I’m quite interested in doing more interviews like this so if anyone knows anyone in any modchip teams or even just in the game industry, I’d be interested in getting in touch with them.

…A Little History
Beyond the basic move to mainstream the original Playstation was one of the first popular consoles to feature CD based games. This is important because CD burners were starting to become more readily available. While the Playstation did feature disc security it was easily broken and the hardware used to break the systems security was cheap as well. The Saturn also saw a modchip appear later in it’s life but the chip was much more expensive and much more complex, the N64 had a backup device titled the 64DD but it cost almost as much as the N64 itself, and didn’t see very wide spread use. It’s debatable which console had the toughest security; though, the popularity of the Playstation saw it hacked the quickest

The combination of a CD based storage medium, and the consoles overwhelming popularity created a perfect storm to bring console modding up to a much more visible level. If you were in high school or college during this time it was rare if you didn’t know someone, or know someone who knew someone who had their Playstation modded. At this point console modding was mostly limited to playing backups and imported games, but there were a few homebrew project here and there.

Last generation Started with a bang in the modding world; the Sega Dreamcast. Despite the fact that the system didn’t use CDs an exploit was found in the way the console booted games that allowed would-be modders to simply burn boot-discs to play their games on CD-Rs. Eventually they were able to combine the boot disc code on the same disc as a game making a properly burned disc playable on any console without modification. In addition to the easy hack the Dreamcast ran on the popular Windows CE platform. With a familiar programming environment and easily backed up discs the Dreamcast saw a literal explosion of homebrew software and other projects. The amount of garage development happening on the Dreamcast was probably the largest seen since the Atari 2600 and Commodore 64 days.

While the Dreamcast was short lived in the market the release of the Xbox picked up right were the Dreamcast left off and brought the concept of a modded console to a whole new level. The Xbox was hacked inside 6 months and being that it was really nothing more than a PC in a funny case the development tools were even more familiar than that of the Dreamcast. More importantly the inclusion of a hard drive allowed homebrew and backed up games alike to not only run on a modded Xbox but stored right on the Xbox without the need for disc media. The inclusion of a built in network adapter and optional IR port made the console that much more versatile to the modding community as well. The ease of modding, and overall functionality really bright modding from a niche within certain gaming and hacking circles into the mainstream where it wasn’t uncommon to hear a store clerk talking about his modded Xbox or to even see TV programs and magazine articles featuring modded Xbox consoles with instructions on how to do it.

In addition to playing backups, imports, and homebrew the Xbox gave a boost to the popularity of console case modding. It’s unclear if this was due to it’s similarity to PCs, causing many PC case modders to move over to the Xbox, maybe because the case design lent itself well to modification, or maybe it was simply that those who like to tinker with the guts are also interested in tinkering with the looks. In any case what might have been a very rare occasion in the console modding world became nearly as commonplace as modchips.

The Playstation 2 and Gamecube were also moddable and in many ways the popularity of Xbox modding spilled over to the point where many were trying to make the PS2 and GC more like the Xbox. The PS2 was arguably the most difficult console to mod but it’s overwhelming popularity really pushed the development of modchips and other hacks. When Sony added an optional hard drive it didn’t take long for people to attempt to use it in the same ways that the hard drive was used on the Xbox. Unfortunately the difficulty of programing and the limited flexibility of the console saw it used mostly for backups with a few token homebrew attempts. Even the hard drive could only store certain compatible games. The release of the Slim PS2 put a damper on that as well since it lacked the provisions for a hard drive, and while USB hard drive support was added it was also plagued by the limited compatibility in addition to limited streaming speed which produced longer load times and choppy video playback.

The Gamecube was probably the most easily hacked of the last generation consoles but it took the longest. This is likely do to the Gamecube being the least popular of the last generation consoles as well as the fact that it was the most limited hardware wise. There were a few interesting homebrew projects but most of them were not very user friendly and without an internal storage medium and small amounts of disc space it saw some creative ways to store things including streaming from another PC on the network as well as storage built into modchips themselves. Attempts were made at USB and external hard drive storage but none of them ever reach a point at gaining a substantial foothold

Where are we now? – Xbox 360
The Xbox 360 having launched first this generation was also the first console to make progress on the hacking front. While arguably home to the most sophisticated security system ever put to use on a console some crafty hackers still found some ways through.

