I’ve heard these mentioned before in conversation, but I have no idea what they do in terms of “Modifying” my console. What are they, and were do you get them? Once you get one, what do you do with it? Sorry to be so electro-ignorant.
Thread being locked in 10…9…8…7…6…5…4…
Seriously, the powers that be really frown upon discussion of illegal (or even border-line illegal) doings.
For the sake of a factual answer, mod chips are supposed to modify your console player so a person can play stolen games. It’s a method of defeating the copy protection on games.
That’s about all that can be said here…oh yeah, that and “stealing is wrong, don’t do it”
On a traditional PS1, mod chips were used to modify your console to read backups of games burned onto CD-R, bypassing the copy protection. They are very much “grey-market” leaning towards illegal in some places. They can also augment your console by allowing you to play VCDs and MP3s. I’m not sure what the chips do for PS2…
I won’t post more as I’m pretty sure that the mods will be along to give a warning against how to use the chips or where to buy them.
This is in that grey area where its legality is not entirely well defined.
For the purpose of GQ, however, we shall allow explanation of what a mod chip does. We shall not discuss how to mod a PS2 or where to get a mod chip.
Any poster violating these guidelines risks losing his/her posting privileges.
-xash
General Questions Moderator
Mo chips allow you to play games from other regions.
Without one, your legally bought game from Japan or Europe will not work on your North American machine. Seeing as some games only come out in other regions, sometime sif you want a certain game you HAVE to import.
For examples, I won Xenogears for the Playstation. Xenogears was not released in Europe, so I have the US version. To play it I have to use a Playstation with a modchip.
Modchips are like getting round region protection on DVD players.
I feel the need to apologize,
In my ignorance about the subject it never dawned on me that this was something illegal. I simply figured that this was some type of after market upgrade made by third parties. Little did I know how third those parties were. Sorry for the faux pas.
It normally does both acts described above, though some people sell modchips that only allow the playing of other region games.
That is complete and utter bull. For one, with the PS1 it was entirely possible to play CD-R’ed stolen copies with no moding, but mod chips still sold.
Mod chips became popular because they allowed you to play import games. There are hundreds of games that come out in Japan that will never see an American release because they are too quirky or unusual. Mod chips allow one to enjoy Japanese games (or European games if that edition is better than the US’s) that one would otherwise not be able to play without buying a console from that country.
Mod chips are like making your DVD drive region free. They allow you to order games from overseas, and for the most part have nothing to do with facilitating copying.
UnuMondo
As someone in the CD/DVD/Video Game wholesale supply industry, I can tell you that games released in a certian region are intended for sale in that region ONLY. (Hence the whole catalyst for region coding).
Export of those games to other countries is in fact, illegal. Just because you can do it, doesn’t mean there isn’t a law against it.
Ditto for DVDs.
In what way is exporting DVDs or Games from one region to another Illegal? Would I be breaking the law if I took DVDs I bought in USA back to UK? Do you have any cites for the illegality of such actions please.
You have a cite for this?
Here’s how it works:
A wholesale company (such as the one I work for) has contracts with various maufacturers to distribute their products to retaillers.
Distribution agreements* however (in most cases; see ‘*’ below) are domestic.
Meaning we can’t supply DVDs/Cds/VGs to Kwok Fong’s Convenience in Vietnam, for example.
This why region codes even exist, to prevent this type of international trade. Believe it or not, they weren’t invented just to annoy consumers.
While not concrete (admittedly), here is a thread on another board regarding international export of DVDs and VCDs.
From Amazon.com:
*
“Amazon.com is currently able to ship books, CDs, DVDs, VHS videos, music cassettes, vinyl records, and select software to international addresses. Items from Amazon Marketplace can be shipped to several international regions, but cannot be shipped to Africa, Island Nations, Israel, Latin America, or the Middle East.”
*
Perfect example…here’s a partial international distribution agreement. Amazon.com can ship certain products to certain countries only, because of their distro agreement.
From a Canadian company called ‘Future Shop’:
*For your convenience, we deliver ANYWHERE in Canada. To make sure that orders being sent to PO boxes and rural route addresses get to their proper destination, please include a physical street address, highway number and/or 911 number with your order. We are currently unable to accept or ship orders outside of Canada. *
…Domestic Distro only.
