies of the platform holder, with PC it's pretty much a non-issue as, at worst, you go with someone else to release, but Microsoft and especially Sony could block games that Nintendo would have allowed, or restrict release in a way that's unpalatable.
 
R

RoyalFool

Banned
alfredofroylan said:
In Japan .... every single person I know over here have a hacked PSP and never bought an original game.
Click to expand...

I remember reading some random Japanese guys blog where he was keeping track of how many people with a DS on the trains had an R4 (pretty easy to spot because of the memory card slot in the cart) - I think by the end of it it was well > 50% which is pretty amazing, I recall him mentioning that everyone to young women to old men seemed to have them - not just your usual 'hax0r' demographic. I think it was pretty rampant over there and partly to blame for the huge amount of shovelware the DS ended up with, the big titles just dried up and many first party titles had a lot of very specific anti-hack measures incorporated (pokemon titles etc)
 
B

BishopLamont

Banned
duckroll said:
I don't think I sound self-centered either. Other people pirating a game has no impact on me, and there is nothing I can do about it, being worried about it or acting like I'm concerned is just a fool's errand. There are tons of things happening in the world that I have no control over, it's not remotely "selfish" to feel that there are better and more productive things to do than to pretend that my concern would have any impact at all. :p

People who want to pretend that by acting concerned about something they cannot do anything about is being a "responsible" person can do as they please. But they just mostly come off as white knights to everyone else I think. Especially when other people are discussing an actual functional benefit for themselves.
Click to expand...
Just because you have no control over something doesn't mean you should express no concern over it. Are you ok that homicide happens even though you have no control over it and that it doesn't happen to you? We're on a gaming forum, if piracy happens due to region lock hacking, then it is of great concern to the platform that it happens to. Sure region locking sucks, but the end result will do far damage than any benefits gained.

donny2112 said:
No, what we say on an online forum doesn't directly impact whether that massive ease of piracy comes to 3DS or not, but if we limited what we discussed via online forums to only things in which our discussions mattered, we wouldn't have a forum. ;P
Click to expand...
This. No discussion will continue if we just boil everything down to what we say or think doesn't matter anyway.
 
7

73V3N

Banned
I wonder what people will say about PS4/Nextbox when they are also region-locked


Let's hope they aren't
 
D

Dantis

Member
BishopLamont said:
Just because you have no control over something doesn't mean you should express no concern over it. Are you ok that homicide happens even though you have no control over it and that it doesn't happen to you? We're on a gaming forum, if piracy happens due to region lock hacking, then it is of great concern to the platform that it happens to. Sure region locking sucks, but the end result will do far damage than any benefits gained.
Click to expand...

Bad comparison.

If somebody else steals a game in front of you, at best, you'd tell someone. Likely, you'd do nothing.

If somebody murders someone in front of you, I would hope you would have some kind of reaction.
 
K

King_Moc

Banned
Hopefully this means i can get round the ridiculous region locking. Anyone that uses it to pirate can piss right off. Pure scum.
 
D

dallow_bg

nods at old men
I'm sure MS will region lock their next system in the same way 360 is. (Some games are, some aren't)
I feel Sony will keep region locking out as they have on their last three devices.

Tmdean said:
The point is that we're taking it as read that every system will eventually have widespread piracy, but that may not be true. Just look at the DSi.
Click to expand...
No one cared about the DSi. Wasn't worth the effort at all as it had zero substantial "DSi only games".
 
B

BishopLamont

Banned
Dantis said:
Bad comparison.

If somebody else steals a game in front of you, at best, you'd tell someone. Likely, you'd do nothing.

If somebody murders someone in front of you, I would hope you would have some kind of reaction.
Click to expand...
My point is that you can express concern even though you have no control over something happening and not take the attitude of "well its not happening to me, or im not doing it, so watever".
 
M

Mpl90

Two copies sold? That's not a bomb guys, stop trolling!!!
On one hand, it's true that piracy didn't affect that much how people enjoyed the platform, since games continued to be announced and released here in the West despite moms buying 100 games in one and all the other things (even 2011 saw many great titles coming on DS... and some came out this year too! XD ); on the other hand, it's also true that piracy affected greatly software sales, and this can't be seen as a good thing, especially from those who wanted to release games on the platform.

