A little OT for this blog but there has been a lot of talk on forums over the last few weeks regarding a working PS4 jailbreak so I though we should clear a couple of points up and debunk a few myths and rumors. We all know about jailbreaking PS3's I mean thats why your hear reading this block it is of course not maybe something that appeals to everyone. There are others though that will decide which of the next generation consoles to go with based entirely on its likelyhood of being hacked. When the Playstation 3 was released much was made of the consoles resitance to being hacked but this all went out of the window once a simple method was made public. The method that did eventually surface was so easy that many gamers found themselves hacking a console for the first time. As we now move into the Playstation 4's life cycle this question is on many peoples lips. How long until there is a jailbreak or hack for the PS4? Then there are people who have already made claims that they have hacked the console and can run pirate games off it. The official line for wanting to hack a console is to gain the ability to run homebrew type applications and that piracy is a side issue. The majority of jailbreakers of course are only interested in playing the latest games for free on their consoles. At this early stage it does seem that any PS4 hack that does come out will not be as simple to execute as the one for the PS4. But of course that could change over night. Sony are simply crazy to think that someone will not figure out a somewhat simple solution to get into the Playstation 4 and mess around with is insides. Once the jailbreak does happen everyone will be waiting for Sony's response as last time there was a few high profile lawsuits that scared many of the hackers underground. The PS4 is winning this generation at the moment and a working jailbreak will shift a lot more consoles off the shelves than any new high profile game release.

How to Jailbreak PS3 with minimal risk.

Many owners worry about the risks involved when learning How to Jailbreak PS3 firmware to install backup managers but in most cases the actual risk with this step is not the one they should be worried about.  To perform a successful PS3 Jailbreak with 4.41 firmware or earlier the process is these days no more complicated than the official update process from USB.  The USB stick needs to be formatted to FAT32 with a folder "PS3" created in its root folder.  Inside the PS3 folder another should be made and named "UPDATE".  It is inside this update folder that you should place the jailbreak/CFW PUP file.  If this PUP file is not properly signed then the PS3 will not even recognize it so there is no danger of installing something that is fake or not working.  Once you have the PUP file in the correct folder choose System Update from USB on the PS3's XMB and your away.

After a little while you will have your newly jailbroken console with the 'Install packages' menu.  Packages are the PS3's install files for apps.  You find them with a PKG file extension.  Place them on your USB stick and choose 'install packages'

This is where some people will run into problems.  Since firmware 3.56 and above Sony can acivly scan a PS3's hard disk remotely when connected to PSN for any unauthorized programs that might be installed.  This means they can quite easily see if a console is hacked or not by finding the existence of the Multiman backup manager files for example.

So a good line of defence for this is to use a FTP program such as OpenFTP for the PS3 and connect and rename the Multiman folder so that it looks just like any other game install.  Multiman stealth can do a similar thing but with that everyone is using the same faked name so In time multiman will be detected.  So make one up for yourself.

The other big problem is account and console bans.  Account bans are common so it is wise to create a new user account and PSN account on the PS3 for the use of Custom Firmware only.  So keeping your original one safe from a ban.

Console bans are more serious but usually reserved for people caught cheating in games.  Many people who went online with a pirate copy of BLOPS2 received console bans recently.  From time to time there will be released a PS3 Unban PKG that will temporarily overwrite your consoleID with one that has not been black listed.  Of course again with this everyone using the same console ID will lead to it being blacklisted much quicker.  A better solution is to have your console spoof an ID that only you are using.  These valid ID's can be extracted from other unbanned consoles without even needing to the Jailbreak PS3 hardware.

To summarize:

• Use a separate PSN/SEN account when on CFW
• Rename Multiman folder to look non suspicious
• Do not cheat in online games.

Links:

• Multiman 4.40 PKG - Download
• ShowTime PS3 4.4 - Download
• OpenFTP PKG- Download
• Jailbreak 4.65 CFW - Download
• PS3 Unban - Download
• ReActPSN - Download

For a complete archive of all PKG's visit the Brewology site.

