Ben-DutkaOkay, so maybe the game is done. Maybe it's just a technical thing…
GTPlanet has been delving into the Gran Turismo 5 delay issue in an attempt to uncover a root cause. As it turns out, and as a moderator at the Blu-Ray.com forums stated, this is all due to the recent hacking/pirating snafu, which resulted in SDK moderation and restriction for the first time. This in turn caused problems with GT5:
"Like I said it is manufacturing issues. I had it confirmed today.
The problem arose when SCE mandated SDK 350 on all games releasing after after October, GT5 was about to go gold running on SDK 341, but it has been delayed by around a week so that they can update to SDK 350. This has caused a big headache for the manufacturing side, given how big this game is missing the gold date by even a week can cause a months worth of delay as slots are already taken up at this time of year for Blu-ray movies and such. So Sony had to find a 3 week slot big enough to make 7m+ copies of this and get them shipped out.
This follows hot on the heels of the news that Polyphony Digital missed their production window by a mere three days . Firmware update 3.50 for the PlayStation 3 is a good deal more secure than 3.41 and simply put, distributing a GT5 for the new version insures it can't be pirated. Well, for the time being, at any rate. So for all you who desperately attempt to defend software piracy with double-speak by saying it doesn't really hurt anyone, this delay may be just for you.
in a way am releived, so long as its not a technical issue on the game side, then am happy.
I have been following a lot of the homebrew chatter across the interweb and it is surprisingly "impressive" how quickly the modding community is revealing the secrets and mysteries of the inner workings of the PS3 to the wider gaming community.
I am not at all surprised by this. I am expecting more leaks to occur down the line as there is obviously a sect of the hacking community that is hell bent in grating Sony up the wrong way.
After 5 years of intense development on GT5, costing upwards of 60 million + I am sure Sony do not want to take any chances. The Sony SDK3.50 supposedly incorporates a set of NEW encryption keys used to decrypt the "eboot.ini" file of the said game allowing it to boot and run.
Without knowing what the new set of encryption keys are hackers cannot tamper with "eboot.ini", and therefore games would be un-affected by current jailbreak devices on the market.
…but for how long?…
Q!
"play.experience.enjoy"
Last edited by Qubex on 10/15/2010 10:18:30 AM
Yes and no. That community is nibbling at the edges, the most direct attack used what was effectively a stolen key to a door lock. But, that still doesn't grant access to the locked containers within.
It's like being able to capture the code/signal from a garage door opener and using a fake door opener to get into someone's garage. You still don't have keys to the house, but you can get inside the garage. If you take a retail PS3 without debug functionality in the firmware, there is no hack to gain access to that system.
There are core elements of the PS3 hardware and software security that have not and quite possibly never will be penetrated. A lot of folks online want to talk up this supposed hack, when in fact it really, really isn't a hack. At best you could say that it is an exploit because by emulating a service key you can exploit the service mode of the system to gain access to run unsigned code. However, the thing is that this does not penetrate the security of the PS3 system. It allows users to exploit a feature of the firmware that is normally reserved for service purposes.
Of course Sony blocked that, and with firmware 3.5 has enhanced that block further still.
Ah, who would developers blame for all their ills from delays to poor sales if it weren't for piracy? So what's the excuse for GTA5's delay the past year before piracy became a (non)issue for Sony? I'll bet anyone a fiver that a japanese GTA5 will show up on the internet, ready to play for jailbroken PS3s, before the retail copy hits the stores. Sony can't win this game they are now stuck in forever, a new firmware update each week in an attempt to shutdown jailbreakers. The jailbreakers keep on breaking and modding and Sony's consumers continue to suffer as game developers can't thoroughly test their stuff under one firmware before Sony freaks out and puts out another firmware with some erroneous public purpose (like the one that stopped alot of 3rd party usb devices from working with the PS3 to ensure 'quality' but it was obv just an attempt to stop the jailbreak dongles from working, which, btw, didn't work, heh). Keep on sweating it, Sony, i got a psbreak two weeks ago that can be flashed via my PC when things change on Sony's side and, as of yesterday, a 'third-generation' jailbreak usb dongle is now available (mine's old already) that allows game updates over PSN. Since the PS3 was originally advertised as allowing one to install another O/S, and Sony subsequently removed this feature, they a) allowed the jailbreak dongles to possibly fall under the new US laws that allow jailbreaking for devices where feature were removed by the manufacturer and b) probably made it easier for the current usb jailbreaks to appear as folks took their eyes off the fairly complex hypervisor access and took another look at those two (or four) front doors called USB ports and within a few weeks the dongles were a flyin'. At this rate Sony will be lucky if they can just keep up with injunctions as these things are all over the place now. Prob some help from the Linux community in their development, no doubt. Treat your consumers like criminals, they may become criminals….HA!
