Ask Slashdot: Are The Days of Homebrew Gaming Over? 181
Croakyvoice writes "A few years ago the Homebrew community went from one console to another releasing some excellent software, from the Days of the Dreamcast the first breakthrough homebrew console, to the PSP which gave us the first handheld Nintendo 64, GBA and PSX emulators on a handheld. The last few years we have seen Microsoft, Nintendo, Sony and Apple all bring out means to thwart homebrew development. The app store on both Android and iOS have taken many homebrew devs over to try and break the market. The major consoles have so many firmware updates that the days of Homebrew seem to be numbered, is there a way back for the Homebrew Community?"
Easy. (Score:5, Insightful)
You can write a "homebrew" choose-your-own-adventure text game in minutes or hours at most.
Without some understanding as to what the author means by "homebrew", this question can't really be answered effectively.
Perhaps if there were an article linked, we'd get that additional information...
Look into XNA (Score:4, Insightful)
Not really. (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless homebrew means "writing software by breaking through console security", there's plenty of homebrew out there.
The fact that Android is mentioned means the original question is vague to begin with!
First off, Android has basically no restrictions - you can install any app any which way you want. There's no "security" to break through so homebrew is basically legitimized - anyone can download the Android SDK and whip out an app. For iOS, it's mostly true as well - homebrew apps games well, they just get the SDK, pay $99 and publish it.
If you want apps that Apple doesn't approve, there's jailbreaking (all Apple devices except AppleTV have a method to do so - all iPhones through (and including) the 4s, iPod Touches and iPads), of which there's a homebrew community as well.
And the Xbox has a homebrew games community they call Xbox Live Indie Arcade as well.
Then there's the venerable PC which even with Mountain Lion can still run any valid executable code.
Of course, if the question is about people breaking security for fun, there's iOS jailbreaking and console security busting.
Between the PC, Xbox Live Indie Arcade, Android, and iOS, there's an outlet for one's programming talents that has legit paths that require no work to customize, really. And since the signing keys for the PS3 are public as well, the PS3 is also an open target that no firmware update can remove (though you can get your console banned from PSN if they discover "strange packages" installed on it).
Perhaps the better question is - what is the real question?
Re:No (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Depends, how much money you got? (Score:5, Insightful)
Fuck homebrew. You want to write your own games? Do it on the PC. Until that's locked down at least. Homebrew is a distraction and a trick to build on a closed platform by prying it open temporarily with a hack. Don't do it. Put your effort into a platform that's actually open. Don't like the diversity of hardware and software? Well if you can build for a Nintendo Wii with it's underspec'd everything and still come out with something fun and usable, stop whining and build for the lowest common denominator on the PC
What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Between XNA, Steam, flash games, iOS, Windows Store, Kindle Store, Google Play, and the upcoming spectacular failure Ouya, the homebrew gaming scene is better than it has ever been.
Re:No (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:No (Score:2, Insightful)
There is no conversation to be had when a headline & story is so uninformed. It's just some writer trying to justify having their job. The article is wrong, the answer is no, nothing more can be said.