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The time has finally come. Microsoft has announced that they'll be shuttering the Xbox 360 Store and Xbox 360 Marketplace next year. On July 29, 2024, users will no longer be able to buy games or DLC on the Xbox 360. Fortunately, if you have a library of 360 titles, you'll still be able to access them, though if you ever purchased TV shows or movies on your Xbox 360 console, you won't be able to access those after that date, and will instead be relegated to watching them on the Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, or Windows 10/11. Those using modern Xbox consoles will also still have access to backwards compatible 360 games, and the option to purchase those titles specifically. Xbox Live on the 360 will still be kept online, allowing players to still access multiplayer servers for games that still support it.

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[codezer0]

At this time people should already had hacked their 360's.

Unfortunately, my primary 360 that has a flashed DVD drive finally had where it's just not reading any discs from anywhere. Had to swap in a spare that isn't hacked at all, but from the same era. Can't really do the flash myself since jungleflasher and the lt DVD firmware is effing gone from the Internet.

At least if it were readily available, I could have also reflashed a spare DVD drive I kept around to mimic the now dead unit, so I could swap until I could do something about it or just bin it.

 

[SpookyBaker]

well, if XBL and PSN is still going to be up for 360 and PS3, then screw ziff davis, because when they aquired ign, they shut down gamespy, and nintendo WFC, powered by such, went down the drain alongside it

 

[DuoForce]

My heart goes out to the 3 or 4 people that still use an Xbox 360.

 

[EvilJagaGenius]

My heart goes out to the 3 or 4 people that still use an Xbox 360.

I mean I wasn't using it as a daily driver, mine is a cheap garage sale find. I figured it would be a good way to experience the AAA games of the last decade before the MTX plague. I guess to that end the death of the store doesn't effect its purpose so much. Still, it'd be nice to have a softmod before this goes down, or some way to easily patch and add DLC to games bought secondhand.

 

[UltraHurricane]

There could always be more but if JTAG kernel capable Jasper (and earlier) is your last interaction then there is a whole lot more -- RGH and then RGH2 both followed that and allow almost all but the newest of new models on almost any kernel. Bit more annoying (many wires chip in the PS1 sense of the term rather than contents of any nerd's electronics components drawer, and time to boot can be higher than is ideal)

https://gbatemp.net/threads/guide-how-to-hack-your-360.334203/

yeeeeeeah... i think that's why i haven't gotten into 360 modding is that it's still not as user-friendly as the PS3 scene which was a lot more fortunate to have more hacking breakthroughs throughout it's lifespan

 

[Tiger21820]

More planned obsolescence... yay...

 

[FAST6191]

Unfortunately, my primary 360 that has a flashed DVD drive finally had where it's just not reading any discs from anywhere. Had to swap in a spare that isn't hacked at all, but from the same era. Can't really do the flash myself since jungleflasher and the lt DVD firmware is effing gone from the Internet.

At least if it were readily available, I could have also reflashed a spare DVD drive I kept around to mimic the now dead unit, so I could swap until I could do something about it or just bin it.

Depending upon the vintage you might be able to do a board swap -- there is no great calibration effort on the board as far as I am aware and the keys (already flashed in this case) are more of a NAND-CPU thing anyway.

That said I will take your word for it that all the firmwares and such are gone (would be shocked if xbins is still active, much less autoxbins/easyxbins). I will have to have a look on my old drives, though I do recall there being some command line efforts for everything at least up to the 8 series liteon.

yeeeeeeah... i think that's why i haven't gotten into 360 modding is that it's still not as user-friendly as the PS3 scene which was a lot more fortunate to have more hacking breakthroughs throughout it's lifespan

Yeah Sony's legend class screw up giving away the keys (and second giving the PSP's away) did rather serve to punt it past the otherwise pretty happening 360 scene.

 

[codezer0]

Depending upon the vintage you might be able to do a board swap -- there is no great calibration effort on the board as far as I am aware and the keys (already flashed in this case) are more of a NAND-CPU thing anyway.

That said I will take your word for it that all the firmwares and such are gone (would be shocked if xbins is still active, much less autoxbins/easyxbins). I will have to have a look on my old drives, though I do recall there being some command line efforts for everything at least up to the 8 series liteon.

In short, both 360 consoles I have, have the old LiteON DVD drives. Out of dumb luck, I managed to also snag a spare 360 DVD drive, a BenQ unit. While I still had the tools and setup readily available, I was able to successfully flash something called an 0800 firmware on the BenQ. To my understanding, I would need to basically spoof the BenQ to be seen like my (modded) LiteOn to be able to swap it in and resume service.

 

[ldeveraux]

Can't really do the flash myself since jungleflasher and the lt DVD firmware is effing gone from the Internet.

Not true at all, you just need to look in the right place! Last year I was able to Find lt3 and JF, buy an X360USB and a new DVD drive, and board swap and flash. It wasn't easy, but certainly doable today.

 

[CharlesDeGaulle]

My heart goes out to the 3 or 4 people that still use an Xbox 360.

Mind you, glad to be one of those.

Best way to experience splitscreen HALO.
I bought one a few weeks ago for dirt cheap and enjoying good old family fun on H3 and ODST.

Come to think of it, not a single nintendo game comes close to the perfection that is HALO party time, for both coop and FFA.
I will now have to rebuy Schizoid and perfect dark on the online store.

 

[Stan4d]

Well crap, I guess Microsoft IS worse than Sony in this aspect...

Facts

 

[DuoForce]

Mind you, glad to be one of those.

Best way to experience splitscreen HALO.
I bought one a few weeks ago for dirt cheap and enjoying good old family fun on H3 and ODST.

