PSX on the Vita: An interview with the mysterious Vita Hacker
As our forum member The Z revealed recently some videos from an anonymous hacker showing PSX games running on the PS Vita, I tried to get in contact (through intermediate people) with that hacker for an interview. The hacker first refused, but I’m kind of a tough guy (j/k) and I insisted a bit. He accepted at my second request via an intermediate person, and shared some of his info on the hack with me.
The mysterious hacker (let me call him Tony, I don’t know his real name as we chatted on IRC) recently published a dump of the PSP emulator’s (on the Vita) internals, a breakthrough that was followed by a video showcasing PSX games running on the Playstation Vita (A feature that the console does not have officially, for now).
Despite these two events being some of the most major pieces of news in the young PS Vita scene, Tony is not your typical scene hacker: a 16 year-old enjoying “Parkour” and playing the piano on his free time, he told me in an introductory comment: “None of my friends know that I have skills in programming. I haven’t written any code anymore since the video showing PSX on PSVita. I neither need respectability nor fame. That’s why I initially refused the interview”
As I emphasized the importance of this hack for the scene, Tony was very humble on the subject: “Well, my exploit isn’t something special. Yes, kernel exploits are very rare, but I don’t feel like a hacker, as some people do. What I do is sharing all my work. I hate people who show off with their work [then don’t release]“. As I asked if he would release his exploit, he answered: “If you guys want, I’ll release the kernel exploit with all the source code“.
We however discussed the external pressure hackers can get from such exploits. On the one hand, concerned gamers (“Oh no, an ISO loader is the last thing we need“), and on the other hand, hackers themselves (“Sony will patch this exploit“). “GUYS! Where is your real life? Sony will patch this exploit, I know, but do we really care? kernel exploit are here to enjoy the console“, Tony said. When discussing the impact of hackers’ work for Sony’s business, he told me “VHBL is harmless, but of course people wouldn’t buy any PSP games on the PSN anymore with a PSP kernel exploit“.
Tony’s exploit is actually a fully functional CFW running on the PSP emulator of the Vita. “I just wrote my own CFW on it. It’s just a normal CFW, nothing special. It does everything a typical CFW does…plugins, ISO games, increased CPU speed, PSX games, homebrews..etc. [For PSX Games,] I just emulated all POPS modules. It’s not really difficult to get that running. Theoretically I can emulate the whole VSH too 😉 ”
As I asked if he was looking deeper into the Vita’s internals, to hack more than the PSP emulator, Tony showed no interest in the Vita itself. “Emulators and PSP games on my PSVita are enough :). I don’t have any Vita game :(. I spare my money for disco, clothes and alcohol =P ”
I asked Tony if he wanted to add something, he replied: “I don’t need to show you guys how cool I am. I just ported the CFW to my PSVita in only 4 hours in the night, when I didn’t have anything else to do. But look at these guys, who are so proud with their skills…please?! I am proud that I play the piano and do Parkour. But these nerds…look at them, they really have no life. You guys may be now angry at me. You guys may hate me, but I don’t care. I care about girls and friends. I care about my family and about school. If you are now angry, do yourself a favor, shut down the pc and go swimming…
I know what I talk about, I used to be a real nerd too, but now, everything has changed 🙂”
If anything, it’s humbling to me that a 16 year-old guy has already achieved bigger hacks than I’ll ever achieve in my life, and has already realized that there’s more to life than being a geek 🙂
At the time of this interview I didn’t have access to the hack itself, but got sufficient proof that the person I talked to had the skills to code a CFW for the PSP (and, by extension, for the emulator on the vita). Let’s just hope for the best for the scene in the near future 🙂
great new to hear
Nice! Really great new.
cool,that is awesome
Sooooo…..
For my part, I would like to see a release of the exploit.
Anyone agree?
yes i agree
That guy knows what he is doing. He isn’t noob, that man is like Drak Alex from old days. He would be a hero. He is real hacker: If something is missing, he will add to it. Like “If i pay 300$ for my ps3 and i decide to play pong, then i’m gona play some **** Pong”
I like his style.
