PSP firmware is lame

[Anayo]

The other day I was browsing a nearby Pawn Shop. I found Soul Calibur for the PSP for $10. Hooray! I took it home.

I tried to play it on my custom firmware PSP, but it told me I needed to update to firmware 5.55 in order to do so.

I poked around online and found out I needed newer custom firmware, so I updated to M33 GEN-B. I tried Soul Calibur again and it didn't work.

Poked around some more and found out GEN-B was just a prerequisite to another step I had to take, entailing two options:
1. Download a cracked version of Soul Calibur and play it from my memory stick
2. Rip the UMD myself, patch it with a program on my PC, then play it from my memory stick.

Basically, because I use custom firmware to play Dr. Robotnic's Mean Bean Machine and Contra, I have to pirate or patch a game I bought through legal means.

Thank you, Sony and Namco, for preventing software piracy.

[t0yrobo]

You're the one that modified your system with unsupported software to play games in a questionably legal way. It's entirely your fault if games won't play properly.

[Riqz85]

dude... as you have bought it, just download it. You won't have commited a crime tbh... if you buy it and then back it up it's not really a crime now is it...

[noiseredux]

dude... as you have bought it, just download it. You won't have commited a crime tbh...

I hate to open this can of worms in another thread, but I doubt that argument would hold up in court.

NOW if you really want to play it, then if I were you I'd rip it myself from the UMD that I already legally bought, instead of downloading a pirated copy.

[ZeroAX]

or you could say

"thank you (irony) pirates for not making custom firmware that plays original games, and only runs homebrew stuff, not commercial releases, so I can be totally legal"

[noiseredux]

^true.

[Anayo]

Sony designed the PSP phat I'm using, but I own it. Is there any legislation in place dictating the programs I can and can't execute with it? By my line of thinking, I should be able to do anything from install something radically different from what it was meant to do, or even destroy the thing with a jackhammer, without having to answer to Sony.

The issue isn't legality, it's the incentive I have to play by Sony's rules. With custom firmware, I get functionality that isn't available otherwise. I generally don't pirate. Most of the 16-bit games I emulate with it are things I own in my genesis collection anyway. All my PSP games are legit originals.

The bottom line is, I bought Soul Calibur on a Sony-stamp-of-approval UMD so I could pop it in my system and play it, but they've installed circumvention that won't let me, presumably to make me want to play by their rules. My options are:

1. Install official firmware 5.55. This will make Soul Calibur work and disable all my emulators
2. Crack Soul Calibur and play it off the memory stick, but this removes any incentive I had to buy a legit copy in the first place.

EDIT:

"thank you pirates for not (irony) making custom firmware that plays original games, and only runs homebrew stuff, not commercial releases, so I can be totally legal"

The Soul Calibur thing is a new measure Sony put in place, and homebrew coders haven't found a really elegant way around it yet. What they've got now is a cracked version you can download, or program to patch it for you. I can complain about Sony, since they want my money (and have to earn it with a good product), but the coders that make custom firmware are really doing it all for free in their spare time. I'm just grateful they've done as much as they have in the first place.

I can play pretty much all PSP games that came out before Soul Calibur: Broken Destiny, by the way...

[noiseredux]

[Anayo]

[noiseredux]

what's FLOSS?