Come to think of it, not a single nintendo game comes close to the perfection that is HALO party time, for both coop and FFA.
I will now have to rebuy Schizoid and perfect dark on the online store.

Just mod your 360 and you won't even notice the store closure.

 

[StrayGuitarist]

I wouldn't be as upset as I am if it weren't for the lack of backups of Rockband DLC. Yes, I understand this is a REALLY niche complaint, but.. Now I have to find a way to buy and back up all the songs I can't find.

 

[FAST6191]

I wouldn't be as upset as I am if it weren't for the lack of backups of Rockband DLC. Yes, I understand this is a REALLY niche complaint, but.. Now I have to find a way to buy and back up all the songs I can't find.

Is it incomplete? When I was doing the 360 releases I ended up shoving the guitar hero and rock band stuff in a spoiler section and pulling out all the other DLC and XBLA stuff lest it reduce it all to white noise. I know it was prolific and I enjoyed various "how much would it cost to buy every DLC" videos for such things (only train simulators seemed able to beat it) but would have thought it got to complete by one means or another.

That said I would have thought homebrew offerings are probably the way to go for such things today. Most of the DDR and other music game communities seem to have gone there for a lot of things (not my thing really so have not investigated in depth, mostly see it when speedrun controversies crop up or interesting technical feats are used). Recent efforts in AI might also be able to render out note lists fairly effectively (assuming scores and karaoke versions/session level tracks don't already exist) which in turn drags it down almost to the level of audiosurf.

 

[StrayGuitarist]

Is it incomplete? When I was doing the 360 releases I ended up shoving the guitar hero and rock band stuff in a spoiler section and pulling out all the other DLC and XBLA stuff lest it reduce it all to white noise. I know it was prolific and I enjoyed various "how much would it cost to buy every DLC" videos for such things (only train simulators seemed able to beat it) but would have thought it got to complete by one means or another.

That said I would have thought homebrew offerings are probably the way to go for such things today. Most of the DDR and other music game communities seem to have gone there for a lot of things (not my thing really so have not investigated in depth, mostly see it when speedrun controversies crop up or interesting technical feats are used). Recent efforts in AI might also be able to render out note lists fairly effectively (assuming scores and karaoke versions/session level tracks don't already exist) which in turn drags it down almost to the level of audiosurf.

It might not be incomplete, but I can't find some songs like Smooth by Santana anywhere I look. Rock Band 3 is a major comfort game to me, since I played it as a youth (and got pretty dang good at it to be honest) and there are a lot of songs I had on the PS3 version that I really want on the version I like playing more, they're on the Xbox 360 store, but just don't seem to exist online.

The only custom song forum I know of, C3, has a strict rule on not charting any songs that already exist as official DLC. It seems it's so they don't incur the wrath of lawyers.

It's entirely reasonable AI might be able to do it, but I'd really only want to use that as a last resort. Training AI to replace hobbyists makes me feel... bad weird.

 

[FAST6191]

I will at least countenance arguments on AI as it pertains to likeness rights and some of the overwhelmingly creative stuff (not going to get far for me but I will stand to hear it). If going for a ROM hacking analogy this seems like complaining because relative search was invented and stopped the need for total brute force transcription.

I have not looked but I would be stunned to see a Santana song popular enough to make the music game cut fail to be dumped in some manner. Though you said not find which I have considered in the past, with the sheer volume of music game DLC probably making it a better candidate for the piracy does not save everything problem than the Norwegian version of random kids tie in game that would normally form the bulk of consideration in... can we call it lost media?

 

[CharlesDeGaulle]

Just mod your 360 and you won't even notice the store closure.

I flashed a LiteOn (?) DVD-drive eons ago.
It was a delight to play Arkham city a few days before my friends.

Sadly, I don't see easy mods for homebrews on 360 nowadays...

 

[Ryccardo]

Sadly, I don't see easy mods for homebrews on 360 nowadays...

Depends on what you mean - RGH3 is generally not easier to solder but doesn't need a chip, and nand programmers are more common than ever (= pi pico, not that the JR programmer clones were hard to find)

Now, getting a 360 for homebrew when the offerings are much worse than the first class of DS/PSP/Wii or even the runnerups of the previous Xbox and GBA... eh, I don't see much demand for that (indeed I regretted buying one), it doesn't even have a decent media center or near-perfect backwards compatibility and, like all models of the PS3, is a power hog...

 

[CharlesDeGaulle]

Depends on what you mean - RGH3 is generally not easier to solder but doesn't need a chip, and nand programmers are more common than ever (= pi pico, not that the JR programmer clones were hard to find)

Now, getting a 360 for homebrew when the offerings are much worse than the first class of DS/PSP/Wii or even the runnerups of the previous Xbox and GBA... eh, I don't see much demand for that (indeed I regretted buying one), it doesn't even have a decent media center or near-perfect backwards compatibility and, like all models of the PS3, is a power hog...

Thank you very much for this insight.
So you seem to confirm the two conclusions I came to:
1 - No softmodes for X360 so CMS soldering is mandatory
2 - No relevant homebrews, besides XBLA games

I modded a PS3 years ago and, even if I don't play with it, it is an AWESOME VCR !

Once showtime was installed, I bought two 256Go usb sticks, and filled it with all the 80s/90s/00s cartoons and movies my children could ask for.

Wii media player is bad and wiiU doesn't even have one !
So the Steam deck is my secondary choice for demanding movies.

According to you, would a PS4 be an interesting media (mkv/avi) player ?

 

[Ryccardo]

According to you, would a PS4 be an interesting media (mkv/avi) player ?

I mean, it's a crippled PC and not one with any interesting features (like the first Xbox), so just get a "tiny" (Chinovo)/"micro" (Dell) class PC and support the open platform