Xbox / Windows Gaming thread

[Pissmaster]

BC on the X1 isn't 'real' BC because instead of MS going the route of making a true emulator, they make a wrapper for each individual game to make it work on the X1, which is why you have to download the games even if you have the disc. Since that technically makes it a new release of the games added to the list, MS has to get permission from the publishers, who in turn have to make sure that the licensing clusterfuck allows them to re-release the game.

I have no fucking clue why MS would do it piecemeal instead of one true emulator. Just ask the homebrew scene - you're making a lot of trouble for yourself in the long term doing it that way.

That makes sense, though I do wonder what exactly is the difference between Xbone's BC system for original Xbox games vs. the 360's. 360 seemed like it used some kind of emulator, considering there were some bizarre entries on there. Like it was a deal where they just tossed every game at it, and whatever worked got supported.

But is there some kind of licensing agreement now? Is it a weird control thing to where publishers can choose if they wanna let me play my 360 version and skip the remaster (Bioshock. Halo 3) or force me to buy a new version for my new console? (Dead Rising, Skyrim)?

Since they said every Xbox One game will work with Series X, what about the Kinect and its games? I.e. Just Dance. Would they need to get the adapter or would Kinect be an afterthought?

There isn't even a Kinect port on the newer Xbox Ones, so I'd imagine it'll just use the adapter.

I can't think of any other edge cases to ask about. I assume Rock Band 4 shouldn't have any problem carrying over your DLC or instruments because presumably, as far as the game's concerned, it might as well be running on a normal Xbox One, right? And of course obviously dead games like Battleborn wont run on it, but that's the fault of Gearbox making the game unplayable offline and reliant on a server that's shutting down in January.

 

[The Last Stand]

I think Xbox One BC is more hardware based like the Wii/GC for instance. In theory, any Xbox One game would run on it. The only input from the publisher would be the Smart Delivery method to upgrade from XB1 to Series X.

IMO, that's a smart move for MS to have. That way your games would carry over without having to buy it twice if you decide to upgrade. I also assume it'll ease development as they can have settings to merely downgrade or adjust to run on older hardware.

Somebody will probably experiment with Kinect on Xbox Series X.

 

[Super Hans]

That makes sense, though I do wonder what exactly is the difference between Xbone's BC system for original Xbox games vs. the 360's. 360 seemed like it used some kind of emulator, considering there were some bizarre entries on there. Like it was a deal where they just tossed every game at it, and whatever worked got supported.

I know that when the PS1 was first being designed, Sony wrote up a best practices guide for developers, with the main goal of it being to smooth out backward compatibility on future consoles. It's the reason that basically all PS1 games work just well on the later consoles and handhelds as on the PS1 itself.

My best guess is that MS didn't do anything like that for the original Xbox, and the abysmal state of backward compatibility on the 360 was the result.

 

[The Last Stand]

Anybody have any fond memories of Xbox?

I remember getting my Xbox 360 on Christmas 2009. I played Gears of War 2 on somebody's Xbox 360 before; I fell in love with the console then.

It was the Elite Holiday Bundle. Then I got Modern Warfare 2, I was immediately immersed with the action and graphics at the time.

I learned I could rip songs from CDs onto the Xbox so I had my own soundtrack of CDs lying around the house.

 

[Trans Fat 41g]

Halo 2 on Xbox Live, circa 2005.

God, the chat was fire those days, you don't back down whenever engaged.

 

[The Last Stand]

God, the chat was fire those days, you don't back down whenever engaged.

Party chat was a great addition to Xbox Live.

You could chat with up to eight people in a closed chat environment and play whatever game you wanted.

Voice chat was an underrated gem of Xbox Live. You could hear anything and everything.

I remember playing Halo 3 with my mic on Big Team Battle. We were literally doing callouts while I was manning the turret in a Warthog on Rat's Nest. Very immersive and cooperative.

 

[Duncan Hills Coffee]

I never had an Xbox in all my life. It's not even because of any real reason, it just kinda happened that way. There wasn't really an exclusive games that interested me, and I got along just fine with my PS2 and GameCube. It's probably because of this that the controller layout on an Xbox controller confuses me; I'm just not used to the button layout.

Now though I don't know if I should at least get an original and a 360. I've always wanted to try Halo and maybe Gears of War, along with other console ports of games that suck ass on PS3, but there aren't a lot of games that justify getting those systems. I have the Halo Master Chief Collection on PC, but from what I hear that collection's got a lot of issues that weren't present in the originals. Does anyone know other good Xbox/360 games? I don't want to buy an entire system for just Halo.

