XNA on JTAG'ed Xbox 360

[vedos]

I was browsing pouët.net and saw that they have their own platform for Xbox 360 demos: http://www.pouet.net/prodlist.php?platform[]=XBOX+360&order=&x=32&y=14&page=1&order=

I was wondering if there is any way to watch XNA demos on JTAG'ed Xbox 360. Is it possible now and if not, how hard would it be to create something like XNA launcher? I'm not going to pay Micro$oft 99USD to watch demos which people have done for free and are in free distribution. Or how much ever the XNA Creators Club Online costs...?

I'd especially like to see this demo http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=31583 running on real hardware.

[ZorgX]

you don't need to pay 99usd you can get a free xna membership use google hehe
i don't know if jtag suport xna but i don't think so

[KrK]

As far as I'm aware it's not possible to run XNA titles at present. The main reason for this is that the XNA Game Launcher requires a connection to Xbox Live to verify that your account has a valid subscription to the XNA Creators Club. The subscription is designed specifically with developers in mind rather than consumers, since the assumption is that if you produce something worthwhile you can get it published through Xbox Live Indie Games, at which point consumers would be able to access it. Even when the title has been published to XLIG I believe you still need an internet connection to execute the title, that is just based on my own experience however.

In theory you might be able to patch the launcher to skip the subscription checks, but I'm not sure you'll see much work done on that given that homebrew development is better suited to and more easily achieved using native code.

- KrK

[ddxcb]

As far as I'm aware it's not possible to run XNA titles at present. The main reason for this is that the XNA Game Launcher requires a connection to Xbox Live to verify that your account has a valid subscription to the XNA Creators Club. The subscription is designed specifically with developers in mind rather than consumers, since the assumption is that if you produce something worthwhile you can get it published through Xbox Live Indie Games, at which point consumers would be able to access it. Even when the title has been published to XLIG I believe you still need an internet connection to execute the title, that is just based on my own experience however.

In theory you might be able to patch the launcher to skip the subscription checks, but I'm not sure you'll see much work done on that given that homebrew development is better suited to and more easily achieved using native code.

- KrK

And the Games needs XBL connection as well. the ones from marketplace.

[dschu012]

If you disconnect from live while playing does it still play?

[atiman]

It will be certainly boring and not useful for expert coders, but modified xna launcher and net library will be interesting for casual coders, and more important to RPG makers (the kind of people who wants to spend most of their time creating a story and graphics rather than coding technical challenges for fun).

- patch xna launcher to severe any relationship with MS servers
- patch net library in order to allow basic network capabilites with private servers (if your homebrew needs networking)

Non-expert coders will be glad to just download legally and for free xna 3.1 game studio and visual c# 2008 express edition (which will be less nasty if they code mistakes in c# rather than in c)
You can then try developping for free and have a few beta testers on jtag'ed 360's then later if you like, pay and try to develop for the real mass market.

It seems that re-using these 2 free stuff seems to work already for creating free homebrew on zune (http://zunedevwiki.org/wiki/) even if there are serious changes in this first approach (c++ instead of c# it seems)

Since managed code based on xna framework is made for identical running on PC/Zune/360 the investment in that way of coding may have more potential in term of user base than one may think...

[XexReloaded]

I looked at the doc from ms: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb975643.aspx

Well, all I'm gonna say is pure speculation, but wouldn't it be possible to rip the xna framework from a legit box install ? It doesn't reside in flash, surely ?
cf.

I went ahead and spent the $49 for 4 months access. It seems that your xbox360 generates and registers a private key, which is used to register your PC's copy of Game Express and tie it to your 360. I believe that this key is also a part of the encryption that occurs when microsoft signs an XEX file.

ss
I gather that the xna key is somehow used to sign / watermark xex when the project is transferred from the dev PC. How about patching the signing step (+ public key decrypting), since jtagged don't really care ?

And if it's really not possible, maybe rip the .net compact framework solely ? I can imagine it could be used for multimedia purposes.

Edit: more info about cf sandboxing in an older thread

[andrewboudreau]

Non-expert coders will be glad to just download legally and for free xna 3.1 game studio and visual c# 2008 express edition

This is why I want better XNA support.  I'm not going to pay 99 dollars to build some physics demos on my weekend time.  But i would still love to write code and play it on the console.

Also, there is already a enormous amount of developer knowledge in this specific framework that we could all use and extend.

[BlueCop]

I just got a free year trial to XNA on my Live box. I tried to get it running on my JTAG boxes but have not have much luck yet.

