Why Sony why?

Alright, as much as you guys might think that this is an outright anti-Sony article, it isn’t. But then again, this isn’t one of those lame petitions which are useless anyways. Recently, I’ve been thinking quite a bit. You see, even though the homebrew scene itself is on a roll, with the huge number of hacks and other accomplishments, good homebrew itself is hardly to be found these days. Now I love all the stuff that Dark AleX is making, but in the end, it’s just a means to an end; then end being running homebrew on the latest firmware.

And that’s where the problem is. I’ve been a spectator in the PSP scene since the PSP came out, and believe me, while the amount of homebrew has grown exponentially, the quality has gone down by leaps. A small reason might be the dumbing-down of development so that every 12-year old kid with an idea can make something. But that’s like blaming the newspaper for bad news. OK, bad analogy, but I guess you get my point. Ultimately, there’s nothing more rewarding than making something to benefit everyone in the scene, whether it’s making libraries, engines or IDEs. And yes, to an extent, it does help the newbies to get eased into development. But the problem lies elsewhere.

For a moment, just try to remember atleast 8-10 homebrew authors. And while you’re at it, don’t count people like Dark AleX, or Fanjita or anyone of them hackers (Just supporting my “means to an end” idea). Difficult, isn’t it? The problem is that while we have all the great hackers in the scene, when it comes to original addictive homebrew, there isn’t much to speak of. Again, emulators are just a means to an end; so while people like Yoyofr can get into the PSP homebrew hall of fame, they’re just helping us play all those Snes games; nothing more, nothing less.

The problem lies with Sony, and they way they’ve handled homebrew. It isn’t hard to see that they’ve used all their might to try and kill homebrew on the PSP. While this might sound surprising to many people, it isn’t out of their behavior. For as long as I can remember, Sony have always wanted full control over their hardware. Whether that was by putting proprietary software down our throats, or making proprietary hardware and dumping it in our hands. We’ve already seen multiple fiascos when it comes to their storage mediums. The UMD, just one of them.

Thinking about it, I don’t think it would have been difficult for Sony to simply give some control into the hands of the people, and let them be happy with it. Microsoft with their XNA concept is one of the greatest examples that I can give you. A while ago, homebrew was a relatively small thing. But because of the internet, it’s become a huge phenomenon. Whether it’s game machines or other gadgets. People want control in their hands, and they want to be able to dictate what they want to do with their gadgets. Is that a bad thing? Absolutely not. The problem, as I said, lies with the control-freak attitude of certain big companies.

Take the case of XNA by Microsoft. There’s already a few dedicated sites for Xbox 360 homebrew, and since it is officially recognised by Microsoft themselves, there’s a better chance of people actually putting in quality time to make something for everyone. With the case of the PSP, homebrew developers have slowly been getting annoyed by the almost dictatorial attitude of Sony. Again, it’s not always a bad thing – any company has a right to protect their intellectual property. But the heights to which they go to shows them in a bad light. And if people are trying to justify Sony’s actions by saying that they’re trying to stop ISO loaders, you can give up. For a long time, people on firmware 2.01 and above were stuck with user-mode homebrew, which was nothing more than emulators and small games/applications made for fun. The fact that Sony kept updating their firmware everytime a small bug was found showed that whether it’s an ISO loader or a simple Hello World, they don’t care.

Ultimately, it’s nothing more than the childish control-hungry attitude of Sony which is taking them away from our hearts. It wouldn’t take them long to make something like XNA for the PSP. While the number of homebrewers might not be that big, it is still quite a substantial amount. Alienating all of them is something which they can’t afford to do at this point. So c’mon Sony, are you listening?

Alright, as much as you guys might think that this is an outright anti-Sony article, it isn’t. But then again, this isn’t one of those lame petitions which are useless anyways. Recently, I’ve been thinking quite a bit. You see, even though the homebrew scene itself is on a roll, with the huge number of hacks and other accomplishments, good homebrew itself is hardly to be found these days. Now I love all the stuff that Dark AleX is making, but in the end, it’s just a means to an end; then end being running homebrew on the latest firmware.

And that’s where the problem is. I’ve been a spectator in the PSP scene since the PSP came out, and believe me, while the amount of homebrew has grown exponentially, the quality has gone down by leaps. A small reason might be the dumbing-down of development so that every 12-year old kid with an idea can make something. But that’s like blaming the newspaper for bad news. OK, bad analogy, but I guess you get my point. Ultimately, there’s nothing more rewarding than making something to benefit everyone in the scene, whether it’s making libraries, engines or IDEs. And yes, to an extent, it does help the newbies to get eased into development. But the problem lies elsewhere.

For a moment, just try to remember atleast 8-10 homebrew authors. And while you’re at it, don’t count people like Dark AleX, or Fanjita or anyone of them hackers (Just supporting my “means to an end” idea). Difficult, isn’t it? The problem is that while we have all the great hackers in the scene, when it comes to original addictive homebrew, there isn’t much to speak of. Again, emulators are just a means to an end; so while people like Yoyofr can get into the PSP homebrew hall of fame, they’re just helping us play all those Snes games; nothing more, nothing less.

The problem lies with Sony, and they way they’ve handled homebrew. It isn’t hard to see that they’ve used all their might to try and kill homebrew on the PSP. While this might sound surprising to many people, it isn’t out of their behavior. For as long as I can remember, Sony have always wanted full control over their hardware. Whether that was by putting proprietary software down our throats, or making proprietary hardware and dumping it in our hands. We’ve already seen multiple fiascos when it comes to their storage mediums. The UMD, just one of them.

Thinking about it, I don’t think it would have been difficult for Sony to simply give some control into the hands of the people, and let them be happy with it. Microsoft with their XNA concept is one of the greatest examples that I can give you. A while ago, homebrew was a relatively small thing. But because of the internet, it’s become a huge phenomenon. Whether it’s game machines or other gadgets. People want control in their hands, and they want to be able to dictate what they want to do with their gadgets. Is that a bad thing? Absolutely not. The problem, as I said, lies with the control-freak attitude of certain big companies.

Take the case of XNA by Microsoft. There’s already a few dedicated sites for Xbox 360 homebrew, and since it is officially recognised by Microsoft themselves, there’s a better chance of people actually putting in quality time to make something for everyone. With the case of the PSP, homebrew developers have slowly been getting annoyed by the almost dictatorial attitude of Sony. Again, it’s not always a bad thing – any company has a right to protect their intellectual property. But the heights to which they go to shows them in a bad light. And if people are trying to justify Sony’s actions by saying that they’re trying to stop ISO loaders, you can give up. For a long time, people on firmware 2.01 and above were stuck with user-mode homebrew, which was nothing more than emulators and small games/applications made for fun. The fact that Sony kept updating their firmware everytime a small bug was found showed that whether it’s an ISO loader or a simple Hello World, they don’t care.

Ultimately, it’s nothing more than the childish control-hungry attitude of Sony which is taking them away from our hearts. It wouldn’t take them long to make something like XNA for the PSP. While the number of homebrewers might not be that big, it is still quite a substantial amount. Alienating all of them is something which they can’t afford to do at this point. So c’mon Sony, are you listening?