#and on citra by extension for a while

[endlesssummerslaycation]

Creating a blog for my next Conquest run!

Hello! My name's Estella, and I've been super into Fire Emblem Fates, specifically Conquest, for a little over half a year, maybe 8 months at this point! I've been playing for 5 months, getting a physical copy of the game back in late December! I'm currently on the tail end of my third run, and since installing the game on Citra, I've wanted to have a place where I can document all of my progress so far! Odds are nobody actually sees this, and I'm actually so chill with that. It's free for anybody to view if you're maybe interested in the stuff I'm doing, but overall this is just for me to have a place to have everything documented for future reference! I don't have any data for the first 9 chapters because I decided to do this after completing that, but oh well!

To start off, I guess I wanna get into my pairings and goals for all of my units! Some come from the internet, others come from me, myself, and I!

So, for starters, we obviously have Corrin. I'm going to be using a female Corrin, who has the same name as me! She has a Magic boon and Luck bane (kind of my go-to), and she also has a Dragon Talent. Not only will Malig Knight be her final class, but I also want her to pass Malig Knight down to her husband.

Corrin's husband is going to be Leo. Leo's just the one I would personally marry if I had the choice, regardless of stats or story relevance, and for my ultimate Support Bot Forrest, you need Leo to marry Corrin instead of Beruka. He's obviously going to be a Malig Knight in the end, as I mentioned! Not only does it give him Trample, but flight is really useful for the last few chapters of the game and I want him to be stable in the late game. His A+ friendship will be with Odin for Vantage and Life and Death. Basically, Leo will be a Vantage tank Sorcerer on a wyvern. I did this on my last run and really loved it.

Elise will be our first Heart Seal use (I know, revolutionary). She'll follow the typical Malig Knight formula for herself, being a glass cannon mage on a wyvern. And, once again, revolutionary, she's marrying Odin for the Ophelia stats (I LIKE THE SUPPORTS TOO, OKAY?)

Odin is NOT going to be the user of our second Heart Seal, I actually don't know who I'm going to give it to yet. But basically, here are my Heart Seal plans: Elise, Odin (later on), Beruka, Corrin, and Keaton. I might wait until after Chapter 10 and then reclass Beruka

Yeah, while we're at it, let's talk about Beruka, and by extension Camilla. A thing I frequently see in Fates pairing discussion is that Camilla/Keaton is a game-breaking support that you absolutely have to do, not only for Fighter access and pair up bonuses, but also to make Velouria powerful. And um... I have always found Camilla to be absolutely trivial in gameplay, regardless of who she's marrying. And Velouria is also often considered to be one of the best child units, making it feel a little bit like overkill (TO ME) to do the pairing. I also just genuinely despise the Camilla/Keaton support line, it feels like they were trying to be funny but it came across as excessively horny instead, and Camilla isn't even happy at the end, she just seems pissed. Anyways, rant is over!

To continue on with Camilla (and Beruka), I want to make Beruka Camilla's designated pair up bot. Since Camilla will be marrying Niles, he doesn't exactly make the best backpack for her. In a lot of situations, he's great because he provides her with speed and movement, which are excellent. But he doesn't give her strength, which is sometimes annoying. Luckily, we have the perfect A support for Camilla in Beruka! Beruka will not only give Camilla the Fighter line through a fast support, (with the way I'm playing, they should have A support with each other by Chapter 14, AKA the chapter Keaton joins, already making this a superior way to give Camilla Axefaire/Sol), but Beruka is providing 5 strength and 3 speed to Camilla with an A support, as well as some skill and defense. Losing out on 2 or 3 strength points might look iffy, but honestly, we can easily rectify this with a Strength/Speed meal, which is so easy to do. I also PLAN to end her in Wyvern Lord, but we'll see how that goes.

Meanwhile, for Niles, he's obviously marrying Camilla, and is playing his wonderful role of being a bow user in this game. I honestly like to keep Niles on the team regardless of whether or not he's actually good, just because he's got some really great crit lines and support lines that make me laugh everytime I hear them. I also came up with the possible idea of using him for rallies. He's not going to be my only "rally bot", but he'll be able to utilize both Rally Skill AND Rally Defense through his class tree. He's already got some support with Arthur (I've been mindlessly letting them get support points), so I could even give him Rally Strength if I do so wish.

I can't not use Selena. She's one of my favorite FE characters. And I also can't not put her with Laslow! Yes, she doesn't exactly GET anything from it, but Laslow does get something from it! She's gonna end up being a Wyvern Lord through a Beruka/Camilla friendship (whichever one happens first!), and I want her to have some time in Hero as well.

For Laslow, he'll be another one of our Rally Bots! I want him to get the classic Strength/Speed/Skill set with a Selena marriage and Keaton friendship. Not much else to say there!

For Xander, he for some reason doesn't have a fast support with Laslow, meaning it's pointless to not just give him the Charlotte marriage for Sol access. I'm torn between keeping him in Paladin or making him either a Hero or Wyvern Lord. Once again, stay tuned!

I REALLY want to try and make Charlotte good this run. I always just make her Xander's backpack, but I feel like she deserves more than that, no? So, I'm going to possibly try to give her a Beruka friendship and give her Wyvern access. MAYBE. With the way I'm playing the game out, I'm planning on having a whole Paralogue chain after Chapter 16 (possibly after 18 but idk), and they'll have plenty of time to build that rank up. She'll stay a Berserker, but stuff like Strength +2 would be nice. If Charlotte gave Troubadour access to Beruka, I would easily just marry Beruka to Leo, but unfortunately the game doesn't want that.

Yeah, let's talk about Forrest! He might not be the BEST child for Corrin to have, but he will always be my designated staff bot! What I'm trying to do this run is get Leo to pass down Rally Defense and for Corrin to pass down Demoiselle through an Elise A support (which I basically already have, it's so painfully easy to do). That makes it so that Forrest can promote to Strategist and never have to switch his class to anything else. That'll be really nice in the late game when everybody else is trying to get other skills. I tried to give him either Amaterasu (through a Shigure A support) or Malefic Aura, but it's honestly pointless to put him out of a staff class.

Soleil and Ophelia are just the Zoran Chapter 25 cheese strat. That's all I want them to be. Ophelia's got the 'ol Vantage Sorc build, and Soleil is a Sol Master Ninja. Nothing to report, go watch "Soleil, Reaper of Souls" and "The Ophelization of Conquest" for context. I might be marrying Ophelia to Percy though, since they both come in super early and Trample will be beneficial to her.

Midori is my little money bot! Her mother will be Azura, who's gonna pass down Luck +4! Probably not her BEST mother in terms of luck growth, but I just really like the Azura/Kaze supports, I think it makes a lot of sense for Azura to be Midori's mother, and it gets the job done well enough. In Merchant, she DOES cap out her luck at 40, but with tonics and pair ups (even managing to snag an Anna's Bow), she'll be getting up to 56 luck. That's crazy.

Next up is one of my favorite kids, Nina! What I really like about Camilla being her mom is that (not only does it makes so much sense), but she becomes a really good mixed unit! She can utilize both the Shining Bow and regular bows, and she also does well in Wyvern classes as a mini Camilla if you wish to go that route! For me, I'm keeping her in Adventurer. In my last run, I attempted to give her all 5 Breaker skills. We're not doing that this run. We're keeping her as a normal unit haha.

And finally, we have Velouria, who's gonna be the daughter of Keaton and Peri. I'm a salty, petty person, and I want to prove that Velouria can still be an insane unit without Charlotte or Camilla as her mom. So I'm doing Peri, because I've never seen anybody make a Peri!Velouria (probably for good reason). She has damage stacks via Elbow Room and Odd Shaped, she can even go into Berserker as her end class and grab Axefaire. Idk I've never trained Velouria before, so I think we'll just go off vibes, okay?

I'm gonna make a list of all the skill sets momentarily! I would prefer it, if anybody sees this, that nobody comments under this and goes "well actually, this pairing would be better". If you have suggestions for skill sets, that's absolutely welcome! But I am somebody that likes to believe that even if your chosen pairing isn't the "optimal" pairing, it can still be good in-game. I also don't want to rely on proc skills for this run, I typically don't. I love the flashy crit animations, but I would rather play it safe and not get a unit accidentally killed because Xander procced Luna on the wrong enemy or something. The only one I will be using is Sol, because it doesn't increase your damage output, just gives you more health.

[theoretical-tactician]

Hey! So, I said I might make a list of Fire Emblem modding links, so here it is! Before anything, be sure you have a hacked 3DS so you can mod your games. You can load mods directly onto a hacked 3DS OR you can use a hacked 3DS to dump your games and play them on an emulator.

If you haven't hacked your 3DS yet, follow this guide to do so! It's easy and super safe!

I would highly recommend using a hacked 3DS as citra was taken down. Of course, if you can find a branch of citra to use or another emulator, feel free to try. Just be aware that emulators can be demanding and not all games function great.

Now, as for game modding, here are a few of my favorite things to use as well as some interesting mods others enjoy. Feel free to share mods you enjoy and I'll add them to this list.

General Modding

Paragon - This in and of itself is not a mod. However, if you're interested in dipping your toes in trying to create your own mods, this is a good starting point! This tool provides you with a friendly user interface to mess with the code of the game and create your own custom mods (don't worry, you don't need to know how to code).

Fire Emblem Awakening

Unofficial Gay Awakening - As the name says it adds gay supports in Awakening. I can't really add anything here.

Project Thabes - This is an overhaul of Awakening, akin to a sort of remix. The idea is fixing up some issues with story, rebalancing, and remixing maps. Definitely an interesting project to check out if you want a fresh experience with the game.

Twin Morgans - Y'know. If you want double the Morgan. :)

Reverse Recruitment Order - Excluding Chrom, Robin, and Lucina, all units are obtained in reverse order. Something fun to mix up your game.

Fates Stances - If you came to really love the stance system in Fates, good news! This mod implements the stance system into Awakening. Yeah, it's less broken, but way more fun.

Gender-Lock Removal - You want male pegasus knights and female barbarians? Here they are. Need I say more?

Gender Neutral Robin - For the fellow nonbinary gamers who wish for a gender neutral experience. A mod that removes all gendered text for Robin, turning it gender neutral.

Sexualization Removal - Women now have pants :)

No Ambush Reinforcements - The worst part of playing Awakening on any difficulty outside normal is that enemies act the same turn they spawn. This mod removes of that ridiculous (and honestly unfair) mechanic.

Fire Emblem Fates

Unofficial Gay Fates - It's as the name says: a mod to add gay supports to Fates. Though it's not just gay, it also generally adds additional supports between characters.

Ignis - This is a Fates randomizer that allows you to customize your own experience. This can randomize recruitment order, chest/village items, skills, classes, stats, and so on. I've been using this for years, so I can vouch for its fun and stability.

Fates HD - Just a mod to upscale textures. Meant for people playing the game on citra, not hardware.

Before Fates - This mod is currently a work in progress, but it's meant to expand the backstory in Fates. While it's incomplete, it's definitely worth keeping an eye on.

Fates Retranslation+ - If you kinda hate the translation of Fates, good news! This mod retranslates the entire game to better match the original Japanese version. It also adds some minor patches, but the idea of this mod is to fix the English translation.

Princess Personals - Legendary weapons for the princesses. Because they earned it. :)

Non-Binary Corrin - For all my non-binary pals out there, someone made a mod to make all references to Corrin gender-neutral. (Note: the mod creator is remaking the mod due to some issues.)

Playable Lilith - Do you love Lilith? Sad that she's stuck being killed off in routes and is otherwise unplayable? Well, this mod adds her as a playable character. Do it for her.

Face-Lift - This mod does some edits to characters to update things like skin tones and eye colors to look more natural/better match parents (like giving Benny darker skin rather than grey skin). It has a regular version for hardware and HD version for citra users who like having the HD mod.

Sexualization Removal - Women can finally have pants :)

Kana Promotion Outfits - A personal favorite of mine: this mod gives Kana actual unique promotion outfits. Their silly little bandana will never leave us.

Everything is Silver - Unlike the other Fates mods here, this is just a silly little challenge mod I made. It gives every weapon the silver weapon flag, causing them to debuff you after combat. It's a fun challenge run that may force you to come at the game from a new angle.

Fire Emblem Echoes

Route Swap - Just a funky little mod that swaps the two parties. So now Celica and crew are on Alm's journey and vice versa.

Model + Texture Overhaul - This mod does small fixes to texture errors and inconsistencies as well as adding some new unique models.

Echoes: RG Edition - This mod adds some new classes including a player axe user class. The additional classes can make an interesting new experience for players, not to mention this mod adds some new difficulty to the game.

Playable Berkut and Fernand - As stated in the title, you'll be able to use Berkut and Fernand should you so desire.

7-Eleven Collab Enabler - Are you aware of the Japan-only limited time 7-Eleven collab with SoV? Well, if you weren't now you are. And you can access these items.

Gender-lock Removal - Gender locked classes have always been an issue in Fire Emblem. But now you can remove that restriction with this mod. Not only are classes unrestricted, but the Ram Village boys now have a triangle attack.

Installing Mods

3DS

Assuming your 3DS is hacked, you should be using luma to mod games. Once you have your mod files, installing them is extremely easy. Load up your SD card and go into luma > titles and create a folder with the corresponding title id to your game.

Once you have a folder for your game, drop the mod files within (remember to unzip them, and they should be a romfs folder). If done correctly, it should look something like this.

There's one final step before you run your modded game, though! Reinsert your SD card in your 3DS and then hold SELECT while powering the console on. The luma config menu should come up. Select "Enable game patching" then press START to save.

You only ever have to do this luma step once. So once you've enable game patching, you can freely switch out mods on your 3DS and they'll run automatically. If you want to disable mods, either delete them from your SD card or disable game patching.

Citra

Just like with hardware, modding games on citra is extremely easy. All you have to do is open citra, right click the game you want to mod, and click "Open Mods Location" from the menu like below.

This will create/open a mod folder for the title you selected. Just like on the 3DS, all you have to do is insert your mod folder here. It should be inside a romfs folder like below.

If you did everything correctly, then your mods should take effect when you next run your game on citra.