So what does this accomplish, stopping people from copying the game?
It tries to delay it somewhat… but if you read my comment above, once the decryption keys for "eboot.ini" are cracked then the game could be launched from a "back-up" made of the original disk.
The reality is that the decryption keys are secret, and, from what I know, the hacking community will find it very very difficult to actually crack the encryption itself, unless the decryption keys themselves are leaked from within Sony.
I guess these are a closely guarded secret now, and I would not be surprised if Sony has really tightened up security internally so that the 3.41 debacle does not happen again.
Unless hackers go for a "hardware" style jig of the system, able to dump ram (in real time) as the PS3 is running code, I don't think they can get to those keys…
By moving the GT5 code base to SDK3.50 they are securing the game with the new decryption key sets so copies of it cannot run on lower firmwares that are jail broken like firmware 3.41. From firmware 3.42 the exploit has been patched and new encryption keys have been used for newly released titles, including the delayed GT5.
Q!
"play.experience.enjoy"
Last edited by Qubex on 10/15/2010 10:38:34 AM
It makes it so that even if you copy the game, you won't be able to play it on a jailbroken PS3, because the lower firmware doesn't have the new key to decrypt the game, to enable it to load.
Yes!
Q!
"play.experience.enjoy"
Qubex,
It's already possible to dump the memory of a PS3, but what you cannot get at is the keys because they do not reside in the memory. The PS3 uses the cellBE processor. The Cell BE includes encryption and secure processing features that are not handled in the firmware at all. One of the SPEs on the Cell is reserved at all times to act as a secure processing vault. That SPV is the final authority on security and encryption. There is a chain of trusted encryption that is rooted in that SPV. The trouble for everyone who wants to hack it is that the only place that the keys are held is inside the processor and cannot be dumped. The SPV automatically clears it's local store if it is reset, and will not accept memory requests from the outside. Simply put, there is no way to get the SPV to hand over it's secrets, and there is no way to look into it to capture them that way.
I think it's a good idea to delay the game to patch it to SDK3.50. If it was hackable from day 1, then I'd imagine sales would suffer significantly.
…to be honest, I don't think sales would suffer that much… if you wanted to "copy" the game you would need to download about 40GB of data…
Not many people would have the patience to download that amount of data, and if you did, your external USB hard drive would lose a nice chunk of its storage space, not to mention it would probably take you a month or more to complete a download of that size. Just not practical.
I would rather own the original of the game myself, and so would the majority of people if they have a choice I think, especially the GT fanatics…
Q!
"play.experience.enjoy"
I don't think downloading would take that long, would it? I'm thinking that it would take about the same amount of time as copying my backup files to the PC. When I was doing that with my 60gb HDD from the old ps3, it had 45gb of data and it took about hour or so to get it copied to the PC from the external HDD. Perhaps the ps3 will take longer to copy, but certainly not that long. With dsl, internet downloads maybe.
Well, I'm p'eed off about those hackers
Its not like downloading Illegal music because singers use Auto Tune, theres no trick to just perfect a game ><
So, here's my theory.