Let's just say I hope piracy doesn't reach a DS-like status / makes developer rethink their approach to the platform. And actually, it seems to me Nintendo will do everything in their power to not see such a thing again ( especially seeing how 3DS sees costant updates and all).
 
R

RoyalFool

Banned
ohlawd said:
so if Sony wants and continue to use blu-ray technology, they could just flip a switch and say "bam motherfuckers, region lock!!"?
Click to expand...

The PS3 has a region lock, but like the Xbox it also allows for Region 0 (Region free) which thankfully is the default option put to publishers. On PS3 there has been only one title that has used the region lock (Region A, Persona) - on the xbox quite a few have (about 40% of them).

Nintendo don't give publishers a choice, they have to tick one of the boxes. They also heavily push for demo limits - something the other two don't even support in their system frameworks. They also IP block a lot of network features - again, something neither Sony or Microsoft do.
 
D

duckroll

Member
BishopLamont said:
My point is that you can express concern even though you have no control over something happening and not take the attitude of "well its not happening to me, or im not doing it".
Click to expand...

You can express concern, I just don't think it means anything. It's like reading about a murder in the newspaper while having coffee in the morning and going "oh, how awful." While someone else reads the same newspapers and just glances over the same piece of news because it is of no interest to him. One person isn't better than the other in any way, the actual net impact on anything is zero.

If a neighborhood is getting more dangerous, those in it should definitely be concerned and if anyone has a suggestion on how to improve things, they should voice it out. That is real concern. If someone has something constructive which can help a situation, being active is always better than being passive. Other than that... shrug.

---

Editing in more stuff:

My perspective on this is pretty fair I think. I'm a regular guy who owns a 3DS. I want to play some Japanese games which aren't available outside of Japan. When I hear that the system has been hacked, I can either:

a) act all concerned about the possibility of piracy which honestly no one has any control over, and is really the business of the company to sort out for themselves.

b) go "FUCK YEAH REGION-FREE!!!!!!!!!!"

Going with Point A does nothing at all, the hacking will continue and life goes on. Going with Point B would be me recognizing there is something positive in this after all, and that the functionality of my 3DS could well be improved in the near future. In the end, I am not choosing between the 3DS being hacked or not. I am simply choosing how to react to the news. If somehow in the future which cannot be predicted, no one makes 3DS games anymore because of piracy, then I will still have a region-free 3DS to buy and play the Japanese games I did not get to play previously. This future will exist regardless of how I react to the news of the 3DS getting hacked. Acting differently will not change it one bit if it does come to past. So why dwell on the negative things when there are positives to dwell on?
 
J

Jockel

Member
Every time this thread gets bumped, my heart skips a beat, because of all the exciting possibilites that could be opened. And then it's just the same old piracy arguments all over again. (I realize that I'm not adding to the discussion, sorry.)
But couldn't the piracy and region lock arguments be split in a different thread or something?
 
K

kobashi100

Banned
RoyalFool said:
I remember reading some random Japanese guys blog where he was keeping track of how many people with a DS on the trains had an R4 (pretty easy to spot because of the memory card slot in the cart) - I think by the end of it it was well > 50% which is pretty amazing, I recall him mentioning that everyone to young women to old men seemed to have them - not just your usual 'hax0r' demographic. I think it was pretty rampant over there and partly to blame for the huge amount of shovelware the DS ended up with, the big titles just dried up and many first party titles had a lot of very specific anti-hack measures incorporated (pokemon titles etc)
Click to expand...

On my daily commute in london I would say 50% of people I saw with DS machines were using R4 cards.

These were everyone from kids to grown women.

My aunt basically never bought a single game for her sons DS machines. She downloaded everything!
 
T

Takuan

Member
donny2112 said:
As said, it's a self-focused way of looking at the possibilities, which is perfectly reasonable from that perspective. :p
Click to expand...

It's actually not selfish at all to realize that worrying about the consequences of piracy accomplishes nothing when one can do nothing to stop it. I think that's what duckroll is getting at.
 
D

Dascu

Member
General comment: DRM and technical barriers to piracy are usually always cracked in some shape or form. If piracy eventually becomes extremely easy, then the only thing reasonably stopping you from downloading* is the internal norm, whether you consider it "right or wrong".