[juette]

a comprehensive guide to custom villagers

when making my custom villager it was very difficult to find good tutorials as many of them would point to deleted pages or only cover things i already knew, so i have decided to make my own complete tutorial. please let me know if you need any aditional help! i will try my best to keep this tutorial up to date and clarify it if needed.

it's important to note that these villagers will NOT show up in online play and dream towns. since only your game is edited, other players will see whichever villager you've replaced instead of the one you've made unless they also mod their game.

first things first, you will need a hacked 3ds with luma3ds and an SD card for this. you can probably play in citra, but i dont really know how using mods in citra works so i will focus on luma3ds for this tutorial.

if you haven't hacked your 3ds yet, do not follow a video tutorial: they can become outdated very easily with no indication of it and following outdated guides makes it a lot more likely that you'll brick your console. follow the guide on 3ds.hacks.guide instead.

other software you will need:

hackingtoolkit9ds to decrypt and unpack the rom

kukkii to extract the textures and put them back in

a drawing software (can be anything, even mspaint) to edit the textures

blender or another 3d editing software to preview what you're doing

010 editor to edit the bin and .umsbt files

step 1: getting a rom

if you're simply downloading the rom online, you may skip this step.

for those who wish to dump the rom from their console, you must first turn it on while pressing the START button to enter godmode9's menu. click the HOME button to see more options, then select "Title manager", then select where you've installed the title (SD card or the console itself). a list of all your installed games will appear. scroll down to Animal Crossing New Leaf or Happy Home Designer depending on which game you want your villager to be injected into.

once you've chosen the game, select "Manage title..." and choose either "Build CIA (standard)" or "Dump CXI/NDS file". you may then shut down the console and insert the SD card into your computer. the rom will be in the folder \gm9\out on the root of your SD card

step 2: decrypting/unpacking the rom

drag and drop your rom to the "PackHack" folder that hackingtoolkit9ds is in. rename it so that it doesn't contain any spaces or special characters.

open up hackingtoolkit9ds and type either CE (for .cia roms) or CXI (for .cxi files) in the window that appears depending on the format of your rom. it will ask you to write the name of your file without the extension. type it and press enter and wait for it to do its thing.

step 3: making your textures!

you'll find your extracted villager models in the folder \ExtractedRomFS\Npc\Normal\Model

the first three letters in each .bcres file name represent the species. open up one of the files of the species you want to make yoir villager be. it doesn't have to be the file of the specific villager you want to replace as we can rename it later, but do be careful that certain villagers have slightly different models than the rest of their species (tucker having tusks or étoile having hairpins, for example)

since i wanted to make an elephant with tusks, i've picked tucker as my base. he uses model elp09.bcres

click the "Batch export PNG" button and choose the folder you want the textures to go in. you may then edit them as you wish. your textures do not need to be semi-transparent like the extracted textures are.

i like seeing the way things look as i work, so i get a copy of the model as a .dae file to open it in blender. you may get those from models-resource.com or you may extract them yourself using ohana 3ds rebirth, though ohana can be a bit unreliable at times. blender's "texture paint" tab also allows you to draw directly on the model, though i don't find it precise enough to my taste so i mostly use it to lay guidelines for me to draw over.

once you're satisfied with your model, make sure to draw the different expressions as well.

eyes 0: neutral

eyes 1: half-blink

eyes 2: blink

eyes 3: angry

eyes 4: sad

eyes 5: happy closed (think ^_^)

eyes 6: surprised

eyes 7: >_< face

mouth 0: neutral/smile

mouth 1: half-open

mouth 2: fully open

mouth 3: frown

mouth 4: half-open frown

mouth 5: fully open frown

you do not have to follow those expressions exactly: for example, being a plush elephant, tusker's mouth moves up and down as he speaks instead of opening and closing.

once everything is done, open the .bcres file in kukkii again and import all of your textures in the right slot (i've found the mass import button does not work for me), then save the file.

step 4: editing names and catchphrases

note: if the villager you are replacing is already in your town, editing the catchphrase in the game's files will NOT change it in-game. similarly, if you are putting the villager in your town with marc robledo's save editor, they will have the catchphrase of the villager you've replaced unless you change it in the save editor yourself.

editing a villager's name or default catchphrase is quite simple, but the new name/catchphrase cannot be longer than the old one. if it is, it will mess up the names and default catchphrases of all the following villagers in the game files.

since you can edit the villager's personality in the game files, simply pick a villager with a long enough name and the right gender. you may also look at the villagers' favourite colors and styles on nookipedia to find one that most closely resembles the villager you wish to make.

since i want tusker to have the sisterly personality, i looked at all the sisterly villagers and i found that pashmina's tastes were close enough, so this is who tusker will be replacing. since her id is goa08, tusker's model needs to be renamed to goa08.bcres

you will find villager names in \ExtractedRomFS\Script\Str\STR_NNpc_name.umsbt and \ExtractedRomFS\Script\Str\STR_NNpc_name_ASR.umsbt

scroll down until you find the name of the villager you wish to replace and change it. the dots between each letter are NOT periods! make sure not to delete them. if you do delete one, or if the villager you're replacing has too many letters in its name, you can copy a dot from another name and paste it between the letters or in place of the extra letters.

catchphrases are found in \ExtractedRomFS\Script\Str\STR_NNpc_habit.umsbt

step 5: editing birthdays, species and personalities

you may skip this step if you only wanted to edit the villager's name. as far as i know, this does not work in happy home designer.

first, download this template.

then, open up \ExtractedRomFS\Npc\Normal\ConstPack.bin in 010 editor and click View -> Line Width -> Custom Width... and enter a value of 34 to make all the villager IDs align.

next, click Templates -> Run Template and select the template we've downloaded. a list will appear at the bottom of the window. scroll through it until you reach the villager you wish to edit, (it will be highlighted in the top half of the window) mine being goa08.

clicking the arrow to the left of struct VillagerConst will reveal a list of all the data this line contains. i will show you how to change birthday, species and personality.

the page we downloaded the template on shows a list of "cases" for each field . for example, for the species field, we want tusker to be an elephant, which is case 0x01 on the page. we will thus type 0x01 in the u8 Species field of 010 editor. the same thing goes for the u8 Personality field. sisterly is 7.

the birth month and day simply require the date. tusker's birthday is may 1st, so i typed 1 in the u8 BirthDay field and 5 in the u8 BirthMonth field. leave everything else alone.

step 6: putting them in the game

luma3ds makes it really easy to put your villagers into the game as long as you pay attention to the folder structure of the original rom.

on the root of your sd card, there should be a folder named luma, and within it a folder named titles (if there isn't, you can create it.)

within that folder, create a folder named with the title ID of your animal crossing game. that title ID will depend on the region of your game.

you can then create a folder named romfs in which you will place your mod files while respecting the path of theoriginal files. for example, the path for the models will be \luma\titles\<game title ID>\romfs\Npc\Normal\Model

when all the files are in place, pop your sd card back into your 3ds and open the game. if the villager isn't in your town, use wisp and an amiibo card (or wumiibo) to see if they show up properly.

and that's it! enjoy your new villagers <3 feel free to tag me in your custom villagers, i'd love to see what you make!

did you find this tutorial helpful? you can buy me a ko-fi as thanks!

[breakthings]

More Jason Headcanons because I am hyperfixated.

On top of the paranoia I mentioned in my last HC post for him, Jason has PTSD after the whole Rook Islands thing, as to be expected. Some triggers include: Loud noises ( like fireworks ) & Yelling/Screaming ( to a degree ). These can cause severe panic attacks. He also has Nightmares & Flashbacks consistently, has a hard time sleeping & he can be a bit jumpy & irritated quite easily.

My Jason is a mixture of both the ‘Save your Friends’ & ‘Join Citra’ route. Meaning a few of his friends have died ( Liza & Keith ), and after going back to America with the few that survived, Jason tried to cut ties due to the extensive trauma. ( Though Daisy & Oliver still try to contact him from time to time.)

Jason has a service dog who was paid for by his mother. A female German Shepherd named Pepper.

Jason stayed with his mother & Riley for a while after coming back to L.A, mostly for his mental health. After about a year he got his own place.

[bisexualbumblebee-writes]

Break- Aragorn x OC

Aragorn x Issa

Description: With the rebuilding of Gondor, Aragorn and Issa have become burnt out and longing for a break. Luckily a certain invitation from an Elven King helps them with that. 

Word Count: 2.4k

Since Aragorn and Issa's coronation and wedding, things had been…hectic to say the least. There was so much that needed to be done, so much that needed to be built, before Gondor could even begin attempting to thrive. They needed to undo the extensive damage caused by Sauron, and it proved to be easier said than done. 

Both the new King and Queen of Gondor were busy at any and all hours of the day no matter what. Aragorn spent his time rebuilding relationships with other Kingdoms that had been broken during Denethor’s rule. While he did that, Issa decided to aid the people in rebuilding any damaged buildings and/or homes in the city. 

All this work meant that Aragorn and Issa barely had any time to spend with each other unless it’s in a professional setting. It was a rare occasion that they even saw each other during the day. Aragorn would usually be in the palace, most likely his office or a councilroom, while Issa remained outside until just before the sun had set behind the horizon. They even ate dinner apart, Issa grabbing something while in town and Aragorn eating in his office. It seemed like there was just so much to be done and not enough time. And there was only so much Boromir and Citra (who had been promoted to being their respective advisors) could do to help them, the monarchs had to do most of it on their own. 

They couldn’t even spend time together before bed. More often than not one of them would just come in and just go straight to bed because they were just so exhausted. On the rare occasion that they were both awake by the time the other got to bed, they could only get a few conversations in before one of them succumbed to sleep. 

It was beginning to cause them to become distant, which terrified them both. The last thing they wanted was for their marriage to fall apart because they don’t have time for each other. Of course they couldn’t take a vacation or anything. How could they just leave their people in the dust while they enjoyed their time in a faraway paradise? The answer was they couldn’t. Logically they knew that all this stress and strain would eventually end, but they didn’t know how much they could take before it ended. 

Luckily, an opportunity arose in the form of their dear friend’s father: King Thranduil of Mirkwood. Well, of course it was now Greenwood once again since Sauron did not have a hold of the land. Since Sauron had been defeated, nature had begun healing, which meant that the kingdom began flourishing, ridding Greenwood of its original grim name. 

Anyways, the Elven King had sent a letter to Aragorn inviting both him and Issa to his kingdom. It was an easy opportunity for him to meet the new King and Queen of Gondor and perhaps discuss some deals with them that could benefit both kingdoms. Aragorn instantly recognized it as an opportunity to get away from their daily duties without the guilt of going on vacation. He sent a letter to the Elf King accepting his invitation before changing into more casual attire and going out to find his wife. 

She had been helping with the finishing touches of a new schoolhouse when he finally spotted her. She had been painting the last wall that needed painting for the building to officially be completed. Today, and every other day really, opted for more casual attire so she wasn’t working in a nice dress. She wore a tunic Aragorn recognized as one she’d received while in the MapleElm realm on the quest to destroy the One Ring, and one that was getting quite a bit of paint on it with all the children running around excitedly. 

He couldn’t help but smile at that, remembering how fond she had been of it before it was ultimately gifted to her when they left. Wordlessly, he walked over to her and wrapped his arms around her waist from behind. Issa tensed up at first as the sudden contact, but quickly recognized her husband’s touch and relaxed into him. 

“What do you think?” She asked softly, referring to the school as Aragron rested his chin on her shoulder. She felt his chin move as a smile formed on his face. 

“I think that my amazing wife did an amazing thing for our amazing kingdom.” 

“So it’s amazing?” Issa teased lightly, turning her head to look at him. 

“Very,” he confirmed, pressing a kiss to her cheek before pulling away. “But I actually wanted to talk to you about something.” At that, the Queen’s brows furrowed in concern. 

“Is everything okay?” She asked worriedly. Aragorn chuckled softly and took her hand in his as he led her away from the many people around them. 

“Everything is fine,” he answered just before they were out of sight. Issa nodded slowly (albeit still confusedly) as her husband took both her hands in his. 

“We were invited by King Thranduil of Greenwood to visit his kingdom,” he said, then watched as her eyes closed. 

“Aragorn,” she started with a sigh. He knew what was coming, she was preparing to say what she’d been saying since they’d had their first conversation about leaving their kingdom for a bit. 

“It is not a vacation,” Aragorn added quickly, which surprised the girl. “It’s technically a diplomatic visit. King Thranduil wishes to meet the new King and Queen of Gondor and perhaps discuss some deals with them that could benefit both of our kingdoms. You wouldn’t deny our people welfare, would you?” Issa sighed again, but this time she looked defeated rather than disappointed. That let him know that he got her, he’d convinced her. 

“Well, when you put it like that…” she trailed off slowly, then ultimately nodded. “Very well. When do we leave?” 

Less than a week later, Boromir and Citra were seeing their King and Queen off. Issa had been going over some last minute duties to fulfill with her advisor just before entering the carriage, and it took Aragorn all but pushing her inside for her to finally get in. Once he wished his two friends goodbye he also climbed in and they were off. 

In total, it took them a couple of weeks to reach Greenwood. It felt weird being in a carriage considering they’d spent most of their lives traveling by horseback. With not having anything to do, Issa didn’t know what to do with herself. Eventually she had to calm herself down by counting any trees they passed. 

Finally, finally, they arrived at the Forest Gate. Because Greenwood was surrounded by thick woods, they would have to continue on foot from there. A small group of guards headed by the Marchwarden Feren were waiting for them. They greeted each other then allowed the guards  to lead them down the trail to the kingdom. Once they reached it they were greeted by more guards lined up side by side along the path to help guide them towards the palace. As they walked, Issa noticed the citizens of Greenwood crowding behind the guards, watching them in awe. She offered them a kind smile before facing forward as they reached the palace. 

They were taken to the throne room and were greeted by Thranduil, who sat on his throne. Legolas was also there, standing beside the bottom of the staircase that led up to said throne with his hands clasped in front of him. Once Aragorn and Issa got to the center of the room, they bowed/curtsied respectfully. 

“King Thranduil, it is an honor to be in your presence again,” Aragorn greeted politely, Issa nodding afterwards. 

“Yes, it is a pleasure to see you again, Your Majesty.” 

“Believe me when I say the pleasure is all mine, King Aragorn and Queen Issa,” The Elf responded regally, standing up and beginning to walk down the stairs. “And it is an honor to have the new King and Queen of Gondor here in Greenwood.” By the time he finished he had finished his descent and was now standing in front of the couple. After a moment he glanced at his son, who took that as his cue to step forward. 

“It’s wonderful to see you again, Your Majesties,” Legolas greeted formally, which Aragorn and Issa returned. The Prince looked at his father afterwards, almost as if asking for permission for something. Thranduil glanced at his son again, and a small smile formed on his face as he nodded once. Instantly Legolas and Aragorn stepped forward simultaneously and embraced each other. All of them were smiling, genuine smiles now, as Legolas let go of the King then pulled Issa into a hug. 

“I’m so happy you’re here, mellons (friends),” the Prince said, much more casually this time. “I have missed you both.”

“We’ve missed you too,” Issa laughed as they pulled away. “You and Alphine.” Legolas smiled at the mere thought of his fiance before his father spoke. 

“Well, I know that the journey here must have been tiring,” he said, already beginning to lead the three of them out of the throne room. “There is a feast awaiting you in the Great Hall, and you can tell us all about it. Then I believe we have a few things to discuss.” 

“Of course,” Aragorn nodded as he walked beside him, Legolas and Issa walking side by side behind them. 

Once they arrived in the Great Hall they got to meet Queen Aster and reunite with Alphine. They spent all of dinner talking about just about everything from the couple’s journey to Greenwood to memories with Legolas and Alphie while Thranduil and Aster listened happily. Afterwards Aragorn and Issa realized just how tired they were and went to bed soon after, promising that they’ll discuss business with the King and Queen tomorrow. 

They ended up spending almost a week there. The first several days were actually about negotiations and making ties between Gondor and Greenwood, but what Aragorn had neglected to remind Issa about was that they’d arrived in the Elven kingdom just in time for Mereth en Giliath- the Feast of Starlight. Of course they just had to stay for it, it’d be rude not to. So, by day they would be doing business with Thranduil and Aster and by night they would be celebrating the moon and stars (plus their new harvest season). 

Every night she and Aragorn would spend the  entire night feasting, drinking and dancing along with their new allies, but her suspicion stayed in the back of her mind. It seemed just a little too convenient that they just so happened to arrive in time for this. Tonight had been the last night of the feast, and it was well spent. King Thranduil thanked everyone for attending and wished them a good night before they separated to go home/their rooms. That’s when Issa took her chance.

“You planned this,” she said to her husband once they were in their temporary room. It wasn’t a question, but more of a statement. Aragorn paused for a moment before continuing to their bed, where their night clothes were. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he answered nonchalantly. The woman rolled her eyes and crossed her arms as she followed him. Aragorn still didn’t face her and instead took his time in unfolding his shirt.

“You knew that the Feast of Starlight was coming up and you took advantage of it because you knew that I wouldn’t remember,” she continued firmly. For a moment it seemed like the man was ready to continue his charade, but he ultimately dropped it and looked at her. 

“To be fair it was Thranduil and Legolas’ idea,” he responded. His answer made her sigh as she moved away from him. 

“Aragorn-”

“Issa, you know we both needed it,” he cut off the beginning of her frustrated rant as he crossed the room to reach her once again. Issa attempted to pull away from him as he took her hands in his, but he kept a firm (albeit gentle) grip.