The first breakthrough was with the firmware on the DVD drive. The firmware essentially leads the console to believe that the disc being used is an original and not a backup. This actually hearkens back to the Sega Saturn modchips where the chip actually filtered the data coming off of the laser assembly and changed the appropriate bits to fool the console into thinking it was an original disc. Since the 360 essentially uses a PC DVD drive communicating with the console through an SATA cable they were able to hijack the chip housing the firmware and make the necessary changes to the data using the console’s own hardware against it. Perhaps most interesting about this hack is it was based on a security hole originally noticed on the Xbox 1 but ultimately ignored because a higher level security hole (the on-board BIOS) was exploited and offered more flexibility. If the drive firmware on the Xbox 1 had been widely compromised before the 360′s release this hack might not be available to us today.

So far Microsoft has proven that they can detect certain hacked firmware version and certain backed up discs, they’ve followed a similar path to thwart modders by banning the offending consoles from their Xbox Live service. Though, they’ve done little to actually stop people from playing backup discs.

Another breakthrough deals with the Xbox 360′s hard drive. The hard drive in the 360 is a standard 2.5″ SATA “laptop hard drive”. Since MS put it in a fancy plastic shell and jacked the price up they also used custom firmware on the drive. Thankfully more crafty people were able to strip the firmware from the hard drive and allow the use similarly branded PC drives. This became a bit more benificial with the release of the 120GB drive since the converted PC drive gets capped at the size of the firmware being used. This unfortunately is also detectable by Microsoft and can result in your console getting banned from the Xbox Live service.

The most impressive break through on the 360 is an exploit found in a demo disc, apparently it only works in Xbox 360s with older dashboard software and is rather complex to run but, when it is run, hackers have been able to gain full access to the console to run Linux and potentially other homebrew software. Functionally this is very similarly to the exploits on the Xbox 1. Unfortunately however the console is designed to prevent downgrading of the dashboard which significantly limits the usefulness of this mod. There have been some discoveries made in the form of preventative hacks that will allow you to downgrade your 360 in the future but most of those were discovered too late and as a result this hack wont gain much footing from most hackers until a readily available method of downgrading is discovered.

Where are we now? – Playstation 3
The Playstation 3 really hasn’t had much progress on the modding front. There have been numerous rumors about a boot disc but no real proof of it’s existence. The Playstation 3, like the Playstation 2 before it, can run Linux right out of the box. Also similar to the Playstation 2 the Linux operating system is artificially limited in it’s access to the hardware, making it a less useful platform for development. The PS3′s Linux does not allow developers access to the Graphics Processor, presumably to prevent it from somehow being leveraged to run pirated games. This also hinders the development of homebrew games as well as emulators; with early emulator ports showing less than spectacular results. It does offer potential for media applications the PS3 could perhaps be used as a MythTV box or run XBMC once it has been fully ported to Linux. As of right now though, there really isn’t much going on. Most console hackers would agree that the legal Linux distributions are no substitute to full access to the PS3′s hardware.

Where are we now? – Wii
The Wii is probably the most open console so far this generation. The security on the Wii was cracked fairly quickly because it was found to be nearly identical to the Security on the Gamecube. Most of the modchips available are simple microcontrollers very similar to the modchips used in the original Playstation days. The biggest difference between the Wii and the Gamecube is there has been disc security added to the Wii to prevent modification of the disc data. This means that like the Xbox 360 only exact or near exact duplicates can be run. The security is light enough that some games can be patched for patching and playing imported games but it’s tight enough to prevent homebrew.

One interesting development with the Wii has been the built in Gamecube emulator, which works so well it actually allows all of the Gamecube’s homebrew to be played on the Wii. This has revitalized the Gamecube homebrew scene with nearly every major Gamecube homebrew app receiving updates regularly now. Most of these updates include additional features to make use of the Wii’s larger disc capacity and faster processor too. One major problem with this is that the Gamecube emulator doesn’t allow access to many of the Wii’s nice features such as Bluetooth devices, SD card slots, or internal memory, it is still very much just a fast Gamecube with a larger disc.

Another interesting front for Wii homebrew development has been the Opera Web Browser. there are a number of sites that have popped up designed specifically for web browsing with the Wii. These sites are not only formatted to fit the Wii’s browser but they offer literally hundreds of flash based games that interpret the Wii Remote’s pointing feature in the same way that they would interpret a mouse pointer, the Wii Remote’s A and B buttons are interpreted like left and right mouse clicks too. So while an on rails flash shooter might be rather boring with a mouse it can actually be quite fun with a Wii remote. Many of these simple flash based titles look and feel quite professional too. There have even been homebrew media streaming applications that run through the browser.