 

[Billy_Sama]

Anybody have any fond memories of Xbox?

I remember getting my Xbox 360 on Christmas 2009. I played Gears of War 2 on somebody's Xbox 360 before; I fell in love with the console then.

It was the Elite Holiday Bundle. Then I got Modern Warfare 2, I was immediately immersed with the action and graphics at the time.

I learned I could rip songs from CDs onto the Xbox so I had my own soundtrack of CDs lying around the house.

I manage to get my OG Xbox at the end of its years since I had a Gamecube and while I loved the games the later releases were sparse and I was jealous of the games outside of the Gamecube Library and wanted a personal DVD player. Since Xbox games were discounted and plenty of cheap used games on the market it became one of my favorite system with the Gamecube.

Oddly enough, I never had the internet for it or cared for Halo but so many other games made the system worthwhile.

 

[The Last Stand]

I manage to get my OG Xbox at the end of its years

I had an Xbox OG for a time until it got stolen.

I had NASCAR, Vice City and a Splinter Cell game.

The NASCAR game had Sweet Home Alabama and the Splinter Cell game had a mission where you had to evacuate a burning building.

This was my younger years so memories are a bit spotty. Oh, and a DVD remote as well.

 

[Pissmaster]

I never had an Xbox in all my life. It's not even because of any real reason, it just kinda happened that way. There wasn't really an exclusive games that interested me, and I got along just fine with my PS2 and GameCube. It's probably because of this that the controller layout on an Xbox controller confuses me; I'm just not used to the button layout.

Now though I don't know if I should at least get an original and a 360. I've always wanted to try Halo and maybe Gears of War, along with other console ports of games that suck ass on PS3, but there aren't a lot of games that justify getting those systems. I have the Halo Master Chief Collection on PC, but from what I hear that collection's got a lot of issues that weren't present in the originals. Does anyone know other good Xbox/360 games? I don't want to buy an entire system for just Halo.

There aren't many original Xbox exclusives that didn't get some kind of HD rerelease down the line. Metal Wolf Chaos used to be a big one, but that was an import and got a rerelease last year. Steel Battalion was another one, but the controller is gigantic and worth a fortune, and it needs that controller to be playable. The one golden exclusive I know of is Jet Set Radio Future, and even that's playable on 360. Really, most of the worthwhile library works on the 360, though if you go used game hunting you'll wanna keep this list handy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_games_compatible_with_Xbox_360

And the 360 has plenty of exclusives itself, so, the original Xbox is kinda redundant for anyone besides enthusiasts and purists.

Though back in the day, the original Xbox was my favorite of its generation. No memory cards needed, and the consoles were overall a lot more sturdy than the PS2 and its inevitable disc read errors. I liked the controller a lot better, too. And then came hacks, where you could just load up your hard drive full of NES & SNES roms, and that became my go-to emulation machine until Wii hacks came around.

 

[Duncan Hills Coffee]

There aren't many original Xbox exclusives that didn't get some kind of HD rerelease down the line. Metal Wolf Chaos used to be a big one, but that was an import and got a rerelease last year. Steel Battalion was another one, but the controller is gigantic and worth a fortune, and it needs that controller to be playable. The one golden exclusive I know of is Jet Set Radio Future, and even that's playable on 360. Really, most of the worthwhile library works on the 360, though if you go used game hunting you'll wanna keep this list handy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Xbox_games_compatible_with_Xbox_360

And the 360 has plenty of exclusives itself, so, the original Xbox is kinda redundant for anyone besides enthusiasts and purists.

Interesting, I've heard that the 360 was backwards compatible but I never really thought about it. It certainly makes it easier and cheaper if I wanted to, say, get the original Halo releases instead of the Master Chief collection. Of course, the pertinent question is did they fix the Red Ring of Death issue? That was the biggest reason I never got a 360 because it was such a pervasive issue early at launch and I never could find anything that definitively said that the problem was fixed.

Though back in the day, the original Xbox was my favorite of its generation. No memory cards needed,

I wish I knew about this. Even as a kid, needing to get memory cards for my PS2 and GameCube were a pain. My parents already bought these consoles and they had to spend a little more just so I could keep my save data. Meanwhile here's the Xbox which didn't need them. I feel a little ripped off honestly. Hell, maybe if it marketed itself as not needing them I might have gotten one back in the day.