4.41 update fails to block PS3 Jailbreak

Every time Sony release an update the scene holds its breath to see if custom firmware PS3's are finally locked out of the PlayStation Network.  This time a huge sigh of relief again went out as it become obvious that this update changes little if anything security wise.  So people wishing to jailbreak a PS3 on 4.41 can do so with the usual CFW...

Firmware 4.40 cracked in hours - New PS3 Jailbreak news

Within hours of the latest firmware version 4.40 rolling out worldwide for the PS3 hackers claimed to have once again cracked the console open.  Early unconfirmed sources are showing videos of a fully updated PS3 on 4.40 running backups online with no problems.  It would appear that this is again a simple PUP file to download and install as custom firmware on the PS3 so not a real PS3 Jailbreak like the original consoles.  More a case of modified firmware really no doubt made possible through the recent release of the lvl 0 keys.  Whatever the technicalities its recommended that if you are thinking of jailbreaking your PS3 then this is the time to go for it before Sony close the loop hole like they have done so many times in the past.

But PS3 CFW user beware.  Something many of the the PS3 Hack sites do not tell you is the risk of being banned when going online with Custom Firmware.  There are a number of ways you can be banned.  You may receive an account ban which will see you needing to make a new account to use on PSN and losing all your progress and trophies in the process or you might get and out and out console ban.

The reasons people get banned online are varied but something that most console banned people are guilty of is running cheats with online games such as BLOPS2 and MW3.  Both these games have inbuilt spyware and complex cheat catching systems and they are quick to ban.

So for the average user wanting know how to jailbreak a ps3 the risk of a ban will be minimal.  Its only when they progress to the next level of ps3 hacking and try cheating that the ban will come.

Stay safe online - say no to cheats :)

click here to read more..

Collection of Grand Theft Auto V known information.

 We may not get it at the already revised release date for Spring 2013 but we are promissed the game in time for Christmas 2013.  With that in mind the Official UK Playstation magazine has brought together everything known so far.

The full article is linked at the bottom of this page for those of you who are unable to get to a UK magazine store lol.  Those of you who can should already be checking out this excellent magazine every month.




Heres some interesting quotes from the full article... 

The characters

Michael is the most intriguing of the three protagonists. In his early forties, he’s older than your average GTA star, and better off too, living in luxury with his family in well-to-do Rockford Hills, Los Santos’ equivalent to Beverly Hills.

His good fortune is the result of a ‘sweetheart’ deal made with the FBI years ago, but his wife’s profligate spending forces him to get back in touch with an old friend from his criminal days, Trevor.

Trevor by contrast has fallen on hard times and is now living in a trailer park out in Blaine Country, a seedy desert region based on the Salton Sea region of southern California. Trevor has a more reckless and impulsive personality than that of Michael’s, and this we’ve already seen that his headstrong ways are the source of much conflict between the main characters.

Completing the trio is a young street hustler named Franklin, who Rockstar’s Dan Houser describes as a “gang-banger in the post gang-banging world”. Aware that he’s on a fast-track to nowhere, Franklin associates himself with Michael and Trevor in the hope that they can teach him about the world of ‘real’ crime.

Maybe more interesting to more players is the actual gameplay and how the game itself runs.  Dont forget there were many complaints about game performance when the last game launched.  Most of which were patched out by RockStar eventually.  Sadly no one has played even an early version yet to get a feel for this side of things.  But the magazine has a few words on the actual game mechanics.

Gameplay

The entire Los Santos region is unlocked from the beginning and outside of missions the player can cycle freely between the three playable characters via a radial menu – in effect allowing you to warp from one side of the map to the other.

Once you’ve selected the character you wish to play as, the screen instantly swooshes out into an overhead view of Los Santos, before zooming back in on the chosen character, wherever they might happen to be at that instant. (The protagonists live out their lives independently when they’re not being controlled by the player – meaning you can find yourself dropping in on some very surprising situations.)