Hacking developments on the Wii get more advanced every day. Recently an LCD modification was released for the WiiFree modchip similar to the LCD screens many had installed in their Xbox 1 consoles, there have been rumors of modchips also being capable of adding DVD playback and other multimedia functionality; which really isn’t all that far fetched seeing as there were a few Gamecube modchips that added that kind of functionality last generation. There are also many indicators pointing towards full access to the Wii hardware becoming available very soon.

What does the future hold?
The Wii probably has the brightest future in terms of modding. Being the most popular console this generation and having quite unique hardware makes it a perfect console for yet another homebrew boom. While the internal memory is limited (512MB) it is more than enough to house a homebrew media streaming application similar to XBMC or even a small build of Linux. The USB ports and SD media slot allow expandability and the Wii Remote opens up lots of opportunities for homebrew game development.

The Xbox 360 and PS3 have loads of potential too but that potential is mostly limited to aspects of raw performance power and storage space. There’s no doubt we could see games from the hard drive as well as some kind of XBMC-HD on either platform if and when they’re fully cracked. However, that is a big “if” at this point. Also with the exception of graphics horsepower neither platform offers anything really compelling in terms of homebrew game development, and I would suspect that the Wii will get the lions share of those developers if for no other reason than the Wii remote.

Recently Bloomberg quoted both David Hufford, and Peter Moore of Microsoft talking about “Sweet Spot” pricing for a console.

Respectively:

We are well aware that the sweet spot of the market is really 199 bucks.

If we don’t make that move, make it early and expand our demographic, we will wind up in the same place as with Xbox 1, a solid business with 25 million people … What I need is a solid business with 90 million people.

Microsoft is notoriously tight lipped when it comes to announcing price cuts, or anything really. Almost every revelation of new information is carefully crafted to be exactly as they intended to say it and said exactly when they wanted it to be said. There’s no way either of these people would have said anything about price cuts unless they intentionally planned on it. This is especially true for comments about what they feel the sweet spot pricing is and that they need to cut pricing soon. I think it’s clear to most people that a price cut needs to happen soon , and more importantly it needs to be significant. The big question is when and by how much?

It’s pretty apparent that this generation Microsoft is applying all of the notes they took on Sony’s business practices last generation. Many of the same marketing movies and time tables for new releases and the like fall pretty closely in line with how Sony ran the Playstation business during the PS2 era. This is of course embellished with the slightly different tastes of the Xbox clientèle as well as lessons learned from the faults of the Xbox 1. So looking at that, what does the PS2 tell us about when the Xbox 360 will see a price cut? Well according to wikipedia (which seems pretty accurate based on what I remember of last generation) there was a timespan of 565 days from the consoles launch of October 26th 2000 at a price of $299, until it’s first price drop which happened in May of 2002 knocking $100 off the price to put it at the “sweet spot” of $199. The Xbox 360 launched in November 22nd 2005, meaning 565 days would put the price drop at June 10th 2007. Since that date has already passed it stands to reason that they’re not following the PS2 exactly, but the recent comments about price cuts coming in around this time seems to be just too much of a confidence.

When will the price drop?
There are a number of dates Microsoft could use to announce a price drop. Depending how closely they’re following the PS2 time line it could be before the end of the month. The problem with that is there really isn’t any platform they can use for such an announcement. Typically a price drop is announced as part of an event or in conjunction with some other big release. The only way I could see them announcing a price drop this month is if they also planned to announce something big like a move to 65nm or video marketplace rolling out in Europe. Though nether of those seem plausible as I feel 65nm will be a rather silent release and the video marketplace will likely come in conjunction with another major dash update…. we could be surprised though, I can’t see the future I can only make educated guesses.

Looking at the event calendar GDC has already come and gone, there is the Hollywood and Games summit later this month, though it doesn’t seem like that big of a show to make such an announcement, E3 is in July though again it’s not that big of a platform anymore. PAX is in August which has grown to be one of the bigger conferences, The Tokyo Game Show in September and of course the Xbox Show which will undoubtedly be titled X07 this year, and that is usually held in September or October.