1. PD was late by 3 days on developing.
2. Updating SDK to 350 took about an extra week.
3. Sony needs about 3 weeks of open time to produce enough for a (probably) global release.
With those in mind, it looks like it might reach December, but early at the latest.
In my opinion, this is just one of many reasons GT5 is delayed.
Kaz has stated that GT5 is only 85-90% of where he wants it.
I honestly believe the game was worked on till the 11th hour and it explains why SDK 350 wasn't implemented sooner.
I think it's pretty much clear that this is only one of the many reasons, so it's not so much an opinion, especially now that we know PD was 3 days late.
I'm also wondering why SDK wasn't implemented earlier if it was mandatory. Firmware 3.50 was released Sept. 21st I believe, and I always thought developers would get their hands on it earlier than the consumers.
I hope that means the delay is only for few weeks
As much as I hate hackers, I don't think this is that big of an impact due to the fact on TGS, the release date stayed the same. Around that time, I assume they're well aware of firmware 3.50 or SDK 350 (and the fact that it's mandatory by Sony), so if a delay is to be announced it would be there or somewhere in the month. The problem we're seeing now is that the delay is announced only weeks before the launch date.
This is why it's crucial for developers to be on time for production. PD was 3 days late, and that's a big deal around the holidays where more companies are mass producing BDs too.
True, but I also think that Sony never anticipated the hacker scene would jump on the PS3 so rapidly. They probably didn't think the PSJailbreak would pose such a threat up until the past few weeks.
So, I think an executive decision was made at the last minute to ensure GT5 implement SDK 3.50 and guarantee security from the hackers — at least for the crucial holiday season.
(in all likelihood, GT5 will be hacked in a few months, anyways)
Sony considered the PSJailbreak thing a threat from day 1, that's why they took court action and immediately pushed out a firmware update to block it. They enhanced that with firmware 3.5. There may be additional countermeasures in 3.5 that Sony wants included in all future games.
Sony has not been slow reacting to the cloned service key attacks.
i think gran turismo 5 delayed itself in fear of call of duty black ops
Oh please. There not even the same genre and GT will obviously do well on it's own since it's been the top selling game of all time for 2 generations.
Flamebait much?
uh… Booze…. what? Why would a racing simulator be scared of a war game that uses auto-aim?
Maybe because the Call of Dooty sheep may have finally out numbered the GT sheep?
like i said, Flamebait.
Even I know booze925 is wrong.
yeah, they're baaaaad.
… I apologize.
i knew id get sum flak for that!
just so im clear,
I WAS JUST KIDDING
@booze925
That doesn't make it any better. It's still flamebait and a weak one at that lol
who cares what you think buddy?
i sure as hell don't
I think hot peppers are a little spicy. I think the sun is bright. I think roses are red. I think snow and ice are both cold. I think I have gas. And I think what you said is pure flamebait.
You might not care what any of us 'think', but all of the aforementioned details remain true, whether you like or care about it or not.
@booze925
You don't care, huh? Well seeing that you bothered to defend yourself and give yourself a thumbs up to make it seem like someone agreed with you, I think you do. 😉
I've read Medal of Honor forces you to update to 3.50 before you can play the game so this makes sense. Good for Sony, screw the hackers. As Ben said, this is proof hackers hurt the industry.
I think it's funny that some people think Hackers are somehow heroes…
I know, like the tool who thumbed me down. 🙂
Well if this news is true, good to know now that I won't have to wait for an update as soon as I pop in the GT5 disc in for the first time. That would be killer for me. The 10gb, optional install is enough!
Anyone who hacks Microsoft stuff is a hero in my book.
Well this makes perfect sense. It is very true that if you call your BD manufacturer and tell them you don't want the run to go through on schedule it doesn't mean they can just turn around and say "ok we'll do it on thursday instead." They have contracts to fulfill.
Now obviously producing 7 million GT5s is a pretty good job that anyone would want, but realistically speaking, yeah, it's going to cause at least a few weeks delay.
GT5 fans should be jumping for joy over this news. Your game is coming boys.
