Use Case IV

homebrew: users wanting to modify and customise their consoles

It's Learn to Solder Month - Ars Technica
23C3 2006: Console Hacking conference - Kotaku
How easy is it to hack 3rd gen consoles? - from 23C3
Future Console Hacking events - 23C3 blog

In console land, it's still called hacking; but in the PC game world it's called modding, and is generally accepted (with some notable exceptions) - another future post (i'm building up quite a library of promised posts) will be about the practice and politics of modding, but for now, I'll list it simply as a use case that any game designer is going to have to account for.

The takeaway here would be that if even the Xbox360 can't be locked down, it's probably not sensible for others to try. far more profitable to accommodate this activity within the device specifications.

out of the console, into the living room II

i posted on monday that the big pitch at CES this year was the smarthome and the home server, with a quote from Bill Gates indicating his intention to leverage the xbox to 'get access to the living room'.

it's not just large corporations pursuing this goal: individual users (aka console hackers) are doing the same thing. my colleague at i2, Richard Carmicheal, pointed me to the Wii controlled smarthome:

Using the Wii-Mote and my Nintendo Wii, I have an onscreen Flash User Interface that lets me control the following aspects of my home: Lights, Thermostat, Security Camera, Music Playback, Cable DVR, and more.

full details are here, and this, and more Wii-hacks than you can poke a stick at, can be found at Liquid Ice's Wii Hacks site. There's a point to be made here about console hacking and user-created content, and another point to be made about console and walled gardens, but they deserve their own posts at another date.