For what it's worth I picked up C, C++, ARM PPC x86 and MIPS assembly, and how to effectively use IDA and Hex-Rays in like 2-3 months. For a lot of people, console hacking (or homebrew) is actually the kick in the butt they need to get themselves programming or reverse-engineering.To all the people saying "Learn how to code and make your own exploit etc" , in which world is it easier to do that (which will take you 1-3 years and you'll probably end up at square 0).
If somebody had just handed me 'completed' 3DS hax a year and a half ago, I never would have learned any of these skills yo. Especially in cases of console hacking, "reinventing the wheel" is actually like the best way to get up to speed and familiar with a system. We actually have our own implementation of the current private PPC kernel vuln because I needed an excuse to get super familiar with Cafe OS userland. All the debug I had to do to get that up and running taught me more than I expected honestly.If you don't have any experience at coding there is an advice I can give you which is don't waste your time trying to "reinvent the wheel" since someone doesn't want to release it. It is a waste of time.
Smea mentions how fun reverse-engineering is a lot, and he's not joking! If you're into computer science at all, you can have a blast with it.