Last edited by Alienange on 10/15/2010 1:12:43 PM
Not that I've thought much about it before, but 3 weeks for 7 million discs seems like a long time. I need a 'How do they do it' episode.
It's all about scheduling. Like someone said earlier, if one thing gets pushed back, you'd have to push everything else back. Since they have contracts, etc, they can't interrupt plans on another contract, so they fit it in where possible. It probably will take an extra week or so to prepare the update upgrade, then all paperwork after that.
If they produced one BD a second it would take 81 days for them to make 7 million copies. I'd say being patient for another couple weeks ain't bad.
They should have a midnight release outside the factory every night and we could all turn up and fight over them. I probably wouldn't win a copy until the 21st night but it would help kill time.
Killer math, btw.
You've got yourself a great idea there. Hell, I'd pay to see some GT5 fans beat each other up. That'd be hilarious.
So THAT's why Best Buy wants money to do this! The freakin games won't work if you get home and don't have internet.
Nah, I'm sure GT5 with also have the update on the disk itself, so when you put it in it'll ask you to update and you'll copy the data from the game disk.
there well always be hacking.. It hurts those of us who buy retail games day one and hurts prices further still to need such securities incorporated into media and hardware… Sad, really, that those who defend their actions by using prices as an excuse continue to cause them to rise..
nonetheless, I can wait a bit longer if it means Sony can be at peace with their countermeasures. unfortunately for the GT team, this has once again become an sore issue for their development and left many pointing fingers at them. I don't know about you all, but I'd be pretty tired and mentally ill of it all..
yah, pretty much for the hacking part too.
Honestly, does such a great title not deserve more than the $60 it'll cost (standard version). I could understand something like a sub 60s score title getting pirated but with GT5 you know that Polyphony clearly will give you a great experience and they don't deserve to lose out on their years worth of work.
Sweet, I'm glad to hear that the GT5 delay may be due to preventing piracy by having it ship with 3.50. Rock on. Sales should be heavy.
The "Hackers" that you all seem to be burning at a stake will never dent game sales due to the cost of downloading a game for the current generation.
Sony are just screwing over the vast majority of PS3 owners by delaying. The hackers really do not care for the backup manager that can be used with a jailbreak device. Most people are already updating as the scene is slowly but surely dieing.
The jailbreak will not be remembered in the furture as it just a mere blip in the grand scheme of things. Eventually people using more stable and substantial hacks, like Geohot mastering the hypervisor, will gain full control of the PS3 capabilities, something sony has been reluctant to give to its consumers. It will run linux and custom firmware so that more of the potential of your £300 machine can be used.
You're missing the point of prevention. Producing an productive hack turns into a lost harvest. Hurting the game sales isn't a big deal to the big guys like Sony, it hurts developers who need every cent they vested into their product. What always surprises me is how reluctant people are About realizing what their actions do.
Theft is the primary reason people waste money in a lot of different fields of work and lifestyles. To say it doesn't hurt sales may be probable if you knew how many people were pirating something. Tell me people can track every torrent along with every physical copy made of said ISO and you're a fool. Plain and simple. SECONDLY, consider you bought a brand new Mustang Boss and found your car chilling on bricks with your wheels and tires missing. Or that you came to your home and someone robbed you blind. Did you deserve that for all your hours at work to afford it?
Harnessing the power of a product a company makes ALWAYS impacts it's eligibility for support. It isn't your creation, after all. Just because you own it doesn't give you the right to use their services unless you comply with their contact.
So what exactly is the point of hacking a PS3 when it's not remotely as powerful todays PC systems? The PS3 requires delicate code to unleash it, surely best suited for its common use. Hacking it is merely bragging rights for the attention hungry and idiots who think it's worth the trouble. ever heard of an HTPC?
meanwhile mainstream is troubled and delayed while every stupid, yet still unacceptable, excuse is blurted out. As if one will be the exception that'll make us all say "crap! He's right!"
Give me a break. Use the allowance your mother gives you more wisely and make some friends!