“I don’t care!” She exclaimed, but she didn’t try to fight him this time. “Our people have been working just as hard as us, if not more, to rebuild the city and make things better. You cannot possibly think that we deserve it more than them.” 

“I don’t,” Aragorn shot back. “Neither you nor I believe that, but they also know when they need a break and they take them. Like Boromir and Citra; they took several days off because they knew that they were becoming burnt out with their workload. Were you mad when they did that?” 

“Of course not,” Issa retorted, though there wasn’t as much as a bite to it. 

“Exactly. So what makes us any different?” The man continued softly. 

“They aren’t the King and Queen,” she answered in the same tone. “We are.” He nodded and carefully squeezed her hands. 

“Yes, we are. But we are also human, we need to take breaks or else we’ll just be miserable. And it wasn’t like we didn’t do anything while here; we now have an amazing ally in Thranduil and his kingdom. You can’t pretend like this trip hasn’t been helpful for both us and our people.” Issa considered his words for a moment, then sighed when she realized he was right. The man, knowing that he had gotten his point across, smiled softly and let go of her hands to hug her. She returned it instantly, relaxing into his embrace. A small grin formed on her face as Aragorn kissed the crown of her head. 

“Now, we must start the journey home tomorrow. We should get some rest.” The girl nodded and allowed him to lead her to bed. 

The next morning they said their farewells to the King, Queen, Prince and Princess before they were finally off. Despite the fact that it took the same amount of time to return home, it felt like it took much longer. Of course that may have been because Issa was just so excited to see Gondor again, but she was practically bouncing in her seat as their carriage stopped in front of their palace. Boromir and Citra were waiting outside for them. The former held out a hand and helped Issa out of the carriage, Aragorn following. 

“Welcome home,” Citra greeted with a wide smile. “Your people have missed you.”

“And we have missed them,” Aragorn answered while Issa nodded. As the four of them began walking up the steps of the castle, Boromir spoke. 

“So, how was your trip?” Aragorn and Issa shared a smile before looking at him. 

“Very relaxing,” she answered, and it was true.

[nwbeerguide]

At 11% ABV, Sierra Nevada Brewing Company announces 2021's Hoptimum Triple IPA.

image courtesy Sierra Nevada Brewing Company

Press Release

CHICO, California … Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. announced the release of Hoptimum Triple IPA, which will be available at select retail locations starting in mid-April. Hoptimum is a special, limited release and a member of the brewery’s High Altitude Series. This limited-time offering, which is touted as Sierra Nevada’s hoppiest beer, is available in 6-packs of 12-ounce bottles and draft while supplies last or through August when the next beer in the High Altitude series is rolled out. New this year, the beer features the highest ABV ever for a Hoptimum Triple IPA release.

Each year the brewers refine the Hoptimum Triple IPA recipe, tinkering with the hop line-up to ensure the beer offers a similar flavor profile, while also featuring the finest, most flavorful hops of the recent hop harvest season.

“Traditionally, we try to maintain that piney, citrusy flavor because it’s what we’re known for,” explains James Conery, Innovation Manager and brewer at Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. “This beer contains the best lots of the hop pick, and has that piney, citrusy flavor with a little bit of dank and stonefruit in there for a twist.”

For 2021 the beer features Magnum, Idaho 7, El Dorado, and Mosaic hops on the hot side, and finishes by dry hopping with Citra, Mosaic lupulin powder, Loral, and Magnum hops. It comes in at 11% ABV and 75 IBU, up from last year’s version that was 10.6% ABV. The process of creating the beer involves the use of Sierra Nevada’s innovative dry-hopping device dubbed the Hop Torpedo, which is used to impart optimal hop aromas and flavors without adding bitterness.

The High Altitude series from Sierra Nevada consists of three limited-time offerings each year, including Bigfoot Barleywine-Style Ale (December-April), Hoptimum Triple IPA (April-August), and Narwhal Imperial Stout (August-December). This collection of monstrous beers each tout high gravity ABVs of 9.5% or more and are released in limited quantity so they are available only while supplies last.

About the Hop Torpedo

Dry hopping is a way to give beer more flavor and aroma, not more bitterness. A traditional method is filling nylon sacks with hops and suspending them in fermentation tanks. But sometimes brewers would remove those sacks—even weeks later—and they’d be dry in the middle! With the Hop Torpedo, the brewers can maximize every hop. Beer circulates out of a fermenter, flows through the column of hops, and back into the tank. By adjusting the time, temperature and speed of circulation, brewers can control the aromas and flavors in a finished beer. The Hop Torpedo invention led to the development of the successful year-round beer from Sierra Nevada called Torpedo® Extra IPA.

About Sierra Nevada Brewing Co.

Inspired by frequent trips to the Sierra Nevada mountain range, Ken Grossman founded Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. in 1980. Highly regarded for using only the finest quality ingredients, Sierra Nevada has set the standard for craft brewers worldwide with innovations in the brewhouse and in its sustainability efforts. The pioneering spirit that launched Sierra Nevada now spans both coasts with breweries in Chico, California and Mills River, North Carolina. Sierra Nevada is famous for its extensive line of beers including Pale Ale, Hazy Little Thing®, Torpedo® and a host of seasonal, specialty and limited release beers. Learn more at www.sierranevada.com.

###

from Northwest Beer Guide - News - The Northwest Beer Guide https://bit.ly/329K84u

[pokefan531]

Legacy AMD APU Llano Laptop for Emulation tests - Part 2

Software tools and Emulators used.

I covered everything about my laptop and its history. I went from Windows 10 to Manjaro XFCE 19 and installed needed software to get great performance and needed emulators to suit my laptop's hardware. I find AUR builds easy again because I can find plugins and needed standalone emulators for good testing. AUR builds work almost perfect for me, aside from some build time, but as long as it can installed a program or an extension, I'm good.

For my laptop, I installed TPC, or TurionPowerControl to overclock my laptop's CPU. The bios doesn't have an option for permanent overclock, since it's a laptop. However, the CPU has used much voltage by default for big room for overclocking with little higher power draw. At stock, it run at base 1.5Ghz at 1.1625V and 2.4Ghz boost at 1.415V. It can easily be undervolted to cool the laptop a bit. The temp limit is at 85C, so it can throttle the CPU if it reaches around that point. Undervolt would go down to 1.5Ghz at 1.0625V and 2.4Ghz boost at 1.200V, which brings down about seven percent deop on temperature, and little more battery life. Overclock would hit up to 2.3Ghz at 1.175V and 2.8Ghz at 1.400V, only little voltage change on each, and still runs stable. Note that each CPUs can differ silicon quality that can reach lower or higher voltage for overclocking or undervolting. Averagely, my laptop's CPU performance would be 33% increase. The Llano APUs are one of the exceptions that you can overclock your laptop without much worry.

I installed Gamemode for Linux, and I explained in the last page. It's useful for setting power mode for both CPU and GPU to performance mode, so it will use highest clock speed as much as it can. Radeon-Profile is an app on Linux that can force power mode on GPU if you run a program if you can't use gamemode for whatever reason. On Windows, you can force performance mode on Catalyst driver, and have Windows set to performance mode on power setup. Drivers used on Linux as of this writing is Mesa r600g Driver 19.3.

Now let's get to the list of emulators I will be using for each system. Some are using Retroarch.

NES: I'm using Nestopia and Mesen on Retroarch. Both are quite accurate, with the latter being the most accurate. Nestopia is the fastest option, but Mesen can run pretty smoothly too with default settings. Nestopia has much more headroom for Runahead and NES CPU overclocking. I use FireBrandX's digital palettes.

SNES: I use Snes9x Mainline for Retroarch and new standalone Bsnes v110 for test. Snes9x runs very well and can use both features listed above. Bsnes is used for testing mostly. I'll explain about Bsnes, but what I can say is it can run a lot of games at fullspeed. No need for Libretro's old many Bsnes cores in my opinion and Snes9x Mainline is suitable generally. Bsnes AUR builds are available.

N64: On Windows, it was Project64 with Jabo's D3D8 1.6.1 Plugin, but after switching to Linux, Mupen64Plus with GlideN64 while using Mesa drivers offers a better option. Since February 2020, M64p is free once again so you don't have to do DIY build for each plugin to use with Mupen64plus, and get good GUI. Just go to this website: https://github.com/loganmc10/m64p/releases . If it doesn't go free in the future, you would have to use AUR files to build plugins and find the gui. There is Mupen64Plus Next for Retroarch, but a standalone build is the fastest and more reliable option.

Gamecube/Wii: I use beta builds of Dolphin to measure it. We'll explain about that later on.

Sega SMS/Genesis/GameGear/32x: I use Genesis GX Plus on Retroarch, and it runs pretty great. For 32x, I can use Kega Fusion for Windows, or Picodrive core, but I don't have 32x game to test.

Sega Saturn: I use Yaba Sanshiro, and it's the fastest emulator you can get for the laptop. Yaba Sanshiro has some great options.

Sega Dreamcast: I installed Redream. It is the fastest dreamcast emulator available and more accurate than NullDC. I do have a fork of Reicast called Flycast that is used for testing too. https://flyinghead.github.io/flycast-builds/ (ubuntu build is just linux build). I do recommend using Flycast standalone builds instead of Libretro core one since standalone Hardware-based rendering emulators often run faster than on Retroarch.

Playstation 1: I use both PCSX-R PGXP and PCSX-Rearmed core. PCSX-R has great option for perspective correction and much less jittering polygons while being faster than Libretro's Beetle PSX core and standalone Mednafen. The explanation on those four emulators and the windows PCSX-R on Pete's OpenGL2 Tweak will also be mentioned.

Playstation 2: I use PCSX2.

GB/GBC: Sameboy. It is more accurate than Gambatte and VBA.

GBA: mGBA, and it is the fastest and most accurate GBA emulator I used.

NDS: Despite development drama, I use standalone Desmume mainline. It's pretty good for this laptop since you have an option to use frameskip. MelonDS with JIT will be included.

3DS: Citra Canary is the best option.

PSP: PPSSPP.

Dos: Dosbox ECE or Dosbox-X at best. ECE install for Dosbox is difficult, and you would need to build one, but I wanted a 32bit build since the dynamic core is pretty robust in 32bit. However on Linux, some forks or main are kinda hard to find 32bit version to have full speed for dynamic recompiler since 64bit is slower or has bugs. At the end, I use Dosbox-X, and it performs the same as standard Dosbox on normal mode. On Dynamic mode, you would need 32bit version to get the exact on either Windows or Linux.

Win9x: PCEM. Using v15 and use 486 CPUs.

Wine: Linux specific to run Windows programs. You can use Stable builds or Staging builds. Lutris and Proton can be used. Although, since my laptop's APU lacks Vulkan support, running DX11 games are much harder and barely run. The APU isn't really that strong for many DX11 games anyway. DX9 works with default OpenGL wrapper, but since we're using AMD GPU with a Mesa Gallium Driver, we can run Native DX9 API on Wine with Gallium Nine Standalone. You just install needed dependencies for Mesa D3D9 files to have Gallium Nine config enable Native DX9. DX10 is the same story as DX11. DX8 and lower works pretty good for the most part. Note that Wine is not an Emulator, but a compatibility layer.

Those are the softwares that will be used for performance testing on the next page.

Next Page on CPU emulation tests.

Previous Page on the laptop overview.

[southeastasianists]

Usmar Ismail’s Darah dan Doa, or The Long March, is said to be the first movie produced and financed by Indonesians. Its first day of filming, March 30, 1950, is now commemorated as National Film Day. But did you know that it wasn’t the first movie produced in Indonesia?

That honour belonged to Loetoeng Kasaroeng by by L. Heuveldorp and G. Kruger, released in 1926, almost two decades before Indonesia’s independence.

When the movie was released, there was no “Indonesia,” only the Dutch East Indies.

While a nicely preserved copy of Darah dan Doa is safely kept at Sinematek Indonesia in Jakarta — the first film archive in South-east Asia and still the only one in Indonesia — Loetoeng Kasaroeng’s whereabouts are unknown.

The oldest movie that Sinematek has is The Teng Chun’s Tie Pat Kai Kawin, released in 1935.

According to Indonesian Film Centre Foundation (YPFI) manager Kiki Muchtar, before 2010 Indonesian films were mainly recorded on celluloid.

“Now movie theatres use DCP [digital cinema package],” Kiki said.

Part of what YPFI does is digitalising celluloid films. That can be easy. Tracing the celluloids themselves often take them off the beaten path.

During the “Mana Film Indonesia?” (“Where Are the Indonesian Films?”) discussion held at microcinema Kineforum in Central Jakarta on Saturday (March 24), Kiki presented the results of his research to map out where celluloid copies of Indonesian films are kept, based on data she compiles from filmindonesia.or.id.

Over 600 celluloid feature films are kept at Sinematek, 707 are kept by their original production houses and 77 are in the possession of a man called Muchlis who used to run a mobile cinema business.

The rest, which amounts to over 2,300 films, are in the private collection of a few companies and collectors, including 14 Entertainment, Be Cang Film, Inter Pratama Studio and the Indonesian Old Cinema Museum in Malang, East Java.

In some cases, old movies end up overseas, usually in the collections of museums, libraries or embassies.

The government has no official film archives centre. Sinematek, established in 1975 by Misbach Yusa Biran and Usmar Ismail, is often mistaken as state-owned, when in fact it’s owned by Yayasan Pusat Perfilman Haji Usmar Ismail, a private foundation that used to be called Yayasan Citra.

With a staff of only 11 people and limited funding, Sinematek does its best to preserve films.

The celluloid copies are kept in a climate-controlled vault with a temperature between 9 and 13°C.

The humidity level is supposed to be kept at 40-45 per cent but since Indonesia is a tropical country, that rarely happens. Most of the time it can only be kept down to 63 per cent.

Sinematek Indonesia head Adisurya Abdy said almost 300 titles in its collection have been digitalised.

Adisurya wants the government to show more commitment to preserve our cinematic legacy by helping to keep Sinematek running and improve its facilities.

“We need someone, the government, to help us pay for it, basically. We need real and continuous support from the government, not just sporadic ones, ones that we have to beg for,” he told the Jakarta Globe on Tuesday.

Adisurya pointed out that short films and documentaries often suffer even worse fate than feature films when it comes to archiving and preservation.

Nevertheless, YPFI has archived and digitalised quite a few celluloid documentaries and short films that they sourced privately from the Jakarta Arts Institute (IKJ), Sonobudoyo Museum in Yogyakarta, Indonesian Old Cinema Museum, PFN, Arsari Foundation, Bung Karno Foundation in Jakarta and Bandung and from private collectors.

Watch vintage films at Sinematek

Sinematek allows anyone to watch films in their viewing room, but you have to make an appointment in advance for a group of five or more people.

Budi Iswanto, a staff member at Sinematek, said the films are also not to be brought outside the centre.

If you want to screen a film from Sinematek’s collection for non-commercial purposes — ie, you’re not charging money for tickets — you can send a letter to request the film, then Sinematek will decide if the copy of the film is in good enough condition to be screened.

If you plan to charge people for tickets, then you’ll need to get permission from the film’s producer.

“Here we don’t only keep films but we also keep posters and printed stills, and books about filmmaking,” Budi said.

Sinematek also keeps newer films in DVD, VCD and VHS.

The original celluloids for the restored versions of Usmar Ismail’s Lewat Djam Malam (After the Curfew), Tiga Dara (Three Maidens), Darah dan Doa and Asrul Sani’s Pagar Kawat Berduri (Barbed Wire Fence) all came from Sinematek.

Old movie trend

The restored version of Lewat Djam Malam was screened in cinemas in 2012, then Tiga Dara followed in 2016.

The restored Darah dan Doa and Pagar Kawat Berduri had no commercial releases since the restoration was government-funded.

So if you hear that a film is being restored, don’t get your hopes up just yet.

Commercial cinemas rarely screen old movies, but CGV kicked off its “Vintage Film Festival” last Thursday with the original Pengabdi Setan (Satan’s Slave), made in 1980 by Sisworo Gautama Putra.