From Radio Shack:
"At this time, we can only accept website orders for delivery to addresses within the United States and telephone orders from customers within its territories, or to APO/FPO addresses (Prices vary outside the contiguous 48 United States). Currently, we do not accept online orders from customers in Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Guam or the U.S. Virgin Islands. Please visit your local RadioShack stores in those areas.’
While Hawaii, Guam, etc… are probably more to do with geography, but the exclusion of all other countries is more likely due to their distro agreement.
- I re-read my post, and 2 things I shouild retract:
- I did imply ALL International export of ALL DVDs/CDs/VGs was illegal. That is not right, and a cardinal sin to generalize like that! -Consider my hands slapped.
I should have more accurately said, the vast majority of international trade that goes on is contratrary to domestic agreements. - “Illegal” may have also been a poor choice of words. It would be contrary to a contract, thus likely carry reprecussions outlined in said contract, but I honestly don’t know how this would fair in a court of law.
Difficult and frowned upon? Yes. Outright illegal? No. Importing video games has been going on for quite some time, and it’s not that hard to find import game shops on the web or even brick-and-mortar shops in big cities like New York or San Francisco (where even Sony themselves have a massive superstore). They do most of their business selling games that are either released first or only released in Japan.
Interestingly, Game Boy games have no region codes.
As for mod chips, you don’t need one to play cross-region games. Some game cheat devices (a certain version of the Action Replay or Game Shark, I forget which) allows you to do so.
The non-chip devices arew not perfect. In a multi-disc RPG, for example, if you are not given the option to save position when you get to the end of one disc (there are a fair few games like this, you save when you start the next disc) then you have no way of swapping to the second disc and progressing.
Can anyone tell me if a game bought in a shop when on holiday in the US and then brought home in my luggage is considered illegal by these somewhat dubious “laws”? My copies of Final Fantasy Anthology (FF5 and FF6 version) and Xenogears were bought by a person (a friend) in a shop in the US and brought to Europe. I’d love to know how it is against the law for them to be used in my Playstation in Sweden.
They were bought because the people that used the swap trick ruined there PS1’s and had to resort to turning the PS1 on its side or even upside down to get games to work.
Does there exist a device that allows you to use out of region software on a PS2 but does not enable you to use coppied or otherwise illegal software? And would such a device be in any way illegal?
As stated earlier, the new GameShark V3, allows you to do so if I’m not mistaken. The earlier GameShark versions did it as well I think, but V3 is supposed to do some other crap as well. Check out some places online, I’m sure you’ll find more info.
“Does there exist a device that allows you to use out of region software on a PS2”
Sure, a GS v3 or an Action Replay, both are legally sold in the USA that make your PS2 region free.The AR is better cause Datel makes it & is no longer with GS.
PS2 games don’t have copy protection on them until you put them in a PS2, which detects whether you have an original or not based on the Sony copy protection pressed on the originals, which is copyrighted. Mod chips are designed to fool the machine into thinking it’s an original disk. Hence, mod chips aren’t legal.
For historical purposes… the original mod chips weren’t for copy protection avoidance or for adapting the games themselves at all. They were used, beginning with the Genesis and Super Famicom (and Super Nintendo when sales began outside Japan) to allow the machines to operate on TVs with foreign standards. NTSC Super Nintendos ran slightly faster (pretty much undetectable, but enough to make a few diehards want to see it) than PAL SNES (if memory serves, because of the lower number of lines on NTSC TVs) so Japanese and European gamers started buying third-party mod chips to allow them to use NTSC nintendos with PAL televisions.
I only know of one person who installed a mod chip in a PSone, and he did it to play Jap-edition games. He burned games and played them long before he got the chip. (ditto for the Dreamcast)
There are plenty of legitimate reasons to bypass the copy protection on video games: Anyone who has small children who play video games, or lives in an area with a lot of burglary, can appreciate the usefulness of making backups and storing the originals somewhere safe. (The DMCA, however, makes it illegal to bypass copy protection even if you have the legal right to make a copy.)
However, a third party can buy games from you, then sell them to Kwok Fong, correct? The third party didn’t sign any contract, and except for a few specific items, it’s generally legal to resell anything you buy.
They don’t have copy protection until you put them in a PS2, which detects the copy protection? What are you trying to say?