February 18, 2010
Gaming Consoles: Nintendo Wii Modchips
Throughout the history of computer and video games, people have been compelled to tweak both software and hardware for fun and/or for monetary gain. From the game hacks on the ZX Spectrum giving you invincibility on Night Lore way back in the 1980s, to Nintendo Wii Modchips allowing you to play a greater range of games on their Wii.
Hardware developers and games developers have had a rocky relationship in regards to gamers and modders who are frequently are all part of the same crowd. In a sense, hackers add worth to the games and systems - e.g. modchips give great convenience to gamers who can download non-sanctioned games from the internet. To add to that, game hacks adds new purpose very challenging games, and in the modern gaming era it’s a convention for software makers to actually embed cheat codes for games players to discover.
Then again, software manufacturers say that this type of modding hurts their revenue, as chipmods can also be used to short-circuit piracy steps, and circumventing hardware that limits discs to play just in certain geographical locations. These are strong grounds for console and software developers to perpetually develop new measures to make chipmods more and more tricky.
Still, no matter how persuasive the arguments are against modifying chips, modding is now a big market that isn’t going to disappear anytime soon.
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