The festival is held in 10 cities where there is a CGV cinema and runs until April 29. Some of the titles being screened include classics like Mat Dower (Big Lips) (1969), Ratu Ilmu Hitam (Queen of Black Magic) (1981), and the Catatan Harian Si Boy (Boy’s Diaries) series (1987-1991).

Micro cinemas Kineforum and Kinosaurus often screen vintage movies as part of their monthly programs.

Just recently Kineforum screened Gadis Penakluk (Girl Conqueror) (1980) and the 1982 version of Titian Serambut Dibelah Tujuh (The Narrow Bridge).

Outside cinemas and micro cinemas, old Indonesian films are now also available on streaming services.

Indihome, Telkom Indonesia’s pay TV service, has a channel called FLiK TV showing Indonesian films from the 1970s and recent releases.

You can also watch classic Indonesian movies on streaming platforms Iflix, Viu, Mox, Catchplay and HOOQ.

HOOQ boasts an extensive collection of around 1,500 local titles. HOOQ head of content Dellawati Wijaya said they contribute to 55-60 per cent of total traffic on the platform.

Recently releases, such as Galih & Ratna and Dear Nathan, both released in 2017, are more popular. The remastered version of the 2000 teen romance Ada Apa Dengan Cinta? (What’s Up with Love) is also a favourite.

“But some films that disappeared quickly from the cinemas have turned out to be big hits on our platform,” Della said.

HOOQ also has a selection of vintage movies, including Alam Surawidjaja’s 1979 war flick Janur Kuning (Yellow Coconut Leaf), Mourtadha Risyaf’s Naga Bonar and comedies starring Benyamin Sueb and the ever-popular Warkop trio.

Della said there are still many Indonesian films available for viewing on illegal streaming websites.

“We have to kill around 20 links per day. When we released Surga Yang Tak Dirindukan 2 (Unwanted Bliss 2), we had to kill 90 links,” Della said.

Power of community

Facebook group Komunitas Pecinta Film Indonesia Jadul (Old Movie Lovers of Indonesia) was formed in 2010 and has nearly 9,000 members so far. They host public screenings of classic Indonesian films at least twice a year, usually in coffee shops.

One of the members, Rendy Dwika Chandra, told the Jakarta Globe the group defines old films as those released between 1927 and 1992.

The members’ combined collections consist of over 1,000 films in VCD, DVD, VHS/Betamax and laser discs.

“We have classic films released between 1956 and 1992. Older than that, it’s much harder to get,” Rendy said.

Members are allowed to borrow or trade their collections, but not every film since some are in very delicate condition.

“We take extreme care of our rare collections,” Rendy said.

Though it’s still an uphill climb for both watching and preserving vintage movies in Indonesia, YPFI is making progress with its plan to launch a website with a complete archival data on Indonesian films.

“Our new website will be a one-stop information centre about Indonesian films. You can find out everything about them, from where you can get access to a copy to where you can watch them with your friends,” Kiki said.

[shinyquagsire23]

Nintendo and Executables, Emulation and Piracy

Edit (Nov 2 2022): This article contains some prior speculation and grumbling about Cemu, which is no longer closed source. Even prior to open sourcing, Cemu aided in documentation efforts for decaf. At the time though, contributions to WUT were solely done by decaf-emu and others.

While hanging around in the Citra and yuzu Discord servers this question (or some variant of it) has arisen several times, "Why was Cemu/yuzu able to develop so quickly?", and while there's some fairly obvious answers with regard to Cemu's actual development strategies (open-source vs closed-source, Patreon, etc) and some misconceptions with yuzu and the Switch I feel like these questions are a good opportunity to write on some of the factors which might play into acceleration in emulation development and reverse engineering efforts in general while also going over some of Nintendo's "DRM" and its relationship with emulation and piracy.

Also before anyone gets their jimmies rustled over piracy I think it goes without saying, my intentions talking about piracy in this article are not an endorsement of it, I just think the requirements and methods between Nintendo’s operating environments are interesting.

QUICK BACKSTORY

Just to give a quick rundown on credentials and I suppose to maybe give an idea on my familiarity with Nintendo stuff. I did some super basic GBA ASM hacking starting around 2010 or so but I started hacking ‘modern’ Nintendo consoles with the 3DS in late 2014 when the homebrew launcher for ninjhax was released. Somehow managed to implement a kernel exploit based on reverse-engineered Gateway code (though firmlaunchhax is relatively simple as far as exploits go), joined up with the rest of KARL3DS (later SALT), did some CFW/vuln stuff for 3DS for a bit, tried to bootstrap a polished Wii U CFW joint with SALT, TiniVi, SciresM and others (it didn’t totally flesh out but I did personally get native homebrew in a decent state via the Wii U Toolkit/WUT), joined with ReSwitched shortly after the Switch launch, later was kicked out, messed with Switch HID/Joy-Con stuff, found shofEL2 with some people independently, started a bit of a fuss with Linux stuff and Real Hackers and now I just do this stuff for fun I guess.

3DS ARCHITECTURE

Quick rundown on the 3DS: The kernel, codenamed Horizon, is a microkernel capable of handling multiple processes at once, along with threading, memory management and communication for those processes. Horizon and all 3DS games/applications run on the dual core (quad core for New 3DS systems) ARM11 processor in the SoC. Additionally, the 3DS has an ARM9 security coprocessor responsible for dealing with eMMC/gamecard protocols, filesystem access, signature verification, encryption, and other things. So if an application wants to access an encrypted content container on the SD card, it asks the FS process for content in that container, FS asks Process9 over PXI if it can get access to that container, Process9 checks permissions in the process exheader to see if permission to this container is granted, if it is Process9 will handle decryption and pass decrypted data from the container back to FS and back to the application. To throw in an additional example, if an application wants to decrypt a Mii QR code it has to scan the QR code, get the data, pass the data to the APT service process to ask for it to be decrypted, APT hands the data to PS and asks for it to be decrypted, PS asks Process9 over PXI to decrypt the data, then the data gets decrypted and it gets passed back to PS, back to APT, and then back to the process which needed a Mii QR decrypted. Granted, I might have missed a step or two in there and I've simplified things a bit, but this is effectively the way data gets passed around within their system.

APPLICATION ARCHITECTURE

The main container which holds executables on 3DS is the CXI container, which is mostly seen on the SD card and NAND under the .app file extension. For SD cards, these files are encrypted with a per-console key, and on NAND there is an encryption layer over the entire CTR OS FAT partition instead. After the first layer of crypto on the file we get to see a signature over the CXI header, the header itself which includes some metadata, ExeFS offsets and lengths, RomFS offsets and lengths, extended header offsets and lengths, and hashes over most of the remaining content such that the signature hash going over the header also covers any and all content within the container. As such, all content in this container is signed and verified.

ExeFS is the file container which contains the code binary along with the application's banner, icon, and metadata (app strings, region specifications, etc), and RomFS is the file container which contains any and all game data that isn't just compiled into the executable. These containers can be mounted by the SDK and accessed by applications depending on permissions. Going deeper into the actual code binary though, the main executable is entirely contained in the ExeFS file ".code", which is a single compiled block which contains the applications .text, .rodata, .data, and .bss. The offset and length of each of these sections is contained within the exheader pointed to in the CXI header, and stack memory is allocated at 0x10000000-<stack size specified in exheader> (stack memory for other threads, however, is usually allocated from the heap). Heap memory is mapped using system calls to 0x08000000 or 0x30000000. While ExeFS and RomFS can be accessed by most applications, the exheader can only be retrieved through the Process Manager service on the ARM9 via PXI and is mostly used by the loader service on the ARM11 and on the ARM9-side to validate permissions.

As far as actually interacting with the hardware goes, SDK code is always linked statically into the code bin, and SDK code is what actually handles heap management, filesystem mounting, and other things. For hardware and OS interaction, the 3DS uses several dozen system services running as their own processes, and the main application does IPC queries through system calls which translate the parameters and addresses between processes. To get a bit more specific, the main application will get a handle for "srv:" from a system call, and this handle will be used to get handles for other system processes, dependent on the application permissions given to the service manager which manages "srv:". If an application needs to talk to the GPU, it gets a handle for the gsp service from srv and from there will use IPC calls to ask the gsp service to send commands to the GPU hardware. If an application wants to install an application, it needs a handle for "am:u", and *if the application has permission to talk to this service*, a handle will be returned and the application can ask "am:u" to send a file handle to send IPC write requests to write CTR Installable Archives (CIAs) to so that "am:u" can handle the actual install. Side note, this allowed 3DS to create CIAs from eShop contents at runtime since CDN content was identical to what would be copied onto the SD card/NAND, albeit with a layer of crypto on top.

REVERSE ENGINEERING

The difficulty in reverse engineering, however, comes as a result of whatever being beyond the IPC layer being largely a black box: there are no symbols, if you're lucky you might get strings, but otherwise you're on your own if you want to know what command 7 in some service does. Without being able to decompile the service, you might be able to fuzz command 7 and figure out how many arguments it wants, what kind of address or handle translation it expects, etc. But at the end of the day you've only got guesswork and maybe some usage cases in the application. With access to decompiled service code, things get better, but not too much better. There are still no symbols and if you want to know what a command *actually* does you need to document a significant amount of decompiled code.

There is one exception, and it is an extremely rare exception on 3DS: 3DS *does* have support for dynamically linked libraries in the form of CROs, or CTR Relocatable Objects, stored on the application RomFS. CROs can be dynamically loaded, linked and unloaded and unlinked to and from an application's memory map at runtime. Since the ExeFS code bin is just a straight binary, a file called static.crs is stored along with CROs to describe the layout of functions in the static code bin, and optionally along with that, symbols can be described in this file. Effectively it acted as a shim for taking .code from a blob to a linkable ELF-alike, and at a basic level, CROs effectively function as ELFs except what would be every ELF section has its offset specified in the header along with the additional code signing measures which reside there. While not many games did ship with symbols, there were some big games like Pokemon Sun and Moon and Smash for 3DS which ended up shipping with a significant portion of their application’s symbols, making reverse engineering at least slightly easier. Some games like Steel Diver ended up shipping with ELF files in its RomFS which just had all symbols outright, so it's not all doom and gloom, but you're still at the mercy of software updates and what functions applications actually end up using unless you reverse things by hand in the relevant services.

EMULATION

As far as what an emulator like Citra actually emulates, it largely just emulates system calls and any IPC calls sent to other processes will be handled in high-level emulation rather than emulating the system processes on a lower level. This is slowly changing of course, because in order to emulate launchable applets such as the software keyboard, emulating multiple processes is required. The difficulty largely comes from emulating the (often strange) PICA200 GPU, along with emulating threading behavior and other syscall behavior of the 3DS kernel. Even with the wealth of reversed functionality, there are still several services with undocumented error behavior and other behaviors which have yet to be discovered.

I WANT TO PIRATE ON 3DS - WHAT ARE THE SECURITY IMPLICATIONS?

Practically, piracy on the 3DS requires full control over both the ARM9 and ARM11 cores. Because applications are bound to the signature verification on the ARM9, and also because all 3DS binaries are one solid lump of nonrelocatable code, it's not easy to pirate games even with arbitrary code execution. What specifically makes it difficult to pirate games without ARM11 kernel access (given gspwn, which allows any code to be overwritten) is being bound to the memory permissions of the application being taken over, one application might start read+write data sections at 0x120000 while another starts it at 0x240000, so it becomes a game of getting memory permissions to match (or alternatively, finding an application which sufficiently-sized sections and then statically recompiling the code to match those bounds). On top of that, all accesses to RomFS have to be remapped to another filesystem (or over network), which is possible as seen with HANS and *hax which transfers SD card file handles from applications which have access to the SD card (home menu) to other applications. Additionally, the permissions of the base application must match the to-be-pirated application, or the to-be-pirated application must have its code patched to no longer require permissions outside of the scope of the base app.

With ARM11 kernel, the issues of memory mappings are less of an issue since system calls can be granted to remap sections as appropriate or even spawn processes from scratch, and the issue of service permissions is lessened because the service manager which checks permissions can be patched to give permissions to all services. However, RomFS is still tricky to deal with and it would still require some sort of loader to set up and patch the application while avoiding the ARM9. Alternatively it is possible to install a select group of applications which came bundled on certain special-edition 3DS systems which were signed with global system keys instead of being tied to any one specific system via tickets.

With ARM9 kernel access, signature checks can be dropped entirely, allowing applications to be installed to the home menu as usual.

WII U ARCHITECTURE

With the Wii U, things get a lot less... nice. The Wii U has a quad tri-core PowerPC processor along with an ARM9 security coprocessor (sound familiar?). Cafe OS, or COS, is the main component running on the PowerPC for Wii U, and much like the Wii, IOSU (internally just called IOS) runs on the ARM component. Comparing the Wii U to the 3DS, IOS basically runs most if not all of what would be service processes on a 3DS, as far as hardware goes the PowerPC effectively only gets to talk to the GX2 GPU and the audio DSP (there's a bit more exposed than that but those are the big ones I can recall). Filesystem access, USB, Bluetooth, network drivers, input drivers, eShop/friend code/BOSS/account https protocol, etc is all handled in IOS. The PowerPC pretty much *only* handles games and applications.

COS doesn't support any real application multitasking, instead it has a single process running at once with multiple processes loaded into memory to be switched to as appropriate. The two main memory areas relevant to this are MEM2 which is used for storing executables and heap, and MEM1 which is used as video/framebuffer memory. If an application wants to "multitask" over to the Home Button Menu (HBM), it has to be waiting for a signal from ProcUI telling it that the home button has been pressed, and on that signal the application has to unload all of MEM1 and prepare its threads to wait (with the exception of Core 2, which is allowed to continue executing while multitasking in HBM, web browser, etc). If a process wants to intentionally switch over to another application, it has to ask sysapp to signal a launch which will trigger ProcUI signaling the application to close up and exit. If an application doesn't signal to ProcUI that it's ready to switch to another process, COS will just never switch to another process.

The Wii U filesystem is a lot closer to *nix in that you can mount/link different devices and folders to the filesystem. The Wii U has three main storage mediums, SLC (a dual-bank 512MB NAND on the board, with one bank used for Wii U and one for vWii), MLC (the main 16/32GB eMMC chip), and USB storage devices. IOS mounts each of these to /vol/storage_slc/, /vol/storage_mlc01/, and /vol/storage_usbXX/ respectively. Titles can either be installed as user programs which can be deleted or system programs which cannot be deleted in the settings app, and the only real difference as far as installation is that one gets installed to the `usr/title/` folder on a device and one is installed to the `sys/title/` folder. Interestingly, the main filesystem is actually accessible to the Wii U, as opposed to 3DS where applications are largely sandboxed away from the raw filesystems. There are, however, permissions checks to prevent applications from meddling with files they don't own: The Wii U filesystem has a full RWX owner/group/everyone permission system for files which specifies which files belong to what app, with groups to allow access of files to other applications or if the file can just be accessible to everyone. So if a title wants to access content from another title, it can access the file outright if it has permissions for it. For some of my GX2 programs I ended up doing a chmod to change the permission of a shader in the Health and Safety application so that I could access it without having to redistribute it in my application. So with permissions changed I could just open "/vol/storage_mlc01/sys/title/00050010/1004E100/content/shader/texture2D.gsh" directly.

APPLICATION ARCHITECTURE

A title consists primarily of three folders on the filesystem: code/, content/, and meta/, each of which gets mounted to /vol/code/, /vol/content/ and /vol/meta/ respectively so the application doesn't have to step through the actual filesystem to open its files. Ownership and group permissions for the files in these folders are set at install time, and all files in the original install content containers are extracted onto the filesystem. The running owner/group is determined by two XML files in code/: app.xml and cos.xml. app.xml specifies the OS version the application can run on (ie updater titles have the updater COS TID here), the group ID it runs with, and the SDK version it requires, the application type (update vs app), etc. cos.xml includes all of the permission masks for each IOS process group, whether the application has a JIT area, the maximum code area size, stack sizes, and other bits. So if an application wants to be able to access the SD card, it needs the appropriate permission bits set in cos.xml, or if an application wants to install other applications it needs the appropriate MCP permissions.

