One modder to another

[mintybreath]

Hi everyone, i had one question about halo 2 modding for the xbox.

I am a modder for Halo PC, and am starting to see that it is kind of hollow. Seriously, you make a mod, enter the game, play with it alone, go online to attempt to gain an advantage and avoid playing with your lonesome self, and get the crap lagged out of you.

I am getting tired of not being able to play my mods with anyone else, and if i start modding with the xbox, then i can at least play multi, or system link.

I just wanted to ask a few questions if you dont mind.

1. Is softmodding your xbox hard?
My situation is, i have a spare xbox, and a friend who modded his own xbox and makes his own mods. The problem is, his parents dont want him to mod MY xbox for me. So instead he is going to coach me through it. I already soft modded, now i need to flash the BIOS, through soldering.

So i guess what im getting at is, would it be very difficult?

2. It modding for the xbox more reliable than the PC?
With Pc, if you do one thing wrong, you get these annoying Exception errors that take what seems like forever to close. Does xbox have annoying errors? I would think it would, but are they much of a pain?



I guess that is all the questions for now, ill post back about more questions if i have any.

Thanks and i really appreciate all your help.

[Tural]

I already soft modded, now i need to flash the BIOS, through soldering.

Um, what reason was given for that? You do not have to do anything past the installation of a softmod and dashboard. The entire premise of softmodding is that it requires no hardware modification. On top of that, soldering has nothing to do with flashing BIOS.

[mintybreath]

Hmmm.... That is interesting.

He said i needed to bridge connections on the mother board, for some reason.

So with just a softmodded xbox, i can install mods?

How then do you flash the BIOs?

[mr_penguin]

you don't need to flash the bios. Just copy everything from your halo2disk to a folder called games, in that folder make a folder called halo2. Now copy everything from your disk to that folder except for the campaign maps which have numbers in front of them located in the map folder on your disk.

[mintybreath]

Copy it to the xbox? or the computer?

if it is xbox, then that is where the problem lies, I cant copy the games, and that is what he is coming over to help with.

and if it is computer, do you just put the disk in and copy?

EDIT:
Actually i dont think it was for BIOS flashing, cuz he said after we could BIOS flash it, but i really dont remember wat it was for...

[Tural]

Eh, if your Xbox is softmodded, you can copy games to the hard drive. My guess is that your friend doesn't know what he's talking about, especially if he's talking about flashing BIOS and soldering. Those things have nothing to do with what you want.

[mintybreath]

Well this is coming from me, i could have completely misconstrude what he said. I really am pretty sure after all that the bios flashing was something we would do after.

He did say he could install an internal HDD for me, and i think that may have been the soldering.

One thing though, you said after soft modding you can copy games. I did the softmodding myself, without his help, and maybe i didnt do the right one or something.

Would anyone be able to redirect me to a good soft modding file set that uses either mech assult or Agent Under fire?



(Plus he has to know what he is talking about, his xbox is modded after all)

[kibito87]

Ok, let's see here.

You can infact solder the mobo to bridge the connections. Then flash the onboard bios. That's annoying and not worth it.

For copying games to your hdd, you can use a program called dvd2xbox. Look around the modding scene for that. You can also use xbox media center or avalaunch.

Installing an internal hdd does not require soldering but it makes it easier if you have either a TSOP flash or a modchip installed.

A good place to find all this information and more would be www.xbox-scene.com.

As for the softmod itself, you do not need any soldering or bios flashing done to your xbox if you already softmodded it. Just grab one of the above programs from somewhere on the net and ftp those to your xbox in E/apps. (since it's softmodded it would be E not F). Then load up the program and pop a disc in. If you plan on copying halo2 to your hdd, you will need a bigger hdd because the Halo2 singleplayer levels are too large to all fit on your stock hdd.

[Dragonfire]

well his might be chipped then if hes talking about soldering and bios flashing,on a softmodded xbox usually it will normally boot to the M$ dash, but if u hld down the white buttn, u should boot to a third party dashboard such as unleashx or evo (w/e the installer did), then from there u can do the other shit, like copy games

[mintybreath]

wow this really helped alot. Thanks guys!

Could someone still answer my second question though, that one is much much easier to answer.

and one other thing. I already installed a soft moding, so, let me just clarify, all i need to do is go to the site you provided, and download dvd2xbox, and some sort of bios flasher? That is it?


One last question. Would transfering VIA an action replay work? I am not 100 percent sure about how to FTP.



Sorry bout all the newby questions.

[kibito87]

wow this really helped alot. Thanks guys!

Could someone still answer my second question though, that one is much much easier to answer.

