Red Octane and Activision have finally announced that the Guitar Hero: World Tour (Xbox 360, PS2, PS3, Wii) Drum Tuning Kit is now available for download. Click on through for more details.

This one's for everyone who misses the Science blog. So that includes me? *Grin*. Anyway, In case you didn't know, the Large Hadron Collider's atom smasher will start today.

So how would you feel about contributing to the research of the Large Hadron Collider? You know, help destroy the world and everything. I kid. But someday you might be able to contribute to the LHC's research. That part's true. Following in the footsteps of Folding@Home is LHC@Home. Dun dun dunnn.

And a big load of thanks goes to trigger for the tip!

"Linux" may have been a bad word in Xbox Live, but that shouldn't stop Linux fans from running the OS on their Xbox 360 platforms. New experimental patches have been released to allow people using Linux on their Microsoft console to upgrade to a newer kernel. More details in the full article.

(Editor's Note: Epicness was never this awesome!)

It's another great week again! We have quite a lot of reasons why we're celebrating, and not least of them all is the fact that QuickJump QuickPeek's finally hit its 30th edition!

Let's pop them corks and let the champaign flow. Everyone's got a reason to party this weekend!

*Originally posted Jan 19, 2008 at 02:49PM

 

You can't talk about web comics without mentioning Tycho and Gabe's Penny Arcade Adventures. With their off-beat, tongue-in-cheek style of comedy about the video gaming industry, gamers will finally get to experience this unique brand of humor in Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness (I personally blame Tycho and Gabe for such a mouthful of a title for their game) developed by Hothead Games.

Suffice to say, the developers are having a lot of fun making the game, probably as much as players will have playing it. Don't take my word for it - in an interview with Joel DeYoung, the producer of Hothead, he gives the team at QJ.net the low-down on the upcoming game based, of course, on the Penny Arcade Adventures web comic. He talks about many interesting points regarding the game's mechanics, as well as the active involvement of the web comic's creators.

The game was originally unveiled during last year's Penny Arcade Expo. There's been no official release date set, however, you can expect it to come out by years end. Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness is slated to come out on the PC, Mac, Linux, and Xbox 360 (Xbox Live Arcade) platforms. Either way, fans everywhere will be waiting with baited breath for the game's release. Don't worry, though, we'll be sure to give you up-to-date reports on the game as we get them.

Check out the full interview right after the jump!

Linux fans who own Xbox 360s may have already noticed this, but it's always good to share some cute factoids: inserting the word "Linux" in the Xbox Live motto section is a big no-no.

Typing in the word and entering it prompts the following message to pop-up: "Your motto contains inappropriate language. Please try again."

Other people tried typing in the names of other rival companies and consoles to see if the names are banned as well, like Nintendo (which was not blocked), It's also interesting to note that typing Windows and Microsoft are banned in Microsoft's online gaming service.

Well, there you have it, a strange mini easter egg from Xbox Live. It's just good knowing these little interesting things, don't you think so?

Following the announcement of *takes a deep breath* Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness (boy, that's a mouthful) heading to the Xbox Live Arcade, Hothead Games and Penny Arcade just launched the official website for their upcoming episodic title.

The website will give the fans of Gabe and Tycho some game-related content and news. You can even view some trailers, screenshots, and fact sheets about the game. The website will also be used to launch the individual episodes in the series once they become available for purchased download.

On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness: Episode One is scheduled to roll out later this year for the PC, Mac OS X, Linux, and Xbox 360 platforms.

Click the Read link below to check out the official Rain-Slick site!

Downgrading your Xbox 360 firmware from any Kernel without using your CPU key used to be just a legend. However, some enterprising hackers on the xboxhacker.net had plans on doing just that.

After much thought they were able to successfully do so using a method that has been dubbed a "timing attack". A hacker by the handle Robinsod managed to successfully boot his Xbox360 using a flashed eFuse with kernel 1888.

While less experienced (and less daring) individuals might not be able to do this for now, the hackers are currently working on a way to simplify the process.

Here's a little quote from Robinsod explaining how the process works:

The timing attack does not try to "bruteforce" the cpu key itself. It tries to find/bruteforce a hash value which is a result of the usage of the cpu key (so even if you have that hash you still cannot backwards compute the cpu key). But finding this hash value (I usually refer to it as the CB-auth value) will enable the xbox to boot the original kernel (v 1888).

This then allows you to upgrade to a vulnerable kernel (eg 4532) and THEN you can extract the cpu key using the kk exploit. Since -on average- you will find the correct value at roughly half of the possible byte values you only need to try (approx) 128 values for each of the 16 bytes.

Thats why vax is talking about 16 * 128 total number if byte changes... There is a theoretical minimum to the reboot time of about 1 second. So in theory you could find the 16 bytes in 34 minutes. Thats probably not gonna happen. Grin And installing the hardware will probably take even more time so its not a really big issue. But this is basically where the time speculations are based on.

This could be good news for the hacking community considering that further refinements on this technique will eventually lead to homebrew, Linux, and possibly even custom firmware for the Xbox 360. For more details on this, feel free to click on our read link which will send you to the forums where this was announced.

Console modding fans may be disappointed that popular modchip creators Team Xecuter have retired from creating products of the sort due to recent raids by the US government on stores carrying the product.

In a statement published in their website, Team Xecuter took a swipe at what they call "crazy times" and said:

We feel our mods are shipped in a legal format with Linux pre loaded and any other products we make contain no copyrighted code and no circumvention of copy protection.

The team assured the public that the modchip division is the only part of their service which will be discontinued. They said that Team Xecuter would instead focus on non-mod operations to deliver products that will enhance the experience for gamers.

The PSP homebrew community has seen a certain number of great programmers out there, Mathieu Hervais of Noobz being one of them. 22 years old and still a student, he is know by most in the PSP homebrew scene as Mathieulh. Today, the Exophase Forums has posted an interview they've conducted with the homebrew developer and a couple of interesting tidbits surfaced.

Now in light of hearing about Dark AleX leaving the PSP scene for good (supposedly due to possible issues with Sony), it seems that Mathieulh might be following suit. Not that he's leaving-leaving, but he says he'll quit working on what he's know for most: custom firmware.

Mathieulh: I will continue to be in N00bz and perhaps help a few friends of mine developing softwares but I am done with anything related to custom firmwares.

This bit of news might prove to be a slight hitch at homebrew development, to say the least. However, our sullen feelings were quickly replaced by something from out in left field. Homebrew for the PS3 and 360? Is he leaving PSP custom firmware for bigger fish to fry? Right after giving the answer above, he was asked whether he would like to tinker around with other next-gen consoles.

Mathieulh: The Xbox360 or the PS3 (I am not intested into the wii for homebrews and I do not take part in piracy either). I am more interested on the Xbox360 though as the system is way better to develop on (unlike what Sony tries to claim with the ps3). I like the fact that the cpu uses real cores (and not SPUs) and that each of those can handle 2 threads at a time. Although the PS3 would probably be way easier to hack than the 360, the 360 installed userbase is greater. Beside SCE claim that they will persecute anyone finding an exploit on their console (which is still not illegal in certain places such as the EU) so I rather not take my chances on it. Still kudos to Microsoft for their work in securing the 360 kernel, this is what I call a real security (and a real challenge for hackers)

Will he pursue homebrew on the 360 or PS3? The way he says it, it seems unlikely - Mathieulh thinks that both the PS3's Linux and Xbox 360's XNA are "way too restricted." Regardless, it's interesting to note what his take is on homebrew for both next-gen consoles. To see the full transcript of the interview, we've posted a Read link below which leads to the Exophase Forums.