New Console Ban Wave on Xbox LIVE?

[Draken]

I doesn't matter if there are backups behind them. People aren't suppose to modify their 360 in any way. When people decide to modify their 360, they knew the risk involved. You can't pout about something you knew was coming down the line.

No no, all I was only saying: HYPOCRITES!! nothing more

No newer games work fine on the older firmware, it's only the latest they won't play in due to stricter playback restrictions in that firmware.

Newest ban wave doesn't make the hard drive unusable as far as I'm aware.

Just the same as the old ones, they ban your console from Live, you can still use it offline.

Again MS drop the ball on this and ***** out of keeping up with their account bans, instead of console bans.

There are many many and many reports of people who can't install games to disk after this ban wave :pinch: that's making the HDD semi-unusable.

I guess if the EULA allows them to do that, it will be like retiring functionality of the product and not only disabling online access.

[sn00pie]

Yeah, wave 4 games will not work on the older firmwares. Only a few of the new games are wave 4, like the new GTA. Forza, FIFA 10 are all wave 3.

[threesixtyflip]

Just a quick question, but what is all this talk about "waves"?

[sn00pie]

Just a quick question, but what is all this talk about "waves"?

It's sort of a like a new protection in the games...and in order for you to play backed up versions of that, your X360 firmware has to "support" those new protected games. The latest games are wave 4, so basically the 4th level of protection if you will. Usually its not even a new protection, its just like a NXE update somewhere in the game, but the old iXtreme firmwares don't recognize it and won't play the game.

iXtreme is the firmware you flash your 360 with in order to play backed up games.

[ckempo]

Just a quick question, but what is all this talk about "waves"?

Yeah I was gonna ask that, at the risk of sounding thick.

[threesixtyflip]

It's sort of a like a new protection in the games...and in order for you to play backed up versions of that, your X360 firmware has to "support" those new protected games. The latest games are wave 4, so basically the 4th level of protection if you will. Usually its not even a new protection, its just like a NXE update somewhere in the game, but the old iXtreme firmwares don't recognize it and won't play the game.

iXtreme is the firmware you flash your 360 with in order to play backed up games.

Thanks for the update :D

[Rudy]

From what I can see (I could be wrong, I don't really keep track of this stuff), the people who make the hacked firmware decided to implement a check in the firmware to prevent people from playing malformed games (which could be detected by MS) but when MS came out with new ways to format the game (like when they started bundling the dashboard update with game) the games would be rejected by the firmware even though they are valid games. So older firmwares without that check will continue to play the games just like a real xbox (but if you download a bad rip then you could get ban)

[Vykranth]

I wonder how many players have been banned or had their account suspended. This afternoon, I have played against a lot of players with 0 Gamerscore and low prestige level in Call of Duty 4. That banhammer strike has been the most visible to me so far.

[Bubbabyte]

It's sort of a like a new protection in the games...and in order for you to play backed up versions of that, your X360 firmware has to "support" those new protected games. The latest games are wave 4, so basically the 4th level of protection if you will. Usually its not even a new protection, its just like a NXE update somewhere in the game, but the old iXtreme firmwares don't recognize it and won't play the game.

iXtreme is the firmware you flash your 360 with in order to play backed up games.

Actually it has nothing to do with protection. Here is some detailed info.

* What IS "Wave 4"?

A regular, retail Xbox 360 disk is split into several sections or "partitions". One of these partitions is known as the "video partition". Before March 2009, this partition simply contained a video that would play if you inserted the disk into a regular DVD player, the video would basically tell you that you were an idiot and need to put it into an Xbox 360 to play it.

One of the ways Microsoft can detect you being a dirty, filthy pirate is to scan this video to make sure it matches with what is supposed to be on the disk, so to protect you, the firmware itself does a quick checksum of it and if it doesn't match with known video data, it wont boot. Every now and then, this video changed, with each change being called a "wave".

Normally, system updates (dashboard updates) are stored on a different part of the disk, taking up about 8Mb of space, however in November 2008 Microsoft launched the "NXE", a completely new Dashboard for the system. Along with the new dash came Avatars, making the whole update substantially larger (somewhere in the region of 130MB). This meant the update wouldn't fit on the disk in the same partition that previous updates were located and so instead the update was placed within the video partition. This was known as "wave 3" and hit around March 2009.