 

[The Last Stand]

Of course, the pertinent question is did they fix the Red Ring of Death issue? That was the biggest reason I never got a 360 because it was such a pervasive issue early at launch and I never could find anything that definitively said that the problem was fixed.

Yes, they did.

The Red Ring of Death was popular in earlier units with a "Falcon" and "Xenon" chip inside 2005-2008 models. Basically, they slimmed down the motherboard with the "Jasper" chip, therefore reducing heat consumption and overheating.

The Xbox 360 Slim and E models do not have the overheating problems the original models had.

 

[Duncan Hills Coffee]

Yes, they did.

The Red Ring of Death was popular in earlier units with a "Falcon" and "Xenon" chip inside 2005-2008 models. Basically, they slimmed down the motherboard with the "Jasper" chip, therefore reducing heat consumption and overheating.

The Xbox 360 Slim and E models do not have the overheating problems the original models had.

Interesting, interesting. Even better is that both models are like $100 on eBay, which isn't too bad if you ask me. Who knows, the day when I get a 360 may come sooner or later.

 

[Pissmaster]

Interesting, interesting. Even better is that both models are like $100 on eBay, which isn't too bad if you ask me. Who knows, the day when I get a 360 may come sooner or later.

Gamestop's on their last legs, keep an eye out for some sick ass dealzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

 

[The Last Stand]

Interesting, interesting. Even better is that both models are like $100 on eBay, which isn't too bad if you ask me. Who knows, the day when I get a 360 may come sooner or later.

Don't buy a 360 from GameStop used. They may have done the "towel trick" on them. A quick fix to "repair" RRoD consoles.

 

[heyitsmike]

Anybody have any fond memories of Xbox?

Going over to the house of one of the guys in our friend group to play 4-on-4 Halo 2 over system link on senior skip days. Such simpler times.

I didn't have a console so I was pretty trash at shooters. So I was always psyched when we played swords because it gave me a fighting chance since you had to be in melee range to kill. But it didn't help all that much since they knew the maps and would screen watch like a motherfucker.

XBox One is the first console I've ever owned and of course I bought the Halo Master Chief collection. It looks way better on my big screen HD set than on those small CRT screens we used to play on. But it's just not the same...

 

[heyitsmike]

I wish Microsoft would make a XBox Series S with a disc drive. It sucks that only the higher price model will have it when a significant reason many people buy physical is the lower cost.

I remember when CD burners first came out. A lot of the higher end players couldn't play burned discs, but the cheaper ones always could. Which was fine because the people who would buy expensive players were not playing burned discs from a flea market. But the people buying cheap players did need that functionality.

 

[seri0us]

do you know w

do you know why they call ti the xbox 360

cause when you see ti you turn 360 degrees and moonwakl away from ti

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

That makes sense, though I do wonder what exactly is the difference between Xbone's BC system for original Xbox games vs. the 360's. 360 seemed like it used some kind of emulator, considering there were some bizarre entries on there. Like it was a deal where they just tossed every game at it, and whatever worked got supported.

But is there some kind of licensing agreement now? Is it a weird control thing to where publishers can choose if they wanna let me play my 360 version and skip the remaster (Bioshock. Halo 3) or force me to buy a new version for my new console? (Dead Rising, Skyrim)?

My best guess is that MS didn't do anything like that for the original Xbox, and the abysmal state of backward compatibility on the 360 was the result.

MS did do that, if you had programmed on Windows and was familiar with it then Xbox was real familiar environment, the XDK was DirectX and Win32 without all the other Windows stuff. Very easy to get going, very similar to programming a game on Windows. The Xbox had a bunch of other stuff going for it as well and it could do things like that because it was a closed environment with fixed hardware, something that wasn't possible on PC, but when people say it's a PC they're mostly correct.

The thing that reeeeally fucked up emulation of the XBox was Nvidia. MS didn't license a custom design to manufacture from Nvidia, they bought custom chips from them(and Intel) so to properly emulate things in the future they needed HLE wrappers tuned for each individual game because they couldn't use the proprietary and very secret Nvidia opcode for the GF3 and build a general purpose emulator. They had to work around that on a game by game basis and that's why emulation authors/autists loathe HLE.

AFAIK Sony bought chips from Nvidia which would make PS3 emulation tricky.

Now both MS and Sony license their chip designs through AMD and both Sony/MS are the ones responsible for having them made so things are different.

 

[CreamyHerman’s]

No

The thing that reeeeally fucked up emulation of the XBox was Nvidia

Not suprised, Nvidia is truly an awful company