The Sony PlayStation 2 (PS2) is the best-selling console with over 150 million units sold. It improved upon the original PlayStation's technology and had enhanced security measures to prevent piracy. The PS2 used a watermark and encryption to protect its games, but modders and pirates found ways to bypass these security measures.
One of the earliest mod chips, the Neo Key, allowed users to play backup copies of games by swapping the original disc with a modded disc. Later, the Messiah mod chip was released, which was more sophisticated and allowed users to play backup copies without swapping discs.
Another method of bypassing security was the "Swap Magic" trick, which involved using a special disc to trick the PS2 into thinking it was playing a legitimate copy of a game. This method is still used today.
The most popular method of running PS2 backups today is the "Free McBoot" exploit, which involves using a memory card to load a custom menu that allows users to run homebrew and backup games. This method is still widely used and is considered one of the most effective ways to bypass PS2 security.
Overall, despite Sony's efforts to enhance security, the PS2 was ultimately defeated by modders and pirates who found ways to bypass its security measures.
Here are the key facts extracted from the text:
1. As of the making of the episode, the Sony PlayStation 2 is still the world's largest-selling console with over 150 million units sold.
2. The PlayStation 2 improved upon the technology of the original PlayStation and was a true evolution in console video gaming.
3. Sony learned from the mistakes of the PS1 and developed a more elaborate copy protection scheme for the PS2 to thwart pirates and modders.
4. The PlayStation 1 was region-locked, and there was no EPROM or jumper setting on the motherboard that could be used to change it.
5. Original PlayStation 1 disks had a simple but effective copy protection method that used a watermark containing the region code of the game.
6. Consumer-grade CD burners were not capable of writing the watermark due to the way data was burnt onto the disk.
7. The PlayStation 2 was upgraded from a CD to a DVD and also had its copy protection beefed up significantly.
8. The PlayStation 2 has a watermark pressed onto it that can't be burnt with a normal DVD burner.
9. The key to decrypt the PlayStation 2 logo is in the watermark data, and that decryption key is also encrypted by using the product code of the disk.
10. The PlayStation 2 has a more complicated boot and security process than the PlayStation 1, but it was still possible to perform a similar hack.
11. The swap magic disk has the watermark and all authentication checks in place, but it's not clear how the creators managed to pull this off.
12. The PlayStation 2 was designed to be upgradable by utilizing a memory card.
13. Sony's plan was to release an update disk that would install itself onto the memory card, allowing the system to be updated.
14. Free McBoot is a custom menu that can be loaded onto a memory card, allowing users to run homebrew, browse files, manipulate save games, and boot backups.
15. Free McBoot works on almost all PlayStation 2 hardware, including the original fat models and all slim models up to the 9000x model.
16. Free McBoot has one main issue, which is that it won't boot back up DVDs.
17. Free McBoot comes with loaders to allow backups to play, including ESR and OPL.
18. ESR allows users to boot backups by patching a game disk to be multi-session and including video DVD playback on the first session and the game data on the second.
19. OPL allows users to run unmodified disk images or ISOs to boot and run from external USB hard drives and even over the network shares via SMB or Samba.
20. The Open PS2 Loader (OPL) is the most popular method of running PS2 backups to this day.