 The size of the map will make things interesting.  This is shaping up to be one big game
Locations

GTA V is big. Very big, in fact. It is estimated that its game world will be five times larger than those of San Andreas, GTA IV and Red Dead Redemption /combined/. This estimate factors in an enormous fully-detailed ocean floor (which you can explore while scuba diving) and the fact that each and every building now has an explorable interior. Due to the larger scale of the map, planes will make their return after taking a leave of absence during the GTA IV story arc.

San Andreas was a tale of three cities; Los Santos (Los Angeles), San Fierro (San Francisco) and Las Venturas (Las Vegas). Although GTA V boasts a larger overall game world, it kicks the latter two cities to the curb in favour of offering a proper, faithful rendition of Los Angeles and its surrounding landscape.

It’s a setting that provides plenty of scope for variety. The environments span the gauntlet from tacky commercial beachfronts to locked-down military bases; from desert lowlands to a fully scaleable Mount Chillad.

Source

New PS4 for Christmas 2013?

The hype built to a peak this last week as Sony tried to drum up interest in their new console.  The PS4 is apparently going to launch in time for next holiday season.  Which means we are probably looking at an early November launch for the console.  No news yet though if this is to be a global release or will the Japan market get their hands on the new device a year before the rest of the world as happened in the past.

But what of the actual console itself.  Well the first big news was Sony dropping the Cell processor touted as the next big thing when the PS3 launched in favor of Intel x86 architecture!  AMD will provide the graphics chip so does that mean it will basically be an 8 core PC with a mid ranged graphics card.  While at first this may sound like madness and the PS4 coming onto the market well behind current generation gaming PC's its not as underpowered as you first might think.

The problem with PC architecture is the multitude of different configuration and hardware a game would be expected to work on.  Add to the the already heavy work load being put on the processor and memory by Windows before the game has even loaded and you are looking at a substantial performance hit.  With a console this is different.  All consoles will be running the exact same hardware and a much more streamlined game os.  This means much more bang for buck when it comes to developing games.  Developers are able to squeeze much more out of a system like this (much like in the original retro home computer days) than a PC setup.

Another benefit is the already well established PC development chains that can now be used to create games directly for the PS4 when its launched hopefully later in the year.

To watch the whole announcement presentation click here

Very little said so far on the security measures that will be implemented in the new console but with the original PS3 jailbreak taking nearly three years from launch expectations will be high.  Sony will no doubt keep someform of Hypervisor method that served them so well during this generation but a recent patent application by them details a DRM method that times the loading of games and compares the result to a bluray disk.  A measure on its own which sounds quite simple to bypass.  Especially with an ODE setup.

Whats your views on the latest Key leak?

Despite the fact that you have been under a rock somewhere recently you will of course have heard of the latest PS3 hack. It has been posted all over the web with many calling a Master Key leak. Whatever updates Sony throw at the console in the coming months cam now be decoded and their secrets exposed. Understandably this is major bad news for Sony with it maybe meaning game over in their battle against the pirates. Read just a little between the lines and you get more of a background to why these keys were released the behind the scenes dealings that have been going on recently show the PS3 scene in a very poor light a state of affairs that hasnt changed from the Christmas that Fail0verflow and Geohot dominated the CCC conference. With such keys being so potent those in the know had already decided to never release them. News that angered the wider PS3 community greatly! That is until some Chinese hackers managed to nab the keys from them. With the keys they developed a new CFW and were in the process of doing their pre-sale hype over the forums. This is going to be another paid solution trying to make money from piracy. Something that goes completely against the scenes morals. Pre sales soon dried up though when the original developers begrudgingly released the keys for free. From here on we should see new CFW within hours of an OFW release thanks to these new keys. Something that benefits everyone.

New firmware releases from here on can be simply decoded and the hackers can then extract the online pass phrase something that up until now only a few people had the ability to do. So we can look forward to updated CFW for quite some time to come. Maybe we have seen the hackers finally win in the back and forth of hack then patch, or more likely Sony is already working on finding a way to stop this. One that started with the release of the original Jailbreak dongle. Lastly spare a thought for those poor PS3 Mod Chip sellers who now have over night lost their market.