/vol/code/ also contains the application RPX and any additional RPLs, with the RPX being the main application and RPLs being dynamically loaded libraries. RPXs/RPLs share the same format and they are effectively ELF files with zlib compressed sections along with import/export sections for linking with other RPLs. RPLs can be loaded and linked dynamically at runtime or automatically when the RPX/RPL is loaded using .fimport_<RPL name> sections. All SDK code is held in RPLs on SLC, so most applications are either just an RPX, or an RPX with some extra libraries like webkit, curl, cairo, openssl, zlib, etc held in RPLs. As an added note, files on SLC actually end up being cached in a ramdisk by IOS to improve load times, though this was actually the reason some CFWs like Mocha ended up having to redirect /vol/system/config/system.xml to /vol/system/config/syshax.xml to prevent Haxchi bootloops, system.xml ends up getting cached too and the ramdisk is not cleared on soft reboots (this ramdisk can also cause issues in running higher/lower firmware versions with NAND/MMC->SD redirection since files from before the reboot will linger into the next COS 'session').

LET'S DIVERT A BIT - TITLE INSTALLATION AND VERIFICATION

Up to this point I haven't actually mentioned anything about title verification, and that's because it gets a bit weird on Wii U. To start, the title "package" format is similar to what you would actually see as an installed 3DS title, there's several %08x.app files, several %08x.h3 files, along with a title.tmd, title.tik, and title.cert file. The ticket and the cert end up going elsewhere on the filesystem, however title.tmd and an additional title.fst are kept in code/ to validate files. The .app files can be either encrypted with the title key encrypted in the ticket with the Wii U common key, or they can just be decrypted. 00000000.app always contains the FST which describes the files and folders stored in the rest of the .app files (a single .app can contain multiple files in the resulting title filesystem). The FST is also used on disks to specify which sectors go with which files, and the FST found on disks will match downloadable games.

The TMD contains a signed header specifying the number of contents, and a hash over the content chunks outside the header, which contains information describing each .app (is it encrypted, what type of content is it, what is the hash of the .app file). What effectively ends up happening for content verification is that any files which need to be verified get their own .app file so the hash in the TMD will match the hash of the file on the filesystem. Files which are *always* validated include anything in code/, along with select other files, and this is consistent with all applications. Were it not, you could simply replace an RPL and get code execution easily.

Since titles are kept extracted as files on filesystems instead of one big verified chunk like on 3DS, this opens some interesting potential attack vectors. The most obvious vector, and the most known, being contenthax, which allows unvalidated content in the content/ folder of titles to be modified at-will. With Haxchi, this is used to get trivial ROP in Virtual Console games which have the JIT area enabled. Some apps such as the browser also include html files, potentially opening up vectors for offline WebKit vulnerabilities (provided they're stable enough that the browser doesn't end up bricked). Additionally, applications which scan the filesystem for files are able to have files added, bypassing any potential signature checks. This doesn't, however, work for any RPX or RPL files in code/ or on SLC, since loaded RPLs always have their existence in the FST checked along with their hash in the TMD having to match. The benefit of less validation of course comes in loading speeds and better disk durability since slight errors have a lower chance of hitting code and a greater chance of hitting content which is not verified.

LOADER.ELF

Back to executables, RPL and RPX loading is done in COS by loader.elf, which is loaded on startup by the PowerPC kernel. loader.elf is pretty much the absolute bane of my existence and I really don't understand why Nintendo felt the need to include an ELF loader in kernel just to load in a much worse ELF loader, but to say the least it does an awful job of parsing RPLs. Luckily it has debug output accessible from IOS which actually specifies what it didn't like about the RPL it just tried to load. RPLs are effectively ELF files with compressed sections and import/export sections which allow them to link to other RPLs at load time. If an app wants to load functions from proc_ui.rpl, it has to include a .fimport_proc_ui section and the functions it wants to import specified in that section. If the functions don't exist, loader.elf will complain and refuse to load. If the system cannot find proc_ui.rpl in code/ or in the SLC OS libraries, it will also refuse to load.

Where RPLs become a bit of a pain point for homebrew and GCC is mostly in loader.elf; getting GCC ELFs into the RPL format is actually a fairly significant challenge. For a start, sections are expected to be written into the RPL in a particular order: Section CRCs and FileInfo are written first, then .rodata and .data, then imports/exports/symtab/strtab, then .text, and then relocation data. The list index order of sections also matters, CODE sections must be first, then DATA, then relocations, then imports, and then strtab/symtab/etc, with CRCs and FileInfo at the end. If any of these are incorrect, loader.elf will not load the RPL. Rodata must be marked as RW. Writable. There is no negotiation, it doesn't make sense, but loader.elf will refuse to load an RPL if rodata is not marked as writable. Every one of Nintendo's RPLs has .rodata marked as RW. All sections have specific alignments expected. A tempSize value is stored in FileInfo, presumably so that loader.elf knows how much RAM it needs to allocate to hold relocation data for linking. Except it doesn't use it, it just calculates the value from the section table and uses its calculated value to scrutinize your tempSize so that it can avoid loading the RPL.

As if loader.elf being extremely picky about ELF layout wasn't bad enough, Wii U's relocations are a massive pain to deal with. The Wii U does not use any sort of GOT (nor does it support it), and loader.elf only implements a limited subset of relocations: ADDR16_HA, ADDR16_LO, REL24, and ADDR32. R_PPC_RELATIVE is not supported, so for every R_PPC_RELATIVE relocation GCC generates it must to be converted to R_PPC_ADDR32 instead. Even more irritating, GCC likes to create R_PPC_RELATIVE relocations to completely different sections than the section the relocation is being operated on even though sections are supposed to be individually relocatable, so each of these relocations must also be converted to ADDR32 and either a symbol index or a memory section reference ($TEXT, $DATA) plus an addend. Even more amusingly, GCC would also create relative jump tables in .rodata (ie each entry is the distance from that .rodata address to .text), and these relative jump tables didn't even have relocations written in so rodata isn't actually able to be relocated away from text. What ends up happening is that since .rodata ends up in $DATA memory relocated completely separate from $TEXT, the calculated distances no longer are accurate. The only solution then, of course, is to lump .rodata in with .text so the relative offsets between .rodata and .text can be guaranteed.

REVERSE ENGINEERING AND EMULATION

Now that the nitty-gritty details on RPLs are out of the way, what's actually kind of interesting about Wii U as far as emulation goes resides entirely in the way Nintendo decided to set up RPLs. On 3DS, all SDK code is compiled into code.bin statically, and code.bin is always located at 0x100000 in the process map. Names and locations of SDK functions cannot be easily gained on 3DS, so the minimum option for emulation is emulating down to the IPC layer. With Wii U, all SDK code exists in RPLs, all SDK RPLs have symbols for each function which can be imported into applications, and there's basically no real IPC setup at all (except between the ARM's IOS and PPC's COS, but this is mostly handled at the SDK level and not by applications). This is a *huge* deal for emulation and a big contrast between 3DS and Wii U, because rather than having to guess what an IPC call does and what arguments it takes and dealing with translation of handles and such between processes, Wii U has every SDK function name laid out by design. The only guesswork remaining is what arguments every library function takes, and how the data actually gets handled. This also means that the likelihood of Wii U SDK materials being useful for emulation is much higher, since SDK headers would specify what arguments every RPL function takes, along with enums and struct definitions, and unfortunately without source code it's unlikely that the integrity of an emulator like CEMU can actually be gauged.

Just because I find it a bit interesting, and it's a decent contrast to Switch/3DS, the IPC interface between COS and IOS is actually an IPC shim for their ioctl interface. Every IOS service has a /dev/whatever device and the actual IPC commands themselves are your usual file operations for ioctls (open, close, read, write, seek, ioctl, etc). There's also a bit of permissions stuff so that processes can't poke interfaces they don't have permissions for but I just thought it was worth mentioning since Nintendo never really returned to this whole *nix-alike idea later on.

I WANT TO SAIL THE SEVEN SEAS ON MY WII U - WHAT ARE THE SECURITY IMPLICATIONS?

Practically, the Wii U only requires PowerPC kernel to pirate games. On 3DS this was a similar case, but Wii U handles most of services and permissions on the ARM-side in IOS, so why doesn't this cause any issues? Well, the issue comes down to the ease of relocation and skirting permissions. Much like the home menu on 3DS provides SD card access for *hax-based homebrew, on Wii U Mii Maker has SD card access in order to save QR codes to the SD card, and given PowerPC kernel access it is possible to take over this application and use that SD card access. Games such as Smash 4 also provide SD card access for screenshots. This application takeover ends up being critical as far as providing permissions goes.

The second part of Wii U piracy lies in loader.elf. While the PowerPC portion is more than capable of reading RPXs from discs/MLC/SLC itself, the reading is actually done entirely on the part of IOS's MCP process. Effectively what happens is once the permissions of the incoming application is established in IOS (these permissions being from the XML files in code/), loader.elf asks IOS for an RPX or RPL. MCP in IOS will check each of its valid RPL paths for file of that name in either SLC (for SDK RPLs) or the code/ folder, and if there is a valid RPL it begins to send it over, and loader.elf will buffer the RPL and load it. If loader.elf is compromised, this can lead to an attack where IOS loads in and believes an application like Mii Maker or Smash 4 is being loaded, but loader.elf can merely discard all the data being sent and load in its own RPX from the SD card. This RPX then runs under the context of what would have been Mii Maker or Smash 4, and because loader.elf is already compromised, mounts such as code/, content/ and meta/ can merely be avoided by patching all filesystem functions to redirect to the SD card since the applications being taken over have access to the SD card. Permissions issues can also be patched out effortlessly, since RPLs are relocatable and aren't particularly constrained. This is why loadiine is able to work by only taking over the PowerPC and not the ARM security processor.

SWITCH ARCHITECTURE

The Switch is probably the most interesting of Nintendo's modern consoles, mostly because it's the Hot New Thing but also because internally it ends up being an interesting synthesis between 3DS and Wii U ideals, usually (but not always) picking the best parts from both. To start, the Switch runs on a variant of Nintendo's Horizon microkernel, though it isn't quite the same as 3DS since it has been rewritten. Internally, it is dubbed Horizon OS, often abbreviated HOS much like Wii U's Cafe OS was COS. At the Switch's core is the Tegra X1, giving the Horizon kernel a 64-bit quad-core AArch64 processor to operate on, along with a TrustZone implementation to use for security. Much like 3DS, all hardware drivers and OS details are handled in their own separate processes, with many of the process being very similar to 3DS but, again, are rewritten. IPC in usage is similar to 3DS but the actual structure of IPC calls has been revamped and improved, with different descriptors for data going into another process, coming from another process, or for instances where data should be sent from one process and then modified and returned by the target service. Additionally, for instances where a service will require additional memory to operate or larger amounts of memory should be transferred, shared memory syscalls have been revamped to allow for different types of transfer memory and shared memory. For instance, the nvservices driver (a service which really is just a shim for NVIDIA's usual GPU drivers) requires that applications turn a chunk of its own memory into transfer memory so that a handle for that memory can be passed for nvservices to actually operate with. As such the application ultimately controls how much memory to use for graphics and all memory limitations can be placed on the application itself rather than having a complicated setup between the privileged processes, nvservices and the running application to determine allocation amounts.

As far as security goes, the critical difference between 3DS services and Switch services is that just about all of what used to be handled by 3DS Process9 has been moved into the respective services in Horizon; TrustZone works pretty much exclusively with crypto secrets and runs on the same processors as everything else (though most operations will only take place on core 3 specifically). By keeping all sensitive crypto secrets in TrustZone but allowing HOS to operate with content-specific keys, the filesystem service can utilize ARM64 crypto extensions and talk to devices directly, reducing the overall IPC overhead for faster load times and performance.

Lastly, given the recent shofEL2 vulnerability dropping, I feel it would be good to also go over the boot process of the Switch just as a general overview. TX1's boot starts on the BPMP, a small ARM7 responsible for spinning up the rest of the cores on the device. It is also responsible for managing low-power sleep modes to an extent. I'll avoid going too much into detail since https://http.download.nvidia.com/tegra-public-appnotes/tegra-boot-flow.html covers things a lot better, however you can stop reading as soon as the boot ROM jumps to the bootloader since that's where Nintendo gets funky. Nintendo's package1 is the first piece of code loaded after bootROM, and this is stored on the eMMC boot partition bank separate from the general-use 32GB partition bank. package1 is responsible for decrypting itself and checking fuses, showing error screens, loading package2 from eMMC into memory, (formerly) showing the Nintendo logo, and starting the CCPLEX 64-bit A57 processors into TrustZone which would then verify and decrypt package2 and then move to EL1 in order to execute the kernel. Because of the diversity of ARM64 processors, TrustZone also handles the PSCI v1.0 protocol responsible for power state management for shutdown, rebooting and sleeping.

APPLICATION ARCHITECTURE

Applications are primarily stored as NCA files, with files on NAND being stored outright and SD files being encrypted with a NAX wrapper (although still retaining the NCA extension). Unlike 3DS, NCAs generally only contain one type of content per archive: program code, program control data, program metadata, or program content. For content and metadata, a RomFS/PartitionFS partition will contain the contents for that NCA, and for code, a PartitionFS is used to specify individual files which are part of the NCA. All of these details are handled by the fs process and are not exposed to the running applications and services.

Similarly to Wii U, NCAs can either reside as a system app on the SYSTEM partition of eMMC or as a user app on the USER partition, though on Wii U this separation was only done via folders on each device but the idea is the same.

For code NCAs, there are two variants of program files. For services, there is a single main file and a main.npdm. For applications, there exists a main, main.npdm, rtld, sdk, and optional subsdkX files. Except for main.npdm, all of these files are NSOs. Pulling from some of the better ideas of Wii U and 3DS, NSOs specify offsets and sizes for text, data, rodata, and bss sections in one big structure up front with offset 0x4 after the NSO text section containing a pointer to what is the equivalent of an ELF's .dynamic section to specify relocations, symbol tables, and other metadata. Much like the Wii U, all SDK components reside separate from game code in the sdk NSO, which provides higher level functions and a layer of abstraction between what developers actually use and the underlying IPC calls sent out to services.

Unlike 3DS and Wii U, Switch executables run in a randomized address space, and as such are required to be able to relocate themselves and link themselves to other loaded NSOs at runtime. With SDK apps this is handled from the rtld NSO which is based on musl. Also in stark contrast to 3DS CROs, Switch NROs are also held to this expectation and unlike 3DS, doesn't require loaded code to be modified for linkink to the main executable since everything just has a GOT and can be set up with rtld. This does mean though that sections are not separately relocatable like on the Wii U since there's an expectation of having all the sections for any one NSO/NRO in the same block of addresses. Once an executable is relocated, setup typically involves asking the kernel for memory, requesting a service manager (sm:) handle and then going through the setup for filesystem access, input sharedmem, video, and so on. Like 3DS, the service manager uses ACI permissions to determine if it should give handles to processes when requested, though prior to 3.0.1 if you didn't send the initialize command it would just give you any service handle you asked for.

main.npdm handles permissions exclusively (as opposed to the 3DS where the exheader also managed code sections), and the file itself is signed individually with separate keys from the NCA. However, there is actually a slight bit of unsigned leniency: Application permissions are defined twice in the file, once in the ACID header and once again in ACI, with the ACID header being verified and ACI unverified. The ACID header defines the min/max title IDs, the maximum file permissions, the maximum service permissions, the maximum kernel permissions and a few other flags. This way Nintendo is able to sign ACIDs with the absolute maximum permissions normal applications should have and the ACI portion is only able to go up to those maximum permissions but isn’t required to actually give out those maximums. The real benefit, I’m assuming, is that development units cannot merely sign themselves higher permissions; the keys to do that remain with Nintendo at all times. As far as retail applications go it doesn’t really make that much of a difference since NCAs are already signed anyhow.

