my beautiful, amazing xbox 360 hypervisor life
recently, a new exploit for the Xbox 360 dropped and has quickly gained attention. the reason? it’s the first exploit that’s truly software-only (the last exploit that reached anywhere near a full software-only way to run homebrew was the king kong exploit, in 2007). while the original release used tony hawk’s american wasteland to load the exploit, a cheaper method using a xbox live arcade demo was released a week after that makes it possible to run the exploit using only a USB drive.
many people have talked about the exploit in depth and what you need to have a good experience with it (despite its flaws), so I’m not going to drop my stupid, uninformed explainer for how it does its thing. you can go to these pages for that. rather, I’d like to talk about what I’ve been doing on my xbox using this exploit.
setting up
after following the various guides that are online, you’ll end up with a temporarily modded system that can run whatever, but what you’ll need is XeXMenu showing up on your dashboard. if you don’t, you should take out your USB real quick and drop it in there, along with aurora and a NAND dumper. get that NAND dumped just in case you fuck up and then move to aurora. once there, you’ll be able to do most of what you want for a good, modded experience. if you’re on the latest version of FreeMyXe you can connect your xbox up to the internet and launch an FTP server to transfer files, including some good ass games.
the game methods
first thing’s first, you need to understand the different types of game formats that exist on the console, and their compatibility with the exploit.
arcade games
xbox live arcade games are probably the easiest games to play, and can be easily patched to remove their demo limitations. you will need to have XM360 installed on your console (or move the content to a removable drive and unlock them with 360 content manager). you can then launch the homebrew and unlock them for full access to the game (i haven’t tried unlocking DLC yet but it should work the same as doing the process on an RGH console). you won’t be able to play them when in an unmoved state, but there’s only so much you could do with the demos.
indie games
from what I’ve seen, indie games do not work properly yet as they require an internet connection with xbox live to work, either as a demo or full game. i haven’t played with them much but you’ll most likely need to figure out how to fake the xbox live connection when launching the game, not sure how that can be done yet.
original xbox games
haven’t tried this, but the newest version of FreeMyXe should be able to run OG xbox backups and discs IF you run the OGXboxPrep.xex file that comes with it (disables patches that improve memory protection). you’ll need to run it again after quitting an OG xbox game if you want to run some homebrew that rely on those patches existing, not sure which ones need it though.
disc backups
the default xbox dashboard allows you to install disc games to your hard drive, making the game load faster and other benefits that come with not having the DVD drive in use. the only issue is that you need the disc in the console to authenticate your install and let it run. if you can back up the games from the disc again, I’d recommend deleting the old ones and ripping the games through aurora instead, as they don’t have that flaw and work like their digital versions from the marketplace. if you can’t get the disc again, you can use GOD Unlocker and convert your pre-existing disc install games into marketplace versions.
the other games
what I do when installing new games is to find a Redump ISO of the game I’m targeting, load up XISO, drop them in and patch all the XEX files that it extracts and copy them to my external hard drive. once it’s back in my xbox, I let aurora scan them and download the covers and stuff. in terms of getting your progress saved onto your profile and having achievements count and stuff, i do switch profiles after loading into the game as it shouldn’t mess with your profile and put you at risk of getting console banned after going online in the retail mode. obviously, switch to the homebrew profile when going back to aurora or xexmenu.
we ain’t doing geometry, we tryna play some GAMES
most of the games that i’ve been playing using bad update are non-backwards-compatible games that I never bought when the marketplace was still active, along with a couple of games where it’s difficult to play compared to the console release
here’s a list of some of them:
midnight club: los angeles - it’s not on PC and i won’t wait years for a proper recomp or emulator to be ready, plus you just don't get as much control as with analog sticks when playing any vehicle game (compared to a keyboard and those binary keys)
geometry wars 2 - the middle child of the geometry wars trilogy and the only one to not get a PC port, and is also bizzare creations’ last entry before they were shut down
project gotham racing 3 - solid launch title, I picked this one up for relatively cheap as they’re not really in demand right now
need for speed: most wanted (the good one not the criterion one) (can you tell I like racing games) - the PC version exists but as i’ve said it isn’t as fun to drive a car with a keyboard as with a controller
fable anniversary - it’s on PC but I don’t feel like setting either the PC version or the original xbox version up and playing that instead
i’ll probably go through more games while I still experiment with this exploit (i’m particularly looking at messing with XNA, as there’s a homebrew mod that makes it work completely offline), but for now this is where I am at. if I don’t drop my xbox again, I’ll push out an update in... 2 weeks?
future of this exploit
everyone involved with developing the tools to get this exploit working and usable has stressed that it’ll never be anywhere near a traditional “softmod” or jailbreak, like what the older PS3 revisions have. i do believe them, and even if bad update gets improved as much as it possibly can, there’s only so much you could do without finding another hypervisor exploit. even if the payloads improve and the timings are shrunk down, it’ll still be a long and downgraded process that can be fixed by getting someone to RGH your console for you. i should probably get on that myself, but I have better things to focus on than modding an xbox 360 and getting everything pre-loaded and cleaned up and shit. oh well, i’ll just be cheap and use this in the meantime.