Internal norms are largely influenced by social norms. If we all here on this message board raise concerns about piracy and reiterate that piracy is something that negatively impact the market, the selection of games published and created and by consequence what you as consumer can enjoy, then we create a social norm against piracy. And this social norm may convince other people to internalize a stance against piracy, thereby reducing piracy in general.

So, I do think there is some point in discussing piracy and the fear that hacking the 3DS may increase piracy, reduce software sales and diminish developer and publisher interest in the console. Can we influence publisher board meetings with these posts? No. Can we influence the behaviour of our peers and potential would-be pirates? I think (or hope?) a little bit, at least.


*There's also the issue of very low catch rates. Plus, many countries do not even bother prosecuting individual downloaders or don't even consider it illegal.



Edit: Fuck it, I don't want to spend my last posts of the year on GAF talking about piracy and hacking. Happy New Year's everyone!
 
T

Tmdean

Banned
dallow_bg said:
No one cared about the DSi. Wasn't worth the effort at all as it had zero substantial "DSi only games".
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's not conclusive evidence of anything. I just take it as indication that the facade of "all DRM will be cracked eventually" is beginning to crumble.
 
D

duckroll

Member
Dascu said:
So, I do think there is some point in discussing piracy and the fear that hacking the 3DS may increase piracy, reduce software sales and diminish developer and publisher interest in the console. Can we influence publisher board meetings with these posts? No. Can we influence the behaviour of our peers and potential would-be pirates? I think (or hope?) a little bit, at least.
Click to expand...

We ban people for piracy here. That's a pretty strong deterrent in this community. We encourage people to buy games, and we don't allow discussions on pirated games, links to pirate sites, or discussion on how to acquire pirated stuff. I think that does more good than trying to make people who want a region-free system feel bad. People who try to argue that those who want a region-free 3DS are being "selfish" or whatever, are more likely to be ignored or getting people annoyed with them than having any actual impact on anything.

NichM said:
Because for some of us, the negatives are also personal.
Click to expand...

Yes well it's your job to care. It's not mine though. I pay for your products I'm doing my part. :p
 
F

Foffy

Banned
Tmdean said:
Yeah, it's not conclusive evidence of anything. I just take it as indication that the facade of "all DRM will be cracked eventually" is beginning to crumble.
Click to expand...

It's not a good indication at all. Most of those interested in DSi hacking wanted to do it to take advantage of the DSi's perks over what the original DS was capable of. The issue is these perks are actually magnificently minor, so a dedicated community was never created to tackle it. Really, the only thing you could get from a DSi hack is getting some DSi-made ROMs to run in DSi mode or to pirate the four-or-less worthwhile games on DSiWare. The former of which could be shrugged, as the features were almost never, ever worthwhile.

Hacking DSi is akin to getting Hey You Pikachu to work in an N64 emulator. I don't think there's even a remotely minor audience that gives a shit for it to actually happen. On 3DS, you have pirates and people who hate region locking to see it circumvented, and this is a far larger audience that cares about that than there ever was for a community to break DSi.
 
B

Bending_Unit_22

Member
Tenki said:
I don't think that law exists. Kingdom Hearts 3D wasn't translated to Spanish or Italian.
Click to expand...

Starwolf_UK said:
Theres an NOE "law" to translate into FIGS*. I think for third parties it is just the manuals for eShop games. But games sales are affected somewhat by lack of translated text. Not sure if that is down to some retailers not stocking it etc...

*-In N64 it was just English, French and German. They officially passed up on Conker's Bad Fur Day for this reason (they were not translating it due to the humor being difficult to translate, others think it it was Nintenod teh kiddie) leaving THQ to publish it.
Click to expand...

Omikaru said:
No.

The only EU law is that there can be no technical barriers implemented to prevent consumers from buying products in different parts of the EU than their own country. So you can't region lock Poland from France or UK, just because the games are cheaper, and you can't do anything that hampers retailers from selling the products to other EU regions either.

Nintendo were nailed by the EU for price fixing about 10-12 years ago, since they used tactics to block EU sellers from shipping around the continent.
Click to expand...