With the conferences in mind I think the announcement will depend greatly on which direction Microsoft wants to go. If they want to dramatically build their user base they’ll Announce it at PAX, this will drive sale strong from August through the holidays As the initial drop will draw sales and the release of Halo 3 in September will continue sales strongly through Black Friday where the holiday shopping and other releases will carry it through to the start of the next year. Alternatively if they’d rather go for more profit rather then more users they’ll hold X07 in October (after Halo 3′s release) and use that as a platform for announcement. That will let them milk console sales at the current price from people buying it for Halo 3 and then dropping the price just before the holiday rush. This scenario has the best mix of boosting both profit and sales but it also has the highest risk of aggravating the large group of people who paid full price just weeks before when Halo 3 launched. If they’re going for all profit they’ll stay at the current price through the holidays and then announce next year during GDC. This will allow them to milk full console price through the entire holiday season and then boost sales a bit when game sales start to wind down for the post holiday slump.

Judging by the recent comments from Peter Moore about their perceived importance of a larger user base I’d say an announcement at PAX makes the most sense. As a general rule price drops are effective immediacy or within a day or two of the announcement. This is because the announcement of a price drop essentially stops sales dead in their tracks. No one wants to pay an extra $100 if they can just wait until a price drop date that has already been announced. Making it immediate doesn’t effect daily sales negatively. Also announcing before the holiday rush reduces the number of people aggravated for having paid full price just days before the drop since that’s when daily console sales are the lowest.

What about the price point?
I think it’s fairly easy to predict a price point because they’ve pretty much already told us what it will be. I’m fairly confident we’ll see an Xbox 360 for $199. I’d say you have a very good chance of seeing the Core console at that price. The Premium and Elite units have always been priced according to the Hard Drive price points in relation to the Core console. A clean $100 drop across the board makes the most sense; Core at $199, Premium at $299, and Elite at $379. Unless they dramatically change the pricing of the hard drives I don’t think the price relationships between the consoles will change all that much.

What about other consoles?
If Nintendo drops the price of the Wii it will probably only be by $50 and that’s only if the 360 Core goes all the way down to $199. If they do this you’re likely to see Wii Sports sold separately. I don’t really think Nintendo will do this. They have strong sales at their current price and I don’t think a 360 price drop will really effect their momentum all that much. Most of the people interested in a Wii want one because it’s nothing like the PS3 and 360 and that’s something a price drop just wont change. I also think Nintendo wouldn’t want to seem reactionary. So if they do drop in response to Microsoft then it will be at a great enough delay as to seem disassociated. In any case it’s still too early for a Wii price drop, especially considering it’s still difficult to find one to even buy if you wanted to, I highly doubt we’ll see the Wii drop this year.
While it’s still technically too early in the PS3′s life for a price drop, a price drop is disparately needed to push their sales stronger, this will be even more true if Microsoft drops their price. Since Sony stopped producing the 20GB model the only PS3s available are at the $599 price point. If Microsoft drops their price $100 across all models that will put the cheapest PS3 at a whopping three times the price of the lowest Xbox 360. You could buy 3 core units, or a Premium and a Wii and still have money left over for games. I don’t think Sony has any desire to drop in reaction to a Microsoft announcement, they like being in control of those kinds of things; though, they may not have much of a choice considering the price disadvantage that would occur if Microsoft drops. Sony is really a big question mark right now. It really depends on if they’re going to ignore their competitors and play things out the way they’ve been going, or if they’re going to make the right business moves to drive sales over profit. They could go one of three ways. 1. They could see the Xbox 360 price drop coming and pre-emptily drop the PS3′s price, this would force Microsoft to drop sooner then planned and cause a bit of an upset, it would also help re-affirm Sony’s power in the game market and their ability to control competitors. 2. They could play it safe and wait for Microsoft to drop first. This will allow them to milk as much as they can at the current price point before having to drop just to keep sales moving at a constant pace. or 3. They could ignore a Microsoft price drop, continuing to claim that the hardware is indeed worth the price their asking and not drop the price until they’re good and ready to do it on their own terms.

I really can’t predict what Sony will do with the PS3′s price. In many respects they’re unpredictable given their current market position. Nintendo and Microsoft are much more predictable in this regard as they’re in much more comfortable market positions and their direction is clear. If this all plays out the way I think it will, we’ll see the 360′s price drop $100 across the board before the end of the year (likely in August). We’ll see the PS3′s price drop around the same time by roughly the same amount, and the Wii wont see a price drop until sometime next year.

