I’ve been waiting for an Xbox 360 for more than half a year now. One of the big pluses was the backwards compatibility with my existing Xbox games. That was in all the gaming magazines that I buy occasionally. The reality is much different. Only 13 percent of my games are compatible, which makes a mockery of the word “compatible.”
I found out the terrible truth in very unsatisfactory manner. I put in an old game and got an error message, telling me that I need to go to the Xbox site. I hadn’t hooked up wireless to the Xbox 360 yet, so I went online using my computer.
After much digging, I found this page, which required me to register just to read it. Joy. After accessing it, I found out I can download some software to a CD to upgrade the Xbox. Alternatively, if I put an old game into the Xbox 360, it will automatically update itself to play it.
OK, I dig out an old Ethernet adapter and got wireless going on the Xbox 360. Unlike with my old Xbox, I actually get into Xbox Live without a problem. I go through a painfully slow registration process, where I’m asked for things like my phone number and my birthday without being told why I need this or how it will be used. I was told some info will be displayed publicly, which kind of worried me about giving it. But you have no choice but to provide it.
Now I try again with an old game, and I’m told Xbox needs to update itself. It does a few things, then I eventually see the system is up to 1.2 rather than 1.0. Still, the game won’t play. That error message returns, telling me to go to the pretty useless xbox.com/games address for more info. I say useless because when you get there, it’s like an Easter Egg hunt to locate the information about playing old games.
Finally, after digging, I come across three great articles:
In the Q&A, the first question is, “Is Xbox 360 backward compatible?,” with the answer, “Yes.” Then the qualification:
Today we’re confirming more than 200 titles including games…
Dig further, and Microsoft tells you they’ve decided to focus on making some top selling games backwards compatible, that a hard drive is required if you want this and that they’ll be getting the entire Xbox portfolio made compatible over time. “We’re going deeper into the portfolio every day,” we’re assured.
They must not be digging too fast is all I can say. The Xbox has been out for months, and there’s plenty not on the list. In fact, the list looks very similar to what they said back in August, as I found here. Meanwhile, this post reports we might not see much more happening until the end of the year.
Let’s look at our own library. What works?
- SSX 3
- Crimson Skies
What doesn’t work?
- OutRun2
- Pirates
- Project Gotham Racing
- Project Gotham Racing 2
- Star Wars Battlefront
- Lego Star Wars
- Midtown Madness 3
- Midway Arcade Treasures
- Silent Scope
- Burnout 2
- The Italian Job
- Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath Of Cortex
- Crash Tag Team Racing
So of our 15 game titles, 2 work — that 13 percent of what we own. That’s backwards compatible?
I know backwards compatibility. It’s on the Nintendo DS. It will play ALL GameBoy Advanced games flawlessly, not 13 percent of them. And it played all old games when it came out.
OK, many of the Xbox games we don’t play that much anymore. Some of them are older titles that perhaps weren’t best sellers. But c’mon! Lego Star Wars doesn’t make the list? The older Project Gothams don’t? Yes, PGR3 was a launch title for the Xbox 360, so I suppose you shouldn’t be going back to the old ones. Then again, if I want to drive a Mini, it’s PGR2 that I need.
From what I understand, Microsoft has to make an emulator for each and every Xbox game they want to make compatible. Despite the promises, I’m not expecting they’ll actually do this or get through the library quickly. That’s especially so after they said things like this that I found from back in August.
1. Will the Xbox 360 be backward compatible with the Xbox?
Yes, the Xbox 360 will be backward compatible with the Xbox. To take advantage of these features though, the Xbox 360 hard drive is required.
3. Many game publications claimed the Xbox 360 won’t be backward compatible with the Xbox. Is that true?
No, that is false and pure rampant speculation based on the fact that Microsoft changed its technology partners for the CPU (from Intel to IBM) and GPU (from nVIDIA to ATI). This speculation ended when Microsoft officially announced that the Xbox 360 will be backward compatible with the Xbox.
Keep reading, and then you get to the part about backwards compatible meaning that this would be for “top selling” games. Honestly. That should have been in response to question one. It should have been like this:
1. Will the Xbox 360 be backward compatible with the Xbox?
The Xbox 360 will be backward compatible with a select number of Xbox games at launch, if you have an Xbox 360 hard drive. Compatibility with other Xbox games will happen over time.
I did try the two games that are backwards compatible. Crimson Skies seemed to jerk occasionally, not a lot, but enough that I noticed and wondered if the emulation wasn’t so good. SSX 3 seemed fine.