As Microsoft now distributes new Dashboard updates in the same partition, each time the 360 gets a software update, we will see a new "wave" a few months later. There was a Dashboard update in August 2009 and that is now being distributed with the latest games. This is known as Wave4. Its identical to Wave3, except the video partition now contains the August 09 Dash update.

[bobeck]

it's certainly been an interesting ban wave to watch unfold...especially the folks who claim they backup all their own games and never use abgx in any way to fix them getting banned

[Qumahlin]

I wonder how many players have been banned or had their account suspended. This afternoon, I have played against a lot of players with 0 Gamerscore and low prestige level in Call of Duty 4. That banhammer strike has been the most visible to me so far.

The current banwave is a console ban, it wouldn't affect their gamerscore at all because they are banning console ID and not Gamertag.

They were issuing gamertag bans for the people playing Forza and a few other games early, but otherwise the large majority of bans for console "mods" is a Console ID ban.

[sn00pie]

Actually it has nothing to do with protection. Here is some detailed info.

yeah, second part of my post was about it being more of an update then protection. :p

[BoDEAN]

Not banned here. Just checked.

[George P Global Moderator]

I think if it's within MS's power they should knock out HDDs as well. Sorry to say, lots of people who pirate don't much care about live anyways. If you can crap on the hdd though, well that's a different matter now.

[BoDEAN]

Sorry to say, lots of people who pirate don't much care about live anyways.

Very much doubt that's true. Most games have patches/updates/rosters/online multiplayer modes, etc.

[Draken]

Very much doubt that's true. Most games have patches/updates/rosters/online multiplayer modes, etc.

nope, It's true, I couldn't care less about live, I'm a 100% offline/SP guy.

Not banned :woot:

[tablet_user]

sweet

[Tech Star]

This is getting confusing for me to follow. :p What you guys are saying is just confusing me. xD

So, those with a proper release can't get caught? It's just those idiots that download the un-proper releases early and games that are leaked early that are caught?

[Bubbabyte]

This is getting confusing for me to follow. :p What you guys are saying is just confusing me. xD

So, those with a proper release can't get caught? It's just those idiots that download the un-proper releases early and games that are leaked early that are caught?

pretty much sums it up. If you have a modded console, it's very much safe provided you are using proper and verified releases on or after the retail release.

[sn00pie]

Yeah, usually when you download a copy you run it through special software that "stealth" checks it. If it passes verification then it means the game is ok to play on XBL without getting caught.

Some early releases are fine too, its just idiots play them online early. It doesn't take a genius to realize that if your playing a game before its released, which will usually get you banned.

[Astra.Xtreme]

How am I misinformed? Don't newer (wave 4) games not work on the older patched FW? Isn't that the whole point of the activation disc itself? Thus my first comment is right, newer games need a newer firmware. Also, if the newest ban wave makes you hdd unusable as well, then you can't save or do anything (unless you get a memory card) the system is so gimped it might as well be a brick.

Noooo, Wave 4 does work on older firmware. The activation disc allows for newer firmware to boot newer games, but it takes away all the security checks,thus making it severely unsafe to play.

Some people claim that the banhammer messed up HDD abilities. It really goes both ways. Some work, some don't. In the end, nobody knows what the cause of the bannings is and what the official policy for consequences are. It's all speculation at this point still, so anything you hear otherwise is just b.s.

[Berserk87]

pretty much sums it up. If you have a modded console, it's very much safe provided you are using proper and verified releases on or after the retail release.

Yeah, usually when you download a copy you run it through special software that "stealth" checks it. If it passes verification then it means the game is ok to play on XBL without getting caught.

Some early releases are fine too, its just idiots play them online early. It doesn't take a genius to realize that if your playing a game before its released, which will usually get you banned.

the big thing about this ban wave is that a lot of people are claiming that they were banned even though there rips were verified several times with abgx, and never played games before release date or did any hacks/mods.

[George P Global Moderator]

As far as live goes, I don't care about multiplayer, I'm more for the story (which is also why I don't play games over often), but I do like it for the updates/patches and the demos ofc.

[Death Proof]

Same here , i dont give 2 hoots for the multiplayer . I play very little & its usually for some excellent single player story telling

[Draken]

well, I think that the install games to HDD issues is confirmed (tons of threads like that around the world), so:

If you're banned you loose install games to HDD functionality