Ahh, thanks for the replies. Like I noted I wasn't sure, but either way legally or not games have to be in the major languages to get decent sales in Europe. Still not happening with most niche text heavy games.
 
D

Dantis

Member
NichM said:
Because for some of us, the negatives are also personal.
Click to expand...

Sure, but as long as we buy Atlus games, we can't do much about it.

I feel it's especially true in my case, as the games I'd be importing would be Atlus games. So I could sit here and worry about what people far outside or my influence are doing illegally, or I could be happy that I might get to play some games that I otherwise wouldn't.

I don't think anybody is saying that those who are more directly affected by piracy are out of order in being upset by this, but you're the first person to post here who is. Everyone else is just blowing smoke to make us feel bad, and it's a little bit silly, considering we're not even talking about piracy in the first place.
 
L

Lonely1

Unconfirmed Member
What I don't like about the whole hacking business is that it ruins the online scene. DS, PSP and Wii online games became unbearable after they became wide open, on the PC side I left Diablo 2 after duped items became widespread and whenever I face a person of imposing skills in Tf2 there's always a bit of doubt... Is the only thing that I don't like of open systems, sadly is something that is very important for me, :(.
 
J

JoshuaJSlone

Member
I keep reading about this major DS software collapse, but it seems to have held up somewhat better than the hardware.

DS_WW_SW

DS_WW
 
T

TheChewyWaffles

Member
Piracy? On a game console? This is the first I've heard of such a thing. Someone call Activision and EA and tell them to close up shop. The jig is up.
 
A

Aquamarine

Member
Javier said:
Up to 128GB cards have been tested to work on the 3DS.
Click to expand...

Really? Oh wow.

It seems like the prices for 128 GB SDXC cards are ~$120 at the moment.

And you could fit about ~96 games onto that card.

For North America:

Total Retail Games as of 12/27/2012: 170 (Not including Special/Limited Editions)
Games released in 2011: 92
Games released in 2012: 78
Click to expand...

So you could fit about half of the games released in North America in one SD card. That's pretty good.
 
M

Massa

Member
duckroll said:
Editing in more stuff:

My perspective on this is pretty fair I think. I'm a regular guy who owns a 3DS. I want to play some Japanese games which aren't available outside of Japan. When I hear that the system has been hacked, I can either:

a) act all concerned about the possibility of piracy which honestly no one has any control over, and is really the business of the company to sort out for themselves.

b) go "FUCK YEAH REGION-FREE!!!!!!!!!!"

Going with Point A does nothing at all, the hacking will continue and life goes on. Going with Point B would be me recognizing there is something positive in this after all, and that the functionality of my 3DS could well be improved in the near future. In the end, I am not choosing between the 3DS being hacked or not. I am simply choosing how to react to the news. If somehow in the future which cannot be predicted, no one makes 3DS games anymore because of piracy, then I will still have a region-free 3DS to buy and play the Japanese games I did not get to play previously. This future will exist regardless of how I react to the news of the 3DS getting hacked. Acting differently will not change it one bit if it does come to past. So why dwell on the negative things when there are positives to dwell on?
Click to expand...

It's not an either/or scenario. You can be excited to play region free games and also recognize the potential negative impact that piracy could cause to the 3DS software ecosystem. Both will greatly affect you.
 
B

Bending_Unit_22

Member
JoshuaJSlone said:
I keep reading about this major DS software collapse, but it seems to have held up somewhat better than the hardware.

DS_WW_SW

DS_WW
Click to expand...

Shouldn't software sales be expected to hold up much much better than hardware sales in late life? Period to period sales would be much better for your argument since cumulative sales include the large pre-pirate base in their totals.

EDIT: I tried eyeballing pixel-counting and got massively different results based on minor changes. Not saying you're wrong or anything but period to period would be better for the point you're making.
 
E

Exterminieren

Banned
To use the example of software I enjoy; I thoroughly enjoyed Mutant Mudds. It's exactly the sort of thing I'd like to see more of. The dev has just come out and said that, should 3DS piracy become rampant, no more will be forthcoming from that developer.

To dismiss anyone who opposes piracy as a corporate shill simply because they're concerned about losing software like this is an incredibly weak argument.
 
D

duckroll

Member
Massa said:
It's not an either/or scenario. You can be excited to play region free games and also recognize the potential negative impact that piracy could cause to the 3DS software ecosystem. Both will greatly affect you.
Click to expand...