Some NCAs can, however, contain other data. Program metadata and icons get their own NCA, and update data has its own NCAs. While NCAs have their own signatures internally, their naming scheme also is a large part of their verification; each NCA is named after the hash of its contents, making verification for corruption (given a filename) as simple as hashing the file and comparing to the name. Since the NCA magic is only visible after decryption the files tend to look like garbage regardless of corruption, so hashing is a decent check. It also makes it impossible to guess an NCA’s filename on Nintendo's CDN, preventing early access of game contents until the CNMT NCA indexing all a game’s contents is updated (and the hash of *that* is given by eShop servers)

REVERSE ENGINEERING

Reverse engineering on Switch, as it turns out, is actually much easier than it was on 3DS and maybe at times is as easy as Wii U, but there are definitely areas where work is still required. On version 1.0, many services actually contained a wealth of symbols, but often times it feels like symbols aren't entirely complete, however where symbols were lacking there was usually a slew of asserts which would not only provide function names, but variable names as well.

Additionally, since the sdk NSO is a separate linked binary with its own symbols for everything an application could want to call (and since all IPC calls originate from the sdk NSO) it's much easier to isolate and document functionality. Though, it's worth noting that system applets statically link the sdk NSO into the main application in order to save space and possibly keep symbols to a minimum when reversing things like web applets.

EMULATION

Switch emulation is actually sort of interesting, similar to the 3DS there's a layer of mystery between a lot of Switch IPC calls, however since the kernel is based on and functions very similarly to that of the 3DS, it has allowed emulators like yuzu to reuse components from Citra pertaining to syscalls and (some) IPC. However since the sdk NSO is separate, it is also possible (in theory) to just hook those SDK functions and opt more for a Wii U-style emulation approach of emulating the SDK behavior. Most emulators have, however, opted for the lower-level emulation approach which is probably a good thing in the long run anyhow.

The wealth of symbols and strings found in Switch services has made reverse engineering them for emulation much easier, and the more modern GPU architecture paired with projects like nouveau has made quicker work in getting shaders decompiled and emulated as opposed to the mystery chip that was the PICA200. Contrary to popular belief, however, there is not much else about the TX1 being a “generic chip” that actually helps much with emulation, maybe with the exception of understanding some driver behavior better because of the TRM.

I WANT TO PIRATE ON SWITCH - WHAT ARE THE SECURITY IMPLICATIONS?

Practically speaking, piracy on the Switch doesn't strictly require TrustZone access at all, since it doesn't really handle all that much except for crypto secrets, and given the right vulnerabilities it's likely that even kernel isn't strictly required. Since Switch code is relocatable it's also much more flexible with where it runs, meaning that theoretically something like a JIT area could be enough, but practically there are the same restrictions as 3DS with services and RomFS. However, with Switch even a DMA vulnerability is a lot more flexible; since ASLR is in play all that is required is a larger .text section and a larger .data section, and then NSOs can just match the .data section starting points and hook the .text start and it will relocate itself to work from that location. And again, RomFS access would need redirection in order to not attempt accessing the original RomFS.

Given kernel access (or probably even just fs ROP), it's more than possible to just have fs to load game contents from the SD card as has been seen with the LayeredFS piracy (which has an uncanny resemblance to loadiine it I'm being honest). In theory it would also be possible to do this sort of MiTM for modding RomFS files from a core process (or smhax) using sm reregistration and some ROP but it would be more effort than it's worth by this point.

[johnboothus]

Meet HDHC the New Hopping Technique Coming to a Hazy IPA Near You

The craft beer industry has never seen more of a need to keep consumers actively engaged. Business was already on shaky ground before the pandemic hit. Hard seltzer has proven a mighty competitor. Now, throughout 2020, government restrictions and health concerns have kept normally busy taprooms quiet. Still, people are drinking beer at home, and there are two different reliable routes brewers can take to keep customers loyal: serving up tried-and-true favorites, and wowing the crowd with new innovations.

To quench American beer drinkers’ seemingly boundless thirst for bigger, bolder IPAs, those innovations often fall under the umbrella of hop products and techniques. Most recently, one in particular is pulling ahead: HDHC.

Those familiar with Brooklyn’s Other Half Brewing won’t be surprised that the brewery, known for its eagerly anticipated hop bombs, is behind the method, which stands for “high density hop charge.” It’s the result of Other Half’s ongoing experimentation with a hop product called Incognito. The brewery released its first HDHC beers in the summer of 2019, unveiling updated versions of fan favorites like More Citra Than All Citra using Citra Incognito, Citra Cryo, and Citra pellet hops.

This is the first HDHC beer Scott Peluso, behind the popular @lorenzothebeercat Instagram account that regularly features Other Half, saw on the market. “This beer became an instant OH fan favorite,” Peluso says of Other Half’s HDHC More Citra Than All Citra in an email. “In my opinion, it was the perfect way to introduce the hopping process.”

Credit: imgur

Hop supplier John I. Haas, Inc. unveiled Incognito (stylized “INCOGNITO”) in the spring of 2019. It’s a flowable hop-flavoring liquid that reduces the amount of beer lost when brewers use pellets, while cranking up hop flavor. Other Half co-founder Sam Richardson says that the brewery’s team is always looking for fresh ways to pack in more hop flavor without any over-hopped pitfalls (notably, hop burn or grassy off-flavors). Realizing Incognito’s potential for maximum hop impact without the risks of using only fresh hops or pellets, they created a combination of INCOGNITO with T90s, the most standard hop pellet used in beer production, and Cryo hop pellets, known for cutting down on beer waste and avoiding potential hop astringency. Together, the three products are clean, bright, and powerful — and have a flavor impact that is equivalent to 15 pounds of hops per barrel.

“The idea of HDHC is to combine these all together to create the biggest hop profile we could but still have drinkable, enjoyable, balanced beer,” Richardson says.

Other Half may not be the only brewery to create some combination of Incognito and pellets, but it is the first to nail it down and name it. The reason, according to Richardson, is so customers can understand where the difference they’re tasting is coming from. This is Other Half’s modus operandi, to label cans with hop information to extend a little knowledge to its fanbase, who typically fall somewhere on the beer geek scale.

“We try to always give people more information about the beer,” Richardson says. “They know what to expect, and they’re excited about getting what’s bigger and bolder.”

It’s also a powerful marketing tool: Like DDH, HDHC is a symbol that, when used on labels, beer drinkers can instantly recognize — and if not truly understand it, yet, can at least understand it means big, bold hops flavors await in the can.

The method is starting to gather steam. Peluso says Other Half fans have come to love and seek out HDHC beers — so enthusiastically that the brewery responded with “HDHC Week,” releasing a slew of its greatest hits with HDHC this past June. It’s growing through collaboration and inspiration, too: Fans of Trillium Brewing Company in Massachusetts met HDHC through Other Half’s Freaky Friday series, in which Other Half and other breweries swap recipes. Other Half brewed Trillium staple Fort Point Pale Ale with HDHC, and Trillium brewed Other Half’s All Citra Everything with HDHC.

“HDHC is an astutely cool way for Other Half to better communicate to customers what a lot of brewers have been tinkering with over the last few years with advanced hop products like Cryo, CO2 extracts, T45s, and now the new Haas products Incognito and Lupomax,” says Trillium co-founder JC Tetreault. “Folks have become familiar with DDH and HDHC is the next logical extension of that for our friends at Other Half.”

Credit: John I. Haas, Inc.

Will HDHC Catch On?

In September, Brooklyn’s Non Sequitur Beer Project debuted All!, an IPA brewed with the combo of Incognito, Cryo, and T90s.

“Other Half branded [this method] and that drew a lot of excitement,” Non Sequitur founder Gage Siegel says. “It’s worth highlighting as a unique thing to utilize these three different hop products.” Siegel adds that he liked Other Half’s HDHC beers even more than their non-HDHC beers. He now considers Incognito to be the purest expression of hops — as a brewer, “that’s a pretty good reason to try it,” he says.

What remains to be seen as more breweries apply this brand of hop products to achieve their own maximum-hop flavor, minimum-burn effect is whether we’ll actually see the term HDHC grow in ubiquity, like DDH. While Richardson says HDHC isn’t proprietary, Siegel named Non Sequitur’s application All! and nodded to Other Half as inspiration. The method may become more common; the HDHC term might not.

Either way, the power of HDHC may simply lie in being able to communicate to consumers that this can contains huge hop flavor, whether it’s labeled specifically HDHC, “Incognito, T90, and Cryo,” or whatever a brewery comes up with and makes transparent to fans.

Kate Bernot, reporter at Good Beer Hunting and contributing editor at Craft Beer & Brewing, sees breweries’ transparency with these experimentations as a way to entice consumers even if they aren’t versed on brewing science. She cites Hop Valley, part of Molson Coors, and its Stash series, made with Cryo hops, as a mainstream example of a brewery touting a new hopping process to engage customers who may not know what the process means except more hop flavor.

“It can’t hurt because people who are geeky and interested will dive into it, and the average consumer will just see new and fancy hop techniques,” Bernot says. “That’s where breweries see value in this innovation: Consumers will equate that with, ‘They’re doing interesting things with hops.’”

Credit: Non Sequitur Beer Project / Instagram.com

Of course, that’s not to say HDHC will kick DDH to the curb. More brewers are continuing to advance and develop their dry-hopping techniques, too. One of the ways is via dip-hopping.

While HDHC blends hop products for maximum impact, dip-hopping introduces a hop addition that can serve as its own stage of dry-hopping, happening between the whirlpool-hopping and the dry-hopping, in order to create different flavors and aromas than dry-hopping alone. Or, dip-hopping can be a stand-alone method for lighter pale ales. The technique was developed by Kirin in Japan in 2013.

“Dip-hopping is allowing the hops to steep in 150 to 170 degrees Fahrenheit wort for a few hours before chilling and pitching yeast,” says Joe Wells, head brewer at Fair State Brewing Cooperative in Minneapolis. “The hop matter is left in the beer for the fermentation, giving it a lot of contact time and the potential for some biotransformation.”

According to Wells, this keeps piney, resinous myrcene flavors low, while ramping up fruit notes. “By showcasing the underlying linalool and geraniol from these hops, and using smart processing to prevent the introduction of their myrcene, we can make very bright, citrusy, and tropical beers from otherwise piney and dank hops,” Wells says.

Fair State first tried dip-hopping during a collaboration with 3 Floyds Brewing of Munster, Ind. Wells says 3 Floyds head brewer Todd Haug had the idea to use it for the collab, Partying Past Burning Bridges. The can label dons “Dip Hopped IPA.”

Fair State has since employed dip-hopping for another collaboration with Fargo, N.D.-based Drekker Brewing Company called Toon Dip. In its Untappd listing, the beer is described as a dip-hopped and double-dry-hopped double IPA with Mosaic, Citra, and El Dorado: “It’s like getting dipped into a vat of citrusy goodness then having a piano of dankness dropped on you from 10 stories above.”

Despite its ultra-trendy-sounding description, Fair State’s dip-hopped offerings have been a success, Wells says, because they cater to a nostalgia for heartier, maltier-bodied brews that stand out in today’s hazy IPA culture. Craft Beer Time editor Ben Brausen, who reviewed Toon Dip in March, agrees. “It had wonderful floral and citrus aromas, without the green hop aroma or floor cleaner notes that can be found in many dry-hopped beers,” he says.

Wells believes sharing hopping methods with consumers can go beyond engagement to education, explaining that educating beer fans is a priority at Fair State. “A smart consumer will return to the highest-quality beer that interests them and I like to think that will often be us,” he says. Wells adds that the number of people inquiring about dip-hopping after trying these beers proves Fair State achieved that curiosity-piquing goal.

“Innovation” can be a gamble during an unimaginable crisis that makes just staying in business a herculean task. But right now, even as the pandemic’s many stresses have sent drinkers back to their tried, true, and trustworthy favorites (or askew to hard seltzer), craft brewers’ penchant for continuous experimentation hasn’t abated. Neither has the furious pursuit of flavor for a certain segment of beer drinkers. Thirsty for the latest trends, fan bases for brewers like Other Half, Fair State, and 3 Floyds expect innovation. And if dry-hopping and doubled-up DDH hazy IPAs have taught us anything, it’s that in craft brewing, innovation is contagious.

The article Meet HDHC, the New Hopping Technique Coming to a Hazy IPA Near You appeared first on VinePair.

Via https://vinepair.com/articles/hdhc-ipa-hop-trend/

source https://vinology1.weebly.com/blog/meet-hdhc-the-new-hopping-technique-coming-to-a-hazy-ipa-near-you

[letsharish12345us-blog]

Kuwait Telecoms, Mobile and Broadband Market in Market Trends, Segmentation, Analysis Forecast Report - 2023

WiseGuyReports.com “Kuwait - Telecoms, Mobile and Broadband - Statistics and Analyses” report has been added to its Research Database.

Scope of the Report:

Kuwait - Telecoms

Government support is integral to Kuwait’s telecom industry progress. Developments over the past year or so in Kuwait has demonstrated how a supportive government can pave the way for telecoms progress. The Kuwait government is making great headway in implementing changes which will improve the overall telecoms industry. One example includes the recent establishment of an independent telecoms regulator (CITRA) and the current project underway by the Ministry of Communications (MoC) which is expanding Kuwait’s fibre broadband infrastructure.

Kuwait has one of the highest mobile penetration rates in the world and while this has led to market saturation; the operators are combating this by building extensive LTE networks and developing mobile broadband content and services. The existence of this substantial mobile infrastructure also places Kuwait in good stead to take advantage of opportunities offered by the evolution to 5G.

While Kuwait’s fixed broadband penetration is currently one of the lowest in the region – this sector offers a potential future growth opportunity for both the operators and government. Improvements to the fixed broadband infrastructure will assist to grow markets such as e-commerce, along with smart infrastructure development, start-ups and M2M.

Request a Sample Report @ https://www.wiseguyreports.com/sample-request/3259369-kuwait-telecoms-mobile-and-broadband-statistics-and-analyses

Overall the telecoms sector has become increasingly important to Kuwait’s economy as the country looks to diversify from its reliance on oil. While it already offers a mature mobile sector – opportunities exist to improve its lagging fixed broadband infrastructure as well as capitalise on growing the mobile broadband services and content sector.

This BuddeComm report analyses Kuwait’s extensive telecoms market and provides key industry statistics as well as information and insights relating to fixed and mobile infrastructure, subscribers, smart infrastructure, regulations and major players. It also includes BuddeComm’s Telecoms Maturity Index which measures and ranks the maturity of Kuwait’s telecoms industry within the Middle East on a scale of 1 to 100.

Key developments:

The three major operators of Zain Kuwait, VIVA and Ooredoo are all offering LTE services as well as exploring 5G opportunities. Zain Kuwait launched initial integrated 5G services to selected areas in 2018. There is a high ownership of smart phones in Kuwait. Improvements to fibre-broadband infrastructure are underway in 2018.

Companies covered in this report include:

Mobile Telecommunications Co (MTC) / Zain, Ooredoo Kuwait, Kuwait Telecom Company (KTC) / Viva.

For Detailed Reading Please visit @ https://www.wiseguyreports.com/reports/3259369-kuwait-telecoms-mobile-and-broadband-statistics-and-analyses

Major Key Points in Table of Content:

1. Executive summary 2. Key statistics 3. Country overview 4. Telecommunications market 4.1 Overview 4.2 Market analysis 4.3 Recent developments 5. Regulatory environment 5.1 Historic overview 5.2 Regulatory authority 5.3 Privatisation 6. Fixed network operators 6.1 Ministry of Communications 7. Telecommunications infrastructure 7.1 Overview of the national telecom network 7.2 Fibre networks 7.3 International infrastructure (satellite, submarine)

Continuous...