I have been looking at the files in IDA Pro but I don't know much powerpc. I patched some checks in HostLoader.dll and default.xex and now it doesn't complain about not being signed in to Live anymore. It just complains that I don't have a XNA subscription now. I don't know if I am on the right track. I have been looking around some Xam imports. The patches I have done so far were for the XamUserGetSigninState. I am looking at XamUserCheckPrivilege, XamUserGetSigninInfo now. I am not sure I am capable of cracking this but I will give it a try.

On a positive note the connection keys that are generated to associate your 360 with your XNA computer seem to be generated locally by the program. I did some test generating new keys while the network was disconnected and it seems to work fine.

I am going to try some tests on compiling packages and sending to the 360 with some network disconnects to try to see if there is anything essential being communicated from live for the functionality or if it is a artificial limitation for another reason.

Edit: On positive note it seems I can compile and deploy a package to the 360 after I disconnect the network from the internet. There is a periodic check for a connection to Live but that happened after I was already playing my test project for a while.

[inspuration]

bump for great justice

[ZorgX]

http://xbox-360.logic-sunrise.com/news-379102-xna-offline-v40-debuguer-vos-applications-xna-avec-visual-studio.html

XNA v4.0 for modified consoles and devkits

Brought to you by Natelx

Use visual studio to debug your xna creations

Make sure to sign in on any profile, even offline, before launching

The file 584E07D100000000 goes in:
Content\584E07D1\00080000\
Will show as a game demo, "XNA Creators Club"

Or you can run it extracted, just copy all the other files somewhere
Then run default.xex

[nateleroux]

http://xbox-360.logic-sunrise.com/news-379102-xna-offline-v40-debuguer-vos-applications-xna-avec-visual-studio.html

XNA v4.0 for modified consoles and devkits

Brought to you by Natelx

Use visual studio to debug your xna creations

Make sure to sign in on any profile, even offline, before launching

The file 584E07D100000000 goes in:
Content\584E07D1\00080000\
Will show as a game demo, "XNA Creators Club"

Or you can run it extracted, just copy all the other files somewhere
Then run default.xex

ohai copy pasta from the readme xD

It only plays if you deploy and launch using visual studio while on the connect ui, btw

I don't see why noone did this sooner, it was only five patches in a single xex :/

[idog]

Cool stuff. I hooked up my Glitched box yesterday and did a bit of programming (just fooling around with colors, text, songs and stuff like that) using VS2010 and the XNA Studio plugin.

As said before, you need to have your pc linked to the xbox.

This is nice and all, and as a programmer I'd like to learn this stuff better Enough ebooks around fortunately.

However, what software do I need when I want to create a deployable product which can run on other jtags/rgh's (including an executable (xex)) ? 

I don't want it to go on Marketplace, rather just create useful applications for other people to enjoy on their jtags/rgh's.

[peshkohacka]

You need the X360 SDK to develop applications like FSD,Nand Flasher, FFPlay. However the SDK is intellectual property of Microsoft and its illegal to do this. You can try and Google it, just verify the signature before installing it.

[XexReloaded]

ohai copy pasta from the readme xD

It only plays if you deploy and launch using visual studio while on the connect ui, btw

I don't see why noone did this sooner, it was only five patches in a single xex :/

I've been meaning for some time to express my gratitude to you natelroux <3 Nice work
BTW, the correct folder for the LIVE package is Hdd1:\Content\0000000000000000\584E07D1\00080000\

You have to have the XNA extensions for XeDK, which afaik isn't leaked.

That or you could edit XNA Connect to not require you to connect to Xbox LIVE, then debug over that.

It's a pity, the executable file in any ccgame archive is the one produced by the XNA GS compiler, with the characteristics :

Code:

FILE HEADER VALUES
             14C machine (x86)
               3 number of sections
        4DF6FFB2 time date stamp Tue Jun 14 08:29:06 2011
               0 file pointer to symbol table
               0 number of symbols
              E0 size of optional header
             102 characteristics
                   Executable
                   32 bit word machine

i.e. it's merely a Win32 PE executable.
It's not necessarily a blocking point (think: Novell and Mono for c# MSIL)

Obviously imagexex won't even accept this as an input file because arch's not PPCBE, so I doubt it could be converted to a .xex.
Can anyone with PPC asm skills look at how XNA games are launched on the console after being deployed from a PC's .ccgame? Is there an acknowledgement packet from XBOX Live that allows it?
The console seems to be waiting for a PC command when deployment has completed.

I'm quite positive it could be done offline, since debugging a project (e.g. a starting kit) from the XNA GS IDE auto launches the game.