It's an either/or scenario when people want to treat it that way. No one here was advocating piracy or suggesting it was a good thing. People with that mindset came in and started to say that region-locking isn't "worth" potential piracy, and that people looking forward to the system getting hacked are selfish or myopic. Their words, not mine. I simply defend against that sort of aggression. They push, I shove back. :)

I <3 NichM though, so he's okay! :D
 
F

Foffy

Banned
NateDrake said:
Funny since Renegade Kid may do just that when it comes to 3DS support.



http://joolswatsham.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/3ds-piracy.html
Click to expand...

I find it hard to heavily support his views, seeing as he cites Dementium II as a victim of piracy. I literally never knew that game existed until that post, so I'm sure there's some marketing issue to be had here. Piracy is not a guaranteed factor it can or has damaged his games, and people tend to be making scapegoats of it. People run with the download = stolen sale mentality, and this is not universally the case. It could be to some percentage, but it never entirely is.
 
P

Pancakes R Us

Member
duckroll said:
People who try to argue that those who want a region-free 3DS are being "selfish" or whatever, are more likely to be ignored or getting people annoyed with them than having any actual impact on anything
Click to expand...

The only selfish entity in this whole debacle is Nintendo. The company alienated a very core group of their userbase which buys numerous games from different regions, and gets to play games which very likely will never see the light of day on their respective shores.
 
D

donny2112

Member
Massa said:
It's not an either/or scenario. You can be excited to play region free games and also recognize the potential negative impact that piracy could cause to the 3DS software ecosystem. Both will greatly affect you.
Click to expand...

Exactly. Hacking that would require some effort/technical know-how probably wouldn't be too bad in the larger sense, either. It'd give region-free to those who want it (and were willing to maintain it) and keep away the "100 games on a cart" levels of DS-piracy that hurt DS in later years from coming back to haunt 3DS, too. :)

RoyalFool said:
2yaFB.jpg


Wish you were here!
Click to expand...

Next year ...

Importing that wouldn't do me any good even with region-free, as can't read Japanese. :(
 
F

Foffy

Banned
donny2112 said:
Exactly. Hacking that would require some effort/technical know-how probably wouldn't be too bad in the larger sense, either. It'd give region-free to those who want it (and were willing to maintain it) and keep away the "100 games on a cart" levels of DS-piracy that hurt DS in later years from coming back to haunt 3DS, too. :)
Click to expand...

To play devils advocate here, piracy does some good in that being able to run games through unofficial means is still the main way unofficial translations are done. Outside of the few on the Wii, the rest almost always require a patch to the game ISO/ROM itself, which of course implores playing the game in what many would consider an illegal way, not directly off of the physical media you bought it on. There's a lot of grey when it comes to hacking a system, even something like the PSP which was region free. It allowed a better, more effective way of playing games off the memory stick (which Sony later did with downloadable games) and, like I mentioned above already, it offers translations to a number of games not officially localized, perhaps the biggest currently being Monster Hunter Portable 3rd.
 
S

Sophia

Member
Pancakes R Us said:
The only selfish entity in this whole debacle is Nintendo. The company alienated a very core group of their userbase which buys numerous games from different regions, and gets to play games which very likely will never see the light of day on their respective shores.
Click to expand...

Nintendo is pretty much their own worse enemy in this regard. The Region Locking and poor online support is basically an enabler for hacking. If I want to import and play Super Robot Wars UX, I have no choice but to wait for the system to get hacked. If someone from the UK or Europe wants to play Soul Hackers in a timely manner, same deal. :\

As much as it sucks for the developer at Renegade Kid, he should be putting his anger towards Nintendo for giving hackers a legitimate excuse to bust the system open in the first place.
 
D

donny2112

Member
Foffy said:
To play devils advocate here,
Click to expand...

Yeah, fan translation stuff isn't an issue, either. Just don't want to see the 3DS software market slide out of relevant support because moms were buying "100 games on a cart" R4s or whatever. That's what I'm hoping does not happen with whatever comes out of this. As mentioned, what we hope for on an internet forum doesn't usually make much difference in the big picture, but we can still hope for it. :)
 
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