If you mean a site that allows you to download a softmod exploit, then no we can not help you. It is illegal to download those files. Like, I said. Your best bet would be to look around xboxscene to find all that you need. This site is based on halo modding, not so much xbox modding. I can offer you further help via personal messages but I can only help you so far as well. The exploits you will need can be found somewhere online. You just need to look a little. Google works wonders in many ways.

[mintybreath]

oh no, i meant my second question, waaay up top. under question # 2

first post.

[kibito87]

eh, you are basically taking the same risks. If you do something the engine won't allow or doesn't like, something will go wrong. The map may not load at all. If it does, it may not have the outcome you would like. Really, you can't compare it much.

[CaptainPoopface]

I've never modded Halo PC, but my experience with Halo 2 mods on the Xbox is that they are fairly stable. If a mod is "broken" in some way, it usually becomes evident quickly during testing (the map doesn't load at all, or performing a specific action immediately freezes the game). By the time a mod is released, those freezing issues have usually been dealt with, or the specific actions that cause freezing are proscribed.

Getting back to your main purpose for doing this though... I've been quite disappointed with the gameplay on Kai (the tunneling program I use, which I believe has the largest number of users). There is a section for mods in Halo 2, and it is a ghost town. You can still get a regular game in the non-modded arenas, but there are plenty of obnoxious kids with headsets, cheating is rampant, and the games are usually 1) swords and shotguns, 2) sniper rifles, or 3) battle rifle + some other lame guns. (In Halo 2 for Xbox, there are a few hacky button combinations for the battle rifle that make it ridiculously overpowered). I don't enjoy these game types at all, on top of the aforementioned crap you have to swallow when you're playing online for free with a relatively small population of people you don't know.

Halo 2 modding has also lost critical mass. It's a shame, because modders of the past have done brilliant work with far less sophisticated tools than we now have. Alas, the luminaries have retired. Even if someone releases a very good mod, the hype dies quickly. These days, most people look at the screenshots in the download post and say "Wow, looks good," and that's the end of it. I think it's a rare day that anyone fires up a new mod for more than 10 minutes, let alone bothers to coordinate a game.

Realistically, I think the best you can do as far as setting up net games is to form some relationships with a few people you like online or in person, then try to coordinate your games manually. As it is, I can no longer stand the off-the-shelf version of Halo 2, let alone 1) swords and shotguns, 2) sniper rifles and 3)battle rifle + some other lame guns. I only play with my own modded weapons and maps, with only a few people I know well.

If Halo 3 modding and Xbox 360 tunneling become feasible, there will probably be an explosion of interest. I think that day is at best many months away, however.

[mintybreath]

Thanks alot, that really answered my question, and then some.

Anyway, ill try to get DVD2Xbox on my xbox, then flash the bios the proper way. But dont be suprised if you see me back on here with more questions or help, infact ill probably be back even if it works. Seems like a really good modding community.

[kibito87]

Thanks alot, that really answered my question, and then some.

Anyway, ill try to get DVD2Xbox on my xbox, then flash the bios the proper way. But dont be suprised if you see me back on here with more questions or help, infact ill probably be back even if it works. Seems like a really good modding community.

Hey, i'm glad we could you out. I'm telling you, do NOT worry about flashing bios until you have a chip or your buddy knows exactly what he's doing with a onboard TSOP flash. Softmodding, as stated above, requires no soldering or flashing of bios to run hacked dashboards, emulators, or game backups. Unless you want the bigger hdd, don't go into mobo land.

[mintybreath]

Softmodding, as stated above, requires no soldering or flashing of bios to run hacked dashboards, emulators, or game backups. Unless you want the bigger hdd, don't go into mobo land.

Wait? What you just said kind of confused me. I was under the the impression you needed to flash the BIOS with softmodding.

Do i need to flash the BIOS?

So all i need to do is put DVD2Xbox on my xbox? No BIOS flashing what so ever? Just clarifying, i dont want to mess my xbox up, even though i have a second.

[kibito87]

Wait? What you just said kind of confused me. I was under the the impression you needed to flash the BIOS with softmodding.

Do i need to flash the BIOS?

So all i need to do is put DVD2Xbox on my xbox? No BIOS flashing what so ever? Just clarifying, i dont want to mess my xbox up, even though i have a second.

You do NOT need to flash your bios with a softmod at all. You can put dvd2xbox on your xbox then pop your game in and tell dvd2xbox to copy it to the spot you want it at on the hdd. That's all.

[mintybreath]

OH good. Thank you so much. That really saved me some time.

Once again, ill post back if i need more help, but thanks everyone for all your help

[halo0001]

BIOS flashing is only for hombrew or commercial modchips to put custom colors and such on the microsoft logo or the big X and other wise its pretty useless (unless you have very advanced skills), i doubt its even possible to do that on a softmodded box. the only flashing that i could think of thats even relevant is flashing the dvd drive but still thats just to play burned games which softmodding takes care of any way.