I understand how “Tony” feels, I mean if he releases the exploit great but if he doesn’t oh well. It won’t be the end of the world. The vita is not everything.
How very pretentious.
agree
Pretentious indeed
Hey here is another project is it true?
http://v4card.blogspot.com/
from what I can see im going to call it fake :/
Most of these “.blogspot.com” websites claiming to have PS3 and PSVita hacks are almost always 100% fake. I have a blogspot (bought a custom domain though) but most of the ones claiming to have hacks are 100% bogus.
Lol, I’ve rarely seen such a poor attempt . Come back when there’s actually something on the blog… even the worst fakers have a video or something, not just 2 lines of text.
in 4hours ? lol why any other hackers dont can hack ith then ….
Honestly this is doable since porting procfw 660 (or any 660 level HEN/CFW) to Vita should be not more than copy-paste, since he already has a kexploit, which may already took him weeks or even months.
This.
He only told me how long it took to port an existing hack+ CFW to the vita, not how long it took him to find the exploit or create the CFW in the first place
Man, if you think it’s bad to be proud of coding skills, and they’re just “geeks”, than you’re just arrogant. Shame
so wololo wen do u think the kernel exploit will be released
Parkour, piano, girls, cool…
On one hand I still believe its too early to release kexploits; on the other hand I’d like to see whether we found the same one (or more). =P
It’s not too early at all, if you have 1 kernel exploit, it’s easier to find others
I’d keep the kexploit till native Vita is prned – if I have some at hand.
so wololo wen do u think we will see this release
does anyone know where i could find a tutorial on coding
I second this?? 🙂
I would say to (Tony) that swimming sounds like a great idea. I would just like my tablet with dual analogs to be able to do what other analogless tablets can do, no thx to adobe. Surfing freedom *lol get it*, and internet radio are my only 2 concerns. Good luck and happy gaming all.
What did adobe do now?
i knew that it was possible for a ps vita psp cfw excellent hope they make a tool to flash without needing the game to exploit 😉
wow that guy should be proud of having the ability to code lol.I would’nt call him a nerd.Thats talent xD
Aww and I thought this guy was kind of cool until he said “I spare my money for disco, clothes and alcohol =P”. I’m fine with alcohol, but disco? he must be from eastern Europe.
Very interesting hack though. This is big news.
but, wait, isn’t he only 16? and spend money on alcohols? isn’t that illegal?
In some european countries its legal to buy beer at 16!
wow that is very cool! he is very admirable and i truly respect him. And I hope to see a hack like this goes public soon.
nice one there … 🙂 live ur life
Great news. Cant wait for a release!
Haha I love his attitude. But good for him! There is more to life than sitting around and doing one thing that will probably be meaningless in 10 or less years. No offense to hackers and devs cause I love gaming, but with anything, we gotta be realistic, there is more to life than whatever we think is important for the time being. He seems humble, not arrogant. People calling him arrogant just sound jealous that they couldn’t do what he did in 4 hours over a months span.
If he releases it, that’d be great and I can’t wait for the release!
WHAT A GREAT NEWSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!! PS1,PSP iso loader in our beautiful VITA :D. Can’t WAit. Thanks Wololo for the news 😀
That’s pretty damn cool. I’m sorry this is kinda off-topic, but i recently found my PSP 3000 and i bricked back in early 2011 and was wondering, is there any possible way to fix it. I messed up 1 file in the Flash0 Memory, i believe it was one to remove the Sony logo in the gameboot. Thanks for anyone that took the time to answer.
Yes, i know its supposedly impossible to do so, but asking wont hurt will it?
Its been awhile but mine bricked and i either put it in recovery mode or did something through media manager but i cant really remember sorry :/
no asking a question wont hurt but asking a obvious or already answered one will
but as for my answer, if you can get to a recovery menu then you could replace the file other then that only Sony can fix it
(FYI unless you know exactly what your doing, dont mess with the flash)
I knew what i was doing but my problem was i was rushing and not being careful and i do have vsh menu and recovery mode but the boot + R/L (I forget) didn’t work.