Contact Us:

NORAH TRENT

Partner Relations & Marketing Manager

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Ph: +1-646-845-9349 (US)

Ph: +44 208 133 9349 (UK)

[mvdc1]

New Items October 22, 2018

Limited Release from our LOCAL Ipswich Brewery:  Bohemian Raspberry!

6/4 Pack 16 oz Cans Item # 13103  $52.00

1/6 Bbls Item # 13102  $85.00

Do you want it all and want it now?  We will rock you with this new sour ale, Bohemian Raspberry.  Try a delightfully tart kettle soured ale fermented atop pureed raspberries.  Under pressure to choose a beer for dinner?  Ipswich bohemian Raspberry is a killer beer to pair with food, or to drink on its own.  Be a champion of the world my friend and rink a crazy little beer call Bohemian Raspberry.  (5%)         

 Seasonal Cider from our Local Salem Cidery!

Far From The Tree Bog!

6/4 Packs 16 oz Cans Item # 79078  $66.00

1/6 Bbls Item # 79077  $95

1/2 Bbls Item # 79076  $195.00

Bog: Cranberry cider with rosemary, sage, and thyme.

 New from Otter Creek:  Drip Drop Coffee Stout!

4/6 Pack CANS Item # 52815  $29.70

Grab a cuppa the good stuff!  Our brand new Drip Drop Coffee Stout is brewed with the fair-trade organic, medium-dark Tres™ blend of beans from our neighbors at Vermont Coffee Company®. This new recipe, developed alongside the roasters up the street in Middlebury, Vermont, features a full-bodied flavor profile rich with slightly sweet notes of chocolate and caramel derived from a heavy dose of dark malts while a touch of brown sugar reveals subtle notes of plum and vanilla. The aroma is highlighted by notes of coffee, chocolate and a touch of roast with minimal hop notes in the background.  In the end, our crew created a smooth, approachable stout designed to be enjoyed whether you're in the northeast or a tropical, coffee-growing climate.  (5.6%)     UPC:  7 56435 00602 4

 Otter Creek Winter Can Jam is in!

2/12 Packs Item # 51815  $29.70  ($5.50 off 5, $6.50 off 15, $7.50 off 25)

Featuring:  Free Flow IPA: Hazy IPA with heaps of hops.(6%)  Ella Hoppy Lager:  Crisp lager with Ella Hops. (5.2%) Drip Drop Coffee Stout:  Stout brewed with VT-roasted beans.  (5.6%)

Dogfish Limited Release:  75 Minute IPA!

4/6 Packs Item # 31996  $46.50  ($2 off 5, $3 off 10, $4 off 15)

1/6 Bbls Item # 31994  $82.50

1/2 Bbls Item # 31995  $165.00

It’s been a minute … but 75 Minute IPA is back! What began as a cask-conditioned ale at our Rehoboth brewpub back in 2011, quickly grew to become a cult-favorite amongst craft enthusiasts. From the groucho glasses that adorned the label to its slightly dry and lingering bitterness, 75 Minute was (and is) beloved by many.

Now in our latest iteration, this classic IPA is again brewed with maple syrup from Sam’s family farm in Massachusetts, while being continually hopped throughout the boil, and then dry-hopped with a slew of cascade hops. The result is a malty and earthy brew with citrusy-pine aromas, balanced by subtle maple notes.  (7.5%)

 Dogfish Limited Release:  Pennsylvania Tuxedo!

6/4 Packs Item # 31997  $52.00  ($2 off 5, $3 off 10, $4 off 15)

A spruce-infused pale ale, Pennsylvania Tuxedo pays homage to the flannel-suited hunters and gatherers who dwell deep in the backcountry of north-central PA.  Brewed in collaboration with family-run outdoor clothing company Woolrich, Pennsylvania Tuxedo is a sessionable concoction with a grassy citrus kick complemented by the resinous conifer notes of fresh green spruce tips. We went into the forests of north-central Pennsylvania and Georgetown, Del., to pick these fresh tips ourselves.  A dry yet doughy malt backbone lets the hops and spruce shine while still balancing out the bitterness, making this one an easy sipper.  (8.5%)

Dogfish 4th & Goal!

1/2 Bbls Item # 31998  $165.00

We look for unexpected flavors in unusual places. For this beer we sourced these crazy peppercorns from Rapti, Nepal that burst with spicy grapefruit aromas and paired them with grapefruit peel and grains of paradise.

Then we amped up the citrus with four Pacific northwest C-hops: Cascade, Comet, Citra and Centennial.

The result is a hoppy golden ale with bright aromas of grapefruit, citrus and spice. Balanced with malt and hop flavor, 4th & Gold is the audible your taste buds have been waiting for!  (5%)

Ballast Point Barrel Aged Victory at Sea is back!

6/4 Packs Item # 05695  $67.00

IMPERIAL PORTER WITH COFFEE AND VANILLA FLAVORS AGED IN HIGH WEST BOURBON AND RYE BARRELS

We partnered with our friends at High West® Distillery to create a barrel-aged version of Ballast Point Victory at Sea, our award-winning Imperial Porter with cold-steeped coffee and vanilla. From a blend of Ballast Point Victory at Sea aged in High West’s own bourbon & rye whiskey oak casks, new layers of complexity emerge with notes of soft caramel and smoky oak over a dark chocolate and roasted almond body. High West crafts delicious and distinctive whiskeys to honor the American West, making it the perfect pairing with our signature San Diego-born porter.  (12%)      UPC:  6 72438 00190 6

 Local Clown Shoes Brewery Limited Release:  Double Dry Hopped Galactica!

6/4 Pack 16 oz Cans Item # 25768  $58.00

Double IPA Double dry-hopped with Galaxy and Citra hops.  (8%)

Clown Shoes Limited Release:  La Bestia!

12/22 oz Item # 25767  $115.00

Mexican-Style Imperial Stout aged in Bourbon and Rum Barrels with chiles and spices.  (10%)

 New from our LOCAL Harpoon Brewery:  Rec. League!

6/4 Pack 16 oz Cans Item # 24218  $45.00

There’s no “I” in “team,” but there is one in refreshing!  An all-star lineup of ingredients that includes a healthy dose of hops, sea salt, buckwheat, and chia work together to create this quenching pale ale.  Low in alcohol, light in calories, and just a little hazy, Rec. League was crafted to be your #1 cool-down companion.    “Love Beer. Love Life.” Is all about having a great beer with your friends and teammates.  It’s not about winning or losing, it’s about how you play the game – and the beer you drink afterwards.  (3.8%)

 Lone Pine Brightside IPA!

1/6 Bbls Item # 02103  $79.00

1/2 Bbls Item # 02112  $179.00

 Our American IPA balances a subtle malt character with smooth, clean bitterness and layers of complex citrus zest, tropical fruit, and pine.  (7.1%)

 Innis & Gunn is in!

1/6 Bbls Item # 64304  $107.00

Our unique bourbon barrel ageing process brings flavors like vanilla and toffee and we've combined this with the malty character of our Scotch Ale to create an incredible taste experience.  We brew The Original using our unique barrel into beer method, turning the traditional beer into barrel process on its head without losing any of the wonderful flavors and aromas from the barrel. (6.6%)

 Greater Good PULP!

1/6 Bbls Item # 04053  $115.00

PULP (Pauls Ultimate Lupulin Protocol) is an 8% ABV IPA, the second beer created in our “8 is the New 5” Series of IPAs. PULP is “juice forward” IPA, possesses the aroma of an orange grove and tastes like nectar of the hop gods! We stayed true to the New Englander’s obsession with haze;  for a NE IPA PULP is considered slightly to moderately hazy. PULP is mauled with a blend of hops at the dry hopping phase to impart maximal juice and subtle bitterness.  This is a fan favorite for its easy-drinking mouthfeel and refreshing flavors.

 Greater Good PULP DADDY!

1/6 Bbls Item # 04063  $115.00

PULP DADDY is an 8% ABV IPA created as an extension of the popular PULP (Pauls Ultimate Lupulin Protocol) brand; like PULP, this “juice forward” IPA has a predominant citrusy aroma and tastes like nectar of the hop gods!  We made one modification to the base process for PULP with a single objective in mind:  dial up the haze. Objective accomplished.  PULP DADDY is easy-drinking and refreshing with perfect nebulosity and mouthfeel.

[nwbeerguide]

We sit down with founding brewer Drew Cluley, of Beardslee Public House, to learn more about their hard seltzers.

Back in July, we announced the release centered on a line of hard seltzers at Bothell’s Beardslee Public House. Included in the announcement were five unique approaches to hard seltzer, in the form of four infusions and a ‘clean’ version of hard seltzer. Made with a variety of yeast called Hornindal Kveik, founding brewer Drew Cluley sought to produce a beverage that is refreshing and light, for days and nights which hover above 70 degrees (Fahrenheit).

So what is Hornindal Kveik and what is it doing in my hard seltzer?

To the laymen, Hornindal Kveik is as fluent to them as Latin or pig Latin, as it relates to hard seltzer. For brewers like Cluley, Hornindal Kveik represents a step forward in production brewing, both in how quickly a seltzer can be made and also the flavors which are produced from such a unique yeast as Hornindal Kveik. 

Sourced from reputable yeast supplier and yeast archivists, White Labs, Hornindal Kveik is described as: 

“… a Kveik strain shared with the world by Terje Raftevold from Hornindal, Norway. It produces an intense tropical flavor and aroma with notes of fresh tangerine, mango, and pineapple, ideal to be used with fruit-forward hops.”

Roughly interpreted, the use of this yeast will complement any beer that makes use of so-called “Southern Hemisphere” hops like Motueka, Pacific Jade, Galaxy, and Nelson Sauvin, or so-called “Northern Hemisphere” hops like Citra, Mosaic, Amarillo, and Simcoe. For Drew Cluley, the yeast produces a clean finish which is needed for hard seltzers.

While most traditional yeast, deriving from the Saccharomyces family, ferment at between 50 and 70 degrees (45 on the low side and 75 on the high side) depending if the beer is a lager or ale. However, with the discovery of Kveik yeast strains, brewers have realized they can ferment a beer at nearly 100 degrees (Fahrenheit) and in less time. 

A table discussion on Beardslee Public House hard seltzers with Drew Cluley

Beardslee Blood Orange Hard Seltzer/Northwest Beer Guide™

Beardslee ‘naked’ Hard Seltzer/Northwest Beer Guide™

Trying two of the four versions of hard seltzers, Blood Orange and ‘naked’, we notice an almost soda-like quality. We are quick to remind the reader that our appreciation of this emerging style is limited, given our focus remains on beer. Rather, this is our first thought when comparing with other local hard seltzer producers, who favor a dryer finish.

Speaking with Drew Cluley, we learn that what is available, today, will continue to grow as the brewers review each edition. So far the current goal is to develop a seltzer with a dryer finish, while still experimenting with infusions. 

Available for takeout, in pitchers (subject to restaurant discretion), and in pints, seek out your choice of Blood Orange, Lemon/Lime, Mango (coming soon), Raspberry, or natural (without flavoring) today. 

Beardslee Yellow Belly Wheat/Northwest Beer Guide™

As a footnote to this story, Beardslee Public House has also released a German-style Wheat Ale with some American touches, called Yellow Belly Wheat. Described as a beer that,  “... presents itself of clove and banana from the authentic Weihenstephan German yeast strain. Our hefeweizen lingers with a crisp citrus finish.” it is also available as well as the rest of Beardslee Public House’s other beers. 

For more information on Beardslee Public House, including hours, hours, and current menus, visit https://beardsleeph.com/. 

About Beardslee Public House

Chef John Howie’s Beardslee Public House is known as a Pacific Northwest-inspired and family friendly eatery that specializes in high-quality, made-from-scratch comfort cuisine crafted from locally sourced ingredients. 

Beardslee Public House’s world-class signature brews and hard seltzers are made on site in the 10-barrell brewery. Head brewer Drew Cluley is an award-winning master brewer with 20+ years of extensive craft brewing experience and designed Beardslee’s beer program to appeal to a variety of tastes – from the most discerning craft beer lover to a newbie ready for their first craft beer experience. 

Beardslee Public House is located at The Village at Beardslee Crossing, 19116 Beardslee Boulevard. The Village is along Beardslee Boulevard, at the NE 195th Street and I-405 interchange at Exit 24. 

About The John Howie Restaurant Group:

The John Howie Restaurant Group includes  (Bellevue, 2002);  (Bellevue, 2009); in.gredients (Microsoft Redmond campus, 2014), ; and  Along with being the chef/owner of the John Howie Restaurant Group, John Howie is also author of the cookbook Passion & Palate: Recipes for a Generous Table. Chef Howie has been honored with an invitation to cook at the prestigious James Beard House in New York City on five separate occasions, represents Washington state annually at the Super Bowl in The Taste of the NFL, and is a sought-after culinary expert featured in local and national media, including Martha Stewart Living, The Today Show, The CBS Early Morning Show, Cooking Channel, Food Network, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. 

Chef Howie and his restaurants are as recognized for philanthropic generosity as they are for culinary achievements. Since 2002, the John Howie Restaurant Group has received numerous awards for philanthropy and community involvement, and has given more than $6 million to hundreds of charitable organizations.

from Northwest Beer Guide - News - The Northwest Beer Guide https://bit.ly/3iz5DSl

[miamibeerscene]

8 Coconut Beers You’ll Crave Right Now

CraftBeer.com

March 28, 2017

Coconut beers. The possibilities and flavor combinations are endless, despite many coconuts getting added to porters or stouts exclusively.

Whether dessert beer or desert island beer, the only limit to coconut is the brewer’s imagination and the amount of coconut available. A brewer can maneuver coconut in many ways to explore various flavor profiles for his or her beer. While some use coconut to complement the dark flavors in a roasty and chocolatey porter or stout, other brewers and mazers are setting out to use coconut to illustrate the versatility in some of their recipes.

(MORE: 2017’s Great American Beer Bars)

If Gilligan was a brewer, then he would make more than a coconut phone when stranded on that island. The crew of the island would be tempted to cobble together some brewing equipment and a few carboys and make some coconut beer fermented with wild yeast. It could happen.

Here are a few coconut beers to consider after a three-hour tour, whether shipwrecked on an island or simply enjoying the sunset.

Perrin Brewing | No Rules Vietnamese Imperial Porter

This behemoth of a beer clocks in at a staggering 15% ABV, and offers an intensely coconutty experience for those souls brave enough to traverse its dark depths. The beer itself was born from an insult a customer threw at the staff and it morphed into something greater from there. Perrin’s Director of Brewing Operations, John Stewart, remembers when the idea for the beer was born. “One of the crazy days at the brewery someone shouted ‘There are No Rules Here!’ and we decided to make an Imperial Vietnamese Porter called No Rules.” Making lemonade from lemons, Stewart and company “sat around and dreamed up what a Vietnamese Imperial porter would taste like and came up with the beer specs and worked our way backwards to build the recipe to create the beer we dreamed up.” After experimentation, the team decided on coconut for its “creaminess in creating a full mouthfeel,” and balance in handling a 15% ABV beer.

Angry Chair Brewing | German Chocolate Cupcake Stout

Tampa’s Angry Chair Brewing Company has made their name by releasing immensely flavorful dessert beers. The brewery sells shirts that lists their most popular dessert beers on the front with one word on the back: “Diabeetus.” While diabetes is no laughing matter, neither are Angry Chair’s dessert stouts, anchored by German Chocolate Cupcake Stout, which was a recipe brewer Ben Romano perfected in his homebrewing days. With such a chocolate-forward stout, Romano says that he thought the cupcake would be a perfect topping, but raw coconut would not be enough. “We have tried a blend of toasted and untoasted coconut,” Romano admits, “but have ended up using just toasted because we get a lot more flavor and aroma out of it.”

