Kyle Orland writes that Sony is preventing customers from re-downloading games they've already paid for, because code flaws in them may be used to run unsigned code on the portable console. The hack is reportedly useful only for homebrew, not for piracy. [Ars]

  • http://twitter.com/openfly ǝɔʎoſ ʇʇɐW

    And with that… the last fan of sony turned off their console, and looked out upon the gaming landscape today.  They breathed a heavy sigh.  Shed a single tear.  Stood.  Shook off the cheeto dust.  And with a heavy heart walked with mournful tread to their door.  One last look back over the shoulder, in a haze of tears is passed to the ps1 on their shelf.  And without turning to face it… they step into the world of real things back finally from their long journey in the fantastic realm of gaming.

    Stepping out your door is dangerous business though….

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Ender-Wiggin/100000885624281 Ender Wiggin

      and then they turned on their pc instead.

  • EH

    Sony is such a bunch of weirdos.

  • http://vertigo25.tumblr.com/ vertigo25

    Silly Rob. You seem to be living under the delusion that we live in a world where, if you pay for something, you actually own it. That’s just whacky.

    • http://www.nathanhornby.com/ Nathan Hornby

       There are countless situations whereby you pay for something and don’t own it; I’ve always seen this as a terribly weak justification for ownership of digital media.

      That time you got a ticket to go to the zoo?  Ye, you don’t own the zoo.

      • http://www.nunoncastors.co.uk/ James

        Straw man is strawy.

      • http://vertigo25.tumblr.com/ vertigo25

        Bad analogy. I own the ticket. In fact… my daughter has zoo tickets hanging on her wall. And the zoo can’t arbitrarily decide it doesn’t like the picture on the ticket, come to our house and take it away.

        Not to mention that in most cases when I pay for something without purchasing it, it is usually made *very* clear what the terms are and how long I may use it. Using your example, the zoo has particular hours. And, in fact, those tickets I mentioned on my daughter’s wall? They even say “One Day.”The point of the “I own it” argument, here, is twofold.When you buy something like the Vita, you *do* own it and you should be able to modify it in anyway you see fit; so long as those modifications are not harmful to the public. Just like if I were to buy a car, I could paint it, change the seats, add a new stereo… etc.And when people bought the games, they had a reasonable belief that these were not rentals, but purchases (as, when you buy a game, it’s actually referred to as “buy” and “purchase”).Even with the idea that I have purchased a *licence* for the game rather than the game itself, how is it at all ok for Sony to remove that game from my device and not replace it? I now *own* the license to… what?

      • Antinous / Moderator

        So….there’s no difference between buying a movie ticket that’s good for one showing and buying a DVD of the movie?

  • http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Mari Lwyd

    I really don’t understand the Sony-customer relationship.

    Or why one still exists.

    • elix

      Momentum. Sony is the new RIM.

      • http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Mari Lwyd

        I concur and hope they receive a similar end.

      • MythicalMe

         That’s backward. Sony came before RIM. They used to have some good stuff then decided to put profits ahead of customers.

        • Samuel Valentine

          *WOOSH*

    • oldtaku

      I think you’ve got the people who still remember the glory days of the PSX and PS2 and are still invested in the brand from that, especially as defined by opposing Sega and Nintendo  (PSX/PS2) and opposing Microsoft (PS2/PS3).

      On the positive side, the Vita is fantastic hardware, but starting to cripple it further for DRM purposes in less than a month is precocious even for Sony.

  • http://twitter.com/SargeMisfit Sarge Misfit

    I gave up on all those games a few years ago in favour of OpenSim, which is free and open source. Screw the Big Biz Bastards. My money’s still in my pocket and I’m having helluva lot more fun, too! :-D

  • AsteriskCGY

    Course, there’s all the commentators saying countering piracy is a legitimate issue so the legally buying folk will still have a product to legally buy. Because piracy is what killed the last gen Sony handheld. 

    Yup. 

    • elix

      Sony’s greed (you’ll pay $250) and hubris (because we say so) killed the last-gen Sony handheld (the PSP Go).

      I understand that corporations are amoral profit-driven ventures, but it’s almost as if Sony’s marketing division looks upon its fanbase as arisocrats look upon the peasantry and come up with metaphors involving bleating sheep to describe the commoners. The incredible dominance of the PS2 clouded their view of the world.

  • http://profile.yahoo.com/GTDIZ7HFEWP6PXJDH6SGJZD424 PS3GAMER

    stupid but whatever looks like I  just won’t being buying full games and such on PSN I will just buy physical copies from gamestop, bestbuy etc.  Plus I hate piracy and agree  people shouldn’t do it. Get a job and pay for it yourself.

    • Fex

       I know that three whole lines of text is a lot, but buried in there was this: “The hack is reportedly useful only for homebrew, not for piracy.”

      Concluding this post with a biting remark that connects PS3GAMER with the sort of company that treats its customers with as much contempt as Sony does is left as an exercise to the reader.

    • http://www.nathanhornby.com/ Nathan Hornby

       ”Get a job and pay for it yourself.”

      If their reading skills are as good as yours, it’s an unlikely achievement.

  • http://twitter.com/frederikvdz Frederik

    I’d expect them to take the games down, fix the bug, and then putt them back in the store. That would be the sensible thing to do.

    • http://twitter.com/incarnedine_v Dan Hibiki

       Yeah well… you know…

  • Andrew Singleton

    Nintendo is only slightly better. Sudokuhax as far as i could tell only allowed the running of homebrew, yet it was patched ast year. I can understand making updates purely tothwart flash carts that would also allow the running of commercial rom dumps put something purely to kill homebrew?

    Yea. Sony isn’t the only cmpany that does this sort of thing.

    • donovan acree

       I see patching a console to prevent add-ons as a completely different issue than denying game owners access to previously purchased content.
      I wouldn’t lump Nintendo along with Sony on this one.

      • Andrew Singleton

        Yet Nintendo patched out a loophole that was used to run homebrew/unsigned code using bought gaes from their store. All that would be required would be an SD card.

        Comparison still stands.