Wii Hacked - First Homebrew Demo

Even better than Hello World, the hackers at 24c3 have figured out how to run their own code on the Wii. By using what they call a 'tweaser' method, they were able to launch the Wii in Gamecube mode then trick the chips into dumping their contents. After rummaging through the dumps they were able to pull out the encryption keys and used a hole in Lego Star Wars cd to boot their own code. The app they demo in the video shows output coming from the Wii-Mote, proving that it is running in Wii mode and not in Gamecube mode.Previously all homebrew was done in GC mode where memory and hardware was limited. Now with access to the Wii mode, homebrew developers can begin to write apps that take advantage of all the hardware, including wiimote, Wifi, Bluetooth, etc.

There are no additional details on when the information will be released so others may write their own apps from the wii. The next step is to get libraries built or obtain an sdk so more apps can begin to get ported to the Wii. It sounds like lots of work still needs to be done before we will see any useful applications come from the Wii homebrew scene, but 2008 is going to be a good year for wii hackers! Stay tuned@!