Titles on these platforms target the casual gamer; maybe I’m alone in this but I’ve always thought of a “casual gamer” as someone who plays games with casual frequency. Sort of the antithesis of a “hardcore gamer”. Though I was recently corrected by someone who works in the casual games industry that the real definition of a casual gamer is someone who plays casual games. Casual games being defined as games with a simple interface, offer gameplay in short bursts, the ability to quickly reach the end of game, or play continuously with no need to save, no plot or characters or a very simple plot/character structure, usually 2D or abstract graphically, and offering some type of try before you buy level of product. If you’d like a more detailed description of casual games you can read the Wikipedia article. This definition is important because it describes casual games as more of a major genre of game. With this in mind it’s possible to have “hardcore casual gamers” which might seem like an oxymoron but it’s really not. It’s simply gamers who play casual games with hardcore frequency.

The way casual games are defined is also important because it reads like a definition of the Xbox Live arcade, to a lesser degree the Nintendo Virtual console, and to an even lesser degree Sony’s e-distribution service. Out of the three it’s clear that the XBLA is the most focused on this genre, the limitations of price and game size placed on XBLA titles helps keep them within the bounds of this genre. Nintendo on the other hand is offering Classic console games which includes, among other things, RPGs which even with their simplistic graphics and gameplay certainly do not meet the criteria of a casual game. Such a game wouldn’t find it’s way to the Xbox Live arcade service simply because the cost of production would be too great a company making an RPG wouldn’t have much to work with in terms of space and the time involved to make something that large would cost too much given the maximum $20 price tag allowed for XBLA games. Sony’s service on the other hand is just a method of distribution; in addition to casual titles they also offer full fledged games like Tekken or Gran Torrismo.

I think it’s important that these services stick to a theme, by doing so gamers know what to expect from it. You know that anything you download from the XBLA will fall into the definition of a casual game. You know that anything you download for the Virtual Console will be a classic game from the 8-bit, 16-bit, or early 3D generation. Looking at the PC world it seems that the most successful casual game sites are the ones that specialize only in casual games. Also it would seem that those more successful sites are those that build a community around their gaming service.

Keeping this in mind I think Microsoft has done well to position the Xbox Live arcade against the well developed casual game market on the PC. All of the factors seems to be in place. Nintendo seems to be going after a slightly different type of gamer, one that is looking for more nostalgia then a casual game. Sony doesn’t really seem to have a direction with their service yet. They seem to want to go after the same things that Microsoft and Nintendo are after, as well as some other things. Theres no doubt that their offering games like Tekken and GTHD through their e-distribution service has been one of the few saving graces for the PS3, but as it is right now I think it’s too diverse of a competitor. If you look at the VC the games are all separated by console or generation, if you look at the XBLA you’ll realize that it’s a small part of the larger XBL Marketplace and that things like retail game demos, betas, and other game offerings that don’t fit into the casual market are offered in a completely separate section of the service. The names of these services are quite revealing as to how they’re organized and what they offer: Live arcade – arcade style games with a community and live stats, Virtual Console – classic console games emulated, e-distribution – games delivered electronically.

A good distribution system for casual games is quite useless unless you have casual games to distribute. This seems to have been Microsoft’s biggest stumbling block so far. While the system itself is quite superior to it’s counterparts in delivering casual games, releases have historically been too few and far between, and once they started delivering them with semi-regularity the overall quality of what was delivered seems to be lacking. Sure there are quite a few classic arcade games like your Pac-Man and Galiga, etc. but Rally-X and Scramble? I’m not the oldest gamer nor do I harbor a soft spot for pixels of the 80s but I seriously question if even classic gaming fans find much to like about some of these titles. I worked in an arcade for several years, an arcade with a fairly substantial classic game collection dating all the way back to Computer Science and Pong, I can honestly say I’d never heard of Scramble or Rally-X before their appearance on the marketplace nor do I recall any inquiries about them from arcade patrons trying to locate their old standards.

If the slew of bad classic arcade ports wasn’t enough even some of the newer titles were really botched when they arrived on the market. The release of Lumines Live was a debacle of trying to fit a game too large in price and size into the Live Arcade. The 50MB and $20 limits on size and price were apparently too small causing them to squeeze the core engine and a few token levels into a $20 50MB download and then a few more levels into another $8 and 50MB download and the game still wasn’t complete at that point when compared to it’s PSP and PS2 counterparts. More levels came later at additional costs and size. I was really excited to have Lumines come to the XBLA I’d heard lots of good things about it and I was disappointed that it was only available on the PSP. When it was released on the XBLA I voted with my wallet and refused to purchase it. I have the money and download size isn’t an issue but it’s execution soured me so. If they ever decide to pull their head out of their ass and re-release the whole game at one price in one download then I’ll buy it. I don’t mind updates to a game, I don’t even care how much the initial game costs, just don’t pretend that the initial $20 purchase is in anyway complete. Countless other screw ups came as well, games with glitches that were never fixed: Smash TV, Texas Hold-em, Small Arms, UMK3, etc. preventing people from getting their money’s worth.