Maui Brewing | Coconut Hiwa Porter

Drawing from its tropical roots on the islands of Hawaii, Maui Brewing Company has built a great deal of its reputation with its Coconut Hiwa Porter. The beer features hand-toasted coconut and is made 100 percent in the Aloha State. Proud to be made 100 percent in the westernmost state in the United States, the porter’s big brother, Imperial Coconut Porter, won a gold medal at the 2016 Great American Beer Festival in the Field Beer Category.

(MORE: Who Owns Maui Brewing? Media Misprint Concerns Owner Garrett Marrero)

VisionQuest | Coconut IPA

For those who believe that coconut is only compatible with the roasted, chocolate flavors of stouts and porters, we encourage you to go on a vision quest. Or, in the case of this Coconut IPA, just visit VisionQuest, a small brewery addition to Boulder Fermentation Supply. There, owner Adam Kandle will serve you a unique beer experience that blends rich coconut with an absurd amount of hops. The current version claims lots of citra; other hops include galaxy, cascade, sorachi ace, mosaic. Kandle says they change the hops from batch to batch to keep it interesting (as if this beer wasn’t already). If you’re looking for something different or you’re on a quest to open your eye to what an IPA can be, head to VisionQuest for this IPA at 5.3% ABV.

Big Top Brewing Company | Hawaiian Lion Coconut Porter

When Big Top Brewing’s team joined forces with the Flying Pig Tap House in Saint Petersburg, Florida, the meeting of the minds spawned a beer that would join the goodness of Hawaiian coffee with coconut. Add to that Big Top’s love of Sarasota, Florida’s history with the culture of circuses, and “the lion was a natural fit,” says Big Top Brewing CEO Mike Bishaha. “The coffee and the coconut allow for a more balanced beer,” Bishaha says. “The first pilot runs were heavy on the coffee and light on the coconut and we felt the coconut sweetened the beer and added more complexity.” The end result is a beer that balances the roastiness of a porter with its natural coffee notes and adds another layer to the parfait with coconut while not thinning out the body.

(MORE: 9 Breweries You’ll Want to Follow on Instagram)

Bottle Logic | Stronger Than Fiction

When Anaheim, California’s Bottle Logic Brewing wanted to explore barrel aging with a beer that was not a stout, they decided on a strong ale base but the decision to add coconut did not come until later. Bottle Logic Founder and Brand Manager Brandon Buckner remembers that, “Our goal with this beer since it was a new prospect was to let the time in the barrel speak for itself. Once we started doing tasting trials, we picked up a lot of coconut notes from its time in the wood, so we thought it would be nice to enhance that.” The group decided that since the beer ended up with chocolate and vanilla tones, that coconut would be an obvious choice to compliment those flavors.

The Bruery | Mash and Coconut

While many coconut offerings are of the stout and porter variety, Placentia, California’s The Bruery went a different direction with coconut going into their Mash barrel-aged barleywine. Mash and Coconut “ratchets up the complex coconut character and complements the oaky and vanilla notes that are imparted to the beer as part of its extensive maturation in bourbon barrels.” In order to achieve this massive amount of coconut not to go quietly into the darkness of a barleywine with bourbon character, the Bruery had to invest in a massive amount of coconut – nearly a pound of coconut for every gallon of finished beer. That works out to each bottle containing about one-third of a coconut worth of ingredients!

Lickinghole Creek | Coconut Quad

Lickinghole Creek Craft Brewery,“Virginia’s farm brewery,” takes coconut to another level by making this tropical ingredient the star of its quadruple. This quad, made with a Belgian candi sugar that has both beet sugar and date sugar at its heart, uses coconut as a complimentary flavor to the dark complexity, malty goodness, and esters present in the quad. This beer is the younger sibling to Coconut Delight, the winner of a silver medal in the 2016 World Beer Cup, which is Coconut Quad aged in rum barrels.

The post 8 Coconut Beers You’ll Crave Right Now appeared first on Miami Beer Scene.

from 8 Coconut Beers You’ll Crave Right Now

[nwbeerguide]

Pike Brewing Company is releasing fresh hop beers, extended Brewery Beer Garden weekends, and a beer celebrating a newborn's arrival.

Press Release

Pike Brews Two IPAs with Fresh Hops Plus popular Brewery Beer Garden gets an extended season and more.

Pike Celebrates New Space Needle Observation Deck with an Exclusive Fresh Hop IPA Today, Pike is brewing a special batch of Pike Space Needle IPA featuring Cascade and Centennial fresh hops from Chelan Valley Hops, the only commercial hop farm with irrigation rights to the glacial waters of Lake Chelan. This limited-edition fresh hop Space Needle IPA will be available exclusively on draft at Pike Brewing Company’s The Pike Pub and Tankard & Tun, and atop the Space Needle itself. The Space Needle’s ongoing $100 million renovation includes a beautiful new observation deck featuring glass floors which is now open, providing visitors with sweeping views of the city and the chance to enjoy a Pike beer 500-feet in the sky! Look for this beer to hit draft lines the last week of September. Label art attached. 

Citra Fresh Hops Featured in 2018 Pike Wolf in the Woods IPA This week, we’re headed to Yakima Valley to collect fresh Citra hops from Perrault Farms for Pike’s second fresh hop IPA of the season: Pike Wolf in the Woods. With both fresh hop beers, Pike collects the farm fresh hops and brews the same day, insuring quality, freshness, and optimal aroma on the final product. Look for Pike Wolf in the Woods to begin pouring on draft the last week of September at The Pike Pub, Tankard & Tun, and throughout Washington state. Label art attached.

 Brewery Beer Garden Extends Season Due to the extreme popularity of Pike’s Summer Brewery Beer Garden, the drinking-in-semi-outdoors-season is getting a month-long extension! On weekends now through September 30th, Pike’s brewery doors to Post Alley are open, inviting guests to sit and sip among the tanks and kegs in our Brewery Beer Garden! In addition to regular service at The Pike Pub and Tankard & Tun, guests can choose to enjoy a beer right inside the production brewery on Saturdays and Sundays through Labor Day weekend. “We want to offer visitors a new way to experience Pike beer and the brewery itself,” says Gary Szeredy, General Manager of The Pike Pub, “While guests visiting each floor of our restaurants can view aspects of Pike’s gravity-flow brew system, opening up the brewery lets them see firsthand where the process begins.” Featuring four beer taps and snackable landjager from Pike Place Market neighbors Bavarian Meats, the Brewery Beer Garden will be open noon to 6pm Saturdays and Sundays through September 30th.

Baby Douglas Gets An IPA Owner and VP of Operations Drew Gillespie is a new dad! Pike is excited to welcome baby Douglas into the family, and to celebrate we’re brewing a special beer. Pike Douglas IPA was inspired by a love of fall family gatherings, Seattle sports, and all things Cascadia. Expect a modernized take on the resin-forward West Coast IPA: Pilsner malt base paired with whole leaf Cascade and dry hopping done with Loral Cryo Hops to create a light mouthfeel with fresh pine notes. Available on draft and in 22-ounce bottles, Pike Douglas IPA hits drafts and shelves the first week of October! Label art attached.

from News - The Northwest Beer Guide http://bit.ly/2x0SI6n

[johnboothus]

We Asked 12 Brewers: What Brewery Makes the Best Hazy IPAs?

Let’s get right to the juicy stuff.

We’re talking, of course, about hazy IPAs, which continue to keep beer lovers waiting and salivating in line (at least before the coronavirus pandemic), in hopes of securing the latest rare releases.

Interestingly, fans of hazy IPAs, also known as New England-style IPAs or simply NEIPAs, far more often find their admiration for breweries that specialize in these highly popular beers rather than for particular examples — this due to many being made in limited quantities, and without broad distribution. (No doubt, scarcity contributes to the NEIPA’s appeal.)

So, with that in mind, we asked the brewers themselves which craft breweries they believe have demonstrated great proficiency in the uniquely American beer style. Below, 12 beer producers from across the country opine on the best purveyor of hazy IPAs.

The Best Hazy IPA Breweries, Recommended by Brewers:

Tired Hands Brewing Company, Ardmore, Pa.

Other Half Brewing Company, Brooklyn

Great Notion Brewing, Portland, Ore.

Humble Sea Brewing Co., Santa Cruz, Calif.

Root + Branch Brewing, Copiague, N.Y.

Cellarmaker Brewing Co., San Francisco

Triple Crossing Beer, Richmond, Va.

The Alchemist Brewery, Stowe, Vt.

Hudson Valley Brewery, Beacon, N.Y.

Mountains Walking Brewery, Bozeman, Mont.

Hop Butcher for the World, Darien, Ill.

Keep reading for details about all the recommended bottles!

“Wow. What a loaded question. The first brewer or brewery that popped into my head was Jean Broillet and Tired Hands. I just like Jean’s approach to beer in general. Trends are changing so quickly, and everyone wants the next hype beer style, but I like to rely on breweries that I know will create a consistently good and balanced product regardless. With hazy IPAs, so many examples are pushed out too quickly and get spicy. But I can have an IPA, or any beer, from Tired Hands weeks, even months, later, and they taste the same. (Full attenuation is key!) I’ve never been disappointed in a hazy IPA, or a pilsner, or an experimental potato something from Jean, and I don’t imagine I will be anytime soon.” — Erika Tessier, Co-owner and Assistant Brewer, Origin Beer Project, Cranston, R.I.

“I’ve been a big fan of Other Half, and the brewery’s IPAs are some of the best in the game, the continuous hype well deserved. They carry explosive aroma, mouthfeel, and flavor profile that checks all the right boxes. DDH Broccoli is still one of my all-time favorite IPAs, and the All Together initiative was not only a great beer, but a great campaign to support all these small business and communities during the coronavirus pandemic. The only downside is that I don’t have the opportunity to drink Other Half here in rural Iowa as often as I’d like!” — Eric Hild, Lead Brewer, Toppling Goliath Brewing Co., Decorah, Iowa

“Great Notion was the first brewer in Portland to start making hazy IPAs, and now there’s not one producer who doesn’t include at least one example in their lineup. What’s great about the city’s brewing community is that we openly share ideas; we’ve learned a lot about this style from each other. The most impressive part of Great Notion’s hazy IPAs is consistency. In particular, the all-Citra Ripe represents the style well, showcasing a silky body, balanced malt, and juicy hop expression.” — Shaun Kalis, Co-founder, Ruse Brewing Company, Portland, Ore.

“My choice for the best hazy IPA brewery isn’t from New England, but from a kooky town by the Pacific. I’ve been stoked on Humble Sea for a while and will always stop for a ‘Foggy’ IPA when in Santa Cruz. The brewery has been cranking out a ton of sick hazies since opening a few years ago, each more radical than the last. I think the Humble Sea team really nailed it with Socks & Sandals. Classic West Coast aromatics and flavor with that soft, creamy mouthfeel of a NEIPA; it really hit that sweet spot for me. It’s like East Coast meets West (Best) Coast.” — Justin Carter, Cellar Lead, Drake’s Brewing Co., San Leandro, Calif.

“Anthony Sorice of Root + Branch is one of a small handful of brewers that can really make a hazy IPA shine. His beers are well thought out, meticulous, and patiently executed. Root + Branch does a great job of keeping the style well balanced. Examples are bright, clean, and show the right amount of restraint, which is very rare these days. I had the pleasure to work alongside Anthony for a period of time and it was clear from the start that he had an excellent grasp on what makes a New England-style IPA work. There’s a very good reason why his beers sell out so fast, and it’s not just hype. The care, quality, and love is obvious.” — Stjepan Pavich, Lead Brewer, Other Half Brewing, Brooklyn

“Tim Sciascia at Cellarmaker makes amazingly crushable hazy IPAs that are consistently imbued with aromatic notes of Citra hops and tropical fruit. This adds to the drinkability of his beers, and shows off his amazing ability to find and select the best hops out in the market.” — Brian Rauso, Co-founder and CEO, Green Cheek Beer Co., Orange, Calif.

“Anytime I have a Triple Crossing hazy IPA, I end up staring at the glass after each sip. I’m half wondering how the Virginia brewery did it, and half hoping the consumed beer will magically replenish itself. That ‘it’ is being able to layer expressive yeast character, water chemistry, and hop aromatics in a way that makes its hazy IPAs truly stand out from the crowd. The single-hop Triangles series really showcases Triple Crossing’s chops; with only a single hop variety, the team achieves an envying amount of structure and complexity. Simcoe Triangles was the last one I had. It’s fresh-cut grapefruit bliss, summertime melon, and dank citrus wrapped up in a velvety smooth mouthfeel.” — Turner Humphries, Head Brewer, Hoptown Brewing Company, Mooresville, N.C.

“In my opinion, The Alchemist is one of the best producers of hazy IPAs. Everything the brewery makes in the style is nicely balanced in terms of aromatics and bitterness, and it’s based in Vermont, which has excellent water sources. Some of my personal favorite IPAs are Heady Topper and Focal Banger. Heady is probably Alchemist’s most famous beer. However, Focal Banger to me seems to be a more dialed-in recipe. I’m more of a malt gal myself, and I enjoy its malt sweetness. Not only does John Kimmich and team produce delicious hazy bois, but they’re also involved in community outreach, aspiring to educate and involve the community around them. The most recent involvement is an anti-racism action plan.” — Haley Ann Warren, Head Brewer, Sparge Brewing, Wellington, Colo.

“Hudson Valley Brewery consistently puts out great, more straightforward hazy, hoppy beer that flies under the radar because of all the attention — and rightly so — its innovative sour IPAs get. Though not an IPA, the hazy pale ale Diadem was one of the best hoppy beers I’ve had this year. The thing that excites me the most about what the Hudson Valley crew does, and where they seem to consistently differentiate themselves, is in blending capabilities. Their ability to skillfully arrange different fermentation profiles can really take hazy, hoppy beers to a place that is perfect for the modern drinker’s flavor and aroma wheelhouse.” — Ben Clayton, Founder and Brewer, The Test Brewery, Brooklyn

“The funky folks at Mountains Walking are making my go-to hazy IPAs these days, in particular the rotating Oat Whip series, which feature single hop varieties without changing the notion of a cloudy, juicy, hoppy beer. They make great companions at the end of a long trail hike or sitting on the side of a stream after a day of fly fishing. We were one of the first to produce hazy IPAs in the wilderness state, and we called them ‘frontier style’ because no one here really knew what a New England IPA was at that time. So we made up that term, since I had brewed in New Mexico and Pennsylvania prior to coming to Montana, where hazy IPAs had been around a lot longer. I’m glad to see other breweries taking the reins on this category that shines brightest on the local level, and making cloudy suds regularly available in Montana.” — Luke Steadman, Brewmaster and Janitor, Smelter City Brewing, Anaconda, Mont.

“I’ve always loved Other Half’s hazy IPAs. Along with a few others, Other Half paved the way for the style. The team is always pushing boundaries and I appreciate that. Right now, I’m really digging the brewery’s double dry-hopped session IPA, [DDH] Baby Diamonds. I love how well Amarillo and Galaxy play together, and it’s easy drinking.” — Maria Cabre, Head Brewer, J. Wakefield Brewing, Miami

“Hop Butcher is knocking it out of the park with the hazy IPAs right now. No two are alike, but they’re consistent with quality, pleasing mouthfeel, and exploding with flavor. The extensive range of hop profiles is incredible. A few of my favorites are Tavern Cut, Neon Green Relish, and Blazed Orange. I’m always excited to see what the brewery is going to put out next.” — Rachel Leiby, Head Brewer, Geneseo Brewing Co., Geneseo, Ill.

The article We Asked 12 Brewers: What Brewery Makes the Best Hazy IPAs? appeared first on VinePair.

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