If you know what you’re doing then why the heck did you messed with the flash0 in a psp 3000
this
If it gets released i would be really happy and a psp iso loader wouldn’t hurt the vita. If it doesn’t then its not a big deal and HBL is fine as long as i get it next release 🙂 What would be sick tho is everyone working together and porting ps2 games!
porting PS2 games would require the games source :/
more emulation code than game source, which doesn’t exist so it won’t be happening
wololo did you ask him to release the hacking method? when will it be shown? i hope soon.
To be perfectly honest he has not been clear on that subject (or, rather, it felt like he changes his mind quite often on this subject). On the one hand he said he would gladly release it, on the other hand he was clear that if he sends it to me for tests, I am not supposed to share it.
oh ok once you test could you tell us whats its like? I think it would be good to make it public after the vita psx update if possible.
Haha funny guy 🙂 he must been from Germany how it sounds ^^.
And about the kxploit and the CFW, with the next mayor update it would be fine to release it. I mean, theres no real interesting PS-Vita Game on the long range (Thanks Sony!) and no really impressive Apps even if Sony could easily port a lot of Android-Apps to the Vita. So there would be no Problem to to stay at an for example 2.00 FW.So even if someone find a way to hack the Vita-OS were still good to go.
And after the kxploit gets released more and more devs could investigate the emu and search for holes and flaws to break through the sandboxed emulator.
On the other Hand, we don’t know if we really could break through the Sandboxed-Emu so here we need some more infos about how the Vita works (SKFU and his plan to purchase a VITA Debug-Unit could lead to some useful infos)but for now, the kxploit and investigate the Emu is our only way to try things out. So i can’t really say if an release of an CFW for the Emu is an waste of an kxploit.
He has released all kmod prx. There’s nothing could stop other devs from studying emu.
I just hope he keeps his word and releases it some time soon.
Too much BULLS**T in that interview
He’s just acting cool like Davee
He never said anything about a release date..he only said if you guys want we could have it but it would requierevwololo to get a hold of it then doing a mass release or ninja release as he’s been doing with vhbl….i hope he does release Tho cuz why would I pay ridicoulos $39.99 for Tekken 6
Such a exciting news! i love tough guy
Thanks for the info Wololo! I hope you can implement this exploit with VHBL… that way it can be released numerous times for many people to enjoy.
this is geat news, seems like the dude just wants his vita to do what he wants it to do and is basically saying ya heck give it to us but he doesnt want his life to revolve around his coding work. I cant wait to get it if he releases it
Guys like him , make me feel like nothing =(
haha you’re telling me. I got EE degree and feel hopeless. hah
If this wasn’t “wololo” i’d call a fake. However I still don’t trust the “girls, parcour, party” joke.
In no way, PSP/PSPV is a easy console to hack in, as far as I know you need a solid programming base to even start with it, popping from out of nowhere is kinda suspicous and the fact that he is kinda insulting all work done in the past feels somehow “pretentious” as previously stated.
But since he doesn’t care, good luck with your k-exploit.
yeah
looks like he just dropped his previous hacking time and now kinda denies it, teenage issues I guess lol
Fake? He did even a port of PS1 to Vita, how should this be a fake? And i can confirm it, this “tony” is the guy who ported the stuff 😉
Hi Wololo,
Great interview, Thanks.
I Hope the Vita PspCfw come soon.
Best Regards,
Piu
“If you guys want, I’ll release the kernel exploit with all the source code“
Of course we want it!
sure we want it ;D … without iso loader ^^^:D
I say dont release it. If I want to play PSX, I’ll fire up the PS1, if I want PSP games, I already have a PSP with CFW. Dont release it……enjoy jumping from rooftop to rooftop
i hope he releases it and have it licensed under GPL..:D
Whatever the exploit is, it doesn’t appear to require vita games running because he stated that he doesn’t own any vita games.
Kudos to “Tony” for pointing out that there are more important things to life than computers and video games.