Normally such poor performances would spell doom for the service especially in the face of two new competitors but lucky for MS Sony has little more then  fl0w a few token casual games, and Nintendo has been surprisingly non-aggressive with their Virtual Console release strategy. Though Nintendo has countless big ticket franchises in the wings that could be released at any time, and Sony’s announcement of Little Big Planet reminds us that they some original stuff up their sleeves too. Microsoft seems to rely almost entirely on 3rd party support though, which can be dangerous, and at the same time disappointing since many of the development houses they own have a lot that could be offered in terms of casual games.

Despite the problems and the competition they’ve been showing signs of turning that ship around, in the last three weeks they’ve released three phenomenal titles: Alien Hominid, Worms, and TMNT. All games that people have been begging to see hit the XBLA and all games that were executed quite well. This has helped to remind us that there are good titles that arrive every once in a while. I think these recent releases are the first time since the console’s launch when I’ve been genuinely excited about titles available on XBLA and XBLA as a platform in general. There have been a few gems along the road to now but they were mostly overshadowed by the fast drought between them. It’s not like there is a shortage of classic games people would like to see hit the arcade, nor a shortage of games planned for release or new games proposed. The real question now is: can they continue to release casual games at a high quality, can they continue to release them with consistency and diversity without digging deep into the abyss of classics that were not meant to be legends, and can they do it without the glitched or hackneyed releases that have plagued what would have otherwise been quality releases?

They’ve taken some steps to help prevent past mistakes from happening again. They’ve upped the minimum limit on game size to a much more reasonable 150MB and a while before that they decided institute Live Arcade Wednesdays; only releases one game a week regardless of how many they had ready to help spread out over the droughts, though they’ve still managed to have a few weeks here and there with nothing new available.

I think if the XBLA can stay on the course it’s on now and MS goes back and fixes some of the past mistakes the can sty in the lead they currently hold in the next-gen casual games market. It’s also important that they realize part of the reason they even hold a lead is not necessarily that their service has been superior, just that they’ve had time on their side to work out the bugs. As it is all of the big three console makers have some interesting offerings and I’m honestly excited about all of them, here’s hoping that they turn up the heat and start trying to out do each other; because when they compete, the gamers win.

While homebrew is not yet possible on the Wii the security system has been found to be very much like that of the Gamecube. As a result the community has very quickly produced modchips that break portions of the security ultimately allowing gamers to play backup discs on the Wii. While the Xbox 360 beat the Wii to this hack with the firmware modifications, and has also recently beat it to homebrew with the recent hypervisor hack I think it’s important to realize that the Wii’s modchips were out in the wild only three short months after it’s release, for those that are wondering that’s LESS time then it took for modchips on the Xbox 1 to arrive.

Much like the early Xbox 1 days the first chips were light in terms of features, but that’s already changing with a few chips already entering V2, not to mention most chips boasting the ability update their software for added features and compatibility down the road. Also very reminiscent of the Xbox 1 days is that there are already a few “open source” modchips available: Chiip and WiiFree. Though unlike the early Xbox 1 days these first run chips are easy to install with only a small handful of wires, unlike the 29 wire chips of the early Xbox 1 mods. Also unlike the Xbox 360 hacks these Wii hacks are likely to stick around without being undone by system updates. Purportedly they modify the code coming off the disc on the fly, meaning that there isn’t really any changes to the system itself. Cool stuff indeed.
Other factors like storage space and a strong community backing are changing as well. The Gamecube didn’t have any onboard storage some modchips came with minimal space to launch apps, other apps had to be streamed on the fly through the broadband adapter, or loaded from a disc. The Wii had 512MB of onboard storage, which is more then enough for most homebrew apps, on top of that it has an SD card slot good for up to 2GB cards, and even if that isn’t enough it also has standard USB ports and built in WiFi, meaning that streaming media or roms over a network from a server is a painless process, and access to an external USB based device wouldn’t require any special hardware. As for the community, with the release of the Wii there has been a barrage of new Wii dedicated sites popping up; I’m most excited about Nintendo-Scene personally not to mention the massive amount of market share Nintendo has been able to attract in such a short amount of time it looks like Nintendo will have their day in the modding and homebrew limelights.