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Xbox 360 Backward Compatibility Finalized

Posted by Zonk on Sat Nov 12, 2005 07:42 AM
from the surprises dept.
XBox (Games)
News for nerds writes "Microsoft has finally announced the list of the 213 Xbox 1 games playable on Xbox 360 at launch. A software emulator is required for each original Xbox game, which means you need an HDD for these games to work on Xbox 360. While it is expected that the list will grow in future via Live update, as of now it lacks first-party titles such as Project Gotham Racing, and other popular titles such as DOAU/X, Doom 3, Far Cry, KUF, Panzer Dragoon Orta, the Splinter Cell series, and the SW: Battlefront series." Xbox.com is also featuring an interview with Todd Homdahl about the quest for compatibility.
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  • PS2 and PS1 games? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jamesjw (213986) on Saturday November 12 2005, @07:48AM (#14014910) Homepage
    Why not just build something with built in hardware emulation? like the PS2 does with PS1 games - i know its not 100% but it makes sense to do it this way doesnt it?

    -- Jim.

    • Re:PS2 and PS1 games? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ScottyUK (824174) on Saturday November 12 2005, @07:52AM (#14014922) Homepage
      Didn't Sony include the essential bits of the PS1 system in the PS2 in order to allow backwards compatibility? I don't think NVIDIA would let Microsoft do this, as they own the rights to the graphics card used in the Xbox.

      • Re:PS2 and PS1 games? (Score:5, Informative)

        by nathanh (1214) on Saturday November 12 2005, @08:49AM (#14015041) Homepage
        Didn't Sony include the essential bits of the PS1 system in the PS2 in order to allow backwards compatibility?

        Correct. The IOP (IO processor) on the PS2 normally handles input from the DVD, game controllers, USB, etc. However it's basically a souped up version of the PSX CPU with all the associated bits, so send it the right instructions and it detaches from the EE (main processors) and the system becomes a nearly 100% compatible PSX.

        Sony could do this because the PSX CPU was 33MHz and had 2MB SDRAM and mere kilobytes of graphics memory. When the PS2 was being made the cost of each IOP must have been measured in tens of cents. The Xbox 360 is being released too soon after the Xbox; the 733MHz Celeron plus the NV25 GPU is still fairly expensive.

        • Re:PS2 and PS1 games? (Score:4, Informative)

          by sznupi (719324) on Saturday November 12 2005, @10:48AM (#14015406) Homepage
          Actually, PS1 has 1MB of Video RAM (also models starting from around 98 have 4MB main RAM...but that's moot point anyway since it was used at most as data buffer, often not at all).
          But of course your argumentation is correct.

    • Re:PS2 and PS1 games? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Quick Sick Nick (822060) on Saturday November 12 2005, @07:53AM (#14014924)
      It's makes perfect sense, but from a technological aspect it's impossible. The Xbox 360 uses a treo of PowerPC processors to run games, in sharp contrast to an intel pentium III of the original xbox. A lot of code simply will not go over. Given these constraints, Microsoft could have either said "fuck it, no backwards compatibility" or they could try their best to port some games anyway. I'm glad they chose the latter.
      • Given these constraints, Microsoft could have either said "fuck it, no backwards compatibility" or they could try their best to port some games anyway. I'm glad they chose the latter.

        Chose and chose. Not having backwards compatibility on a console is pretty much shooting yourself in the foot. I suppose the current effort could be described as "We only grazed the foot".

          • Re:PS2 and PS1 games? (Score:4, Insightful)

            by Txiasaeia (581598) on Saturday November 12 2005, @10:19AM (#14015310)
            There sure is: the revo will be backwards compatible for gamecube (and earlier Nintendo) consoles, and the PS3 is apparently backwards compatible (if not 100%, then close to it). If the Xbox360 is only partially BC and the other two are (for the most part), then they could be shooting themselves in the foot with regard to competition in the next gen. If somebody needs to keep their Xbox to play Xbox games because it won't play *all* their Xbox games, what's to stop this theoretical person from getting a PS3 or Revo instead?

              • The Revolution will NOT be backwards compatible beyond the Gamecube - unless you think that they're going to include cartridge slots? Any games previous to Gamecube that are playable on the Revolution will be those that Nintendo decides to sell/rent/whatever from their online service. And they'll be played on what? Yes, software emulators.

                From IGN's Revolution FAQ: "At E3 2005, Shigeru Miyamoto said: "We have not set a price or determined a list of software for the Nintendo Revolution download service. B

          • Re:PS2 and PS1 games? (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Kjella (173770) on Saturday November 12 2005, @10:36AM (#14015359) Homepage
            Since when did not having backwards compatability become, "shooting yourself in the foot"?

            Since your two biggest competitors (Sony PS3, Nintendo revolution) have announced that feature? And that it was one of the major reasons the Dreamcast was hurled into obscurity and securing the Playstation's spot as market leader?

            Outside of Nintendo's handheld devices, the extra hardware to let the Sega Genesis play Master System cartridges, and the PS2's ability to play certain PS1 games there really aren't many examples of backward compatibility in consoles.

            If by "certain" you mean all except 10 out of 8000, even the controllers were largly compatible. The new slimline model is getting complaints because it is incompatible with 7 PS2 and 40 PS1 games. That's 0,5% of the PS1 games, up from 0,13%. The two market leaders, Nintendo (handheld) and Sony (console) are doing it, those that haven't have failed. Can you say "formula for success"? If that was supposed to be an argument against me, it's a pretty pathetic one.
            • Since your two biggest competitors (Sony PS3, Nintendo revolution) have announced that feature? And that it was one of the major reasons the Dreamcast was hurled into obscurity and securing the Playstation's spot as market leader?

              So in your mind, the history of game consoles starts in 1999?

              The PS1 was obviously not backward compatible with anything and it did pretty well. Same deal with the original Xbox.

              Hardware manufacturers made the mistake of putting too much stock in backward compatibility in 1982-198
              • So in your mind, the history of game consoles starts in 1999?

                It's nothing to do with history. It's to do with what the current compatition are doing. And they are both going to be backwards compatible.

                Neither Sony nor MS could even exist in the video game industry if backward compatibility was a requirement for success.

                MS is neither here nor there because they didn't win the last console war. Sony did, in no small part because of it's backwards compatibility to the winner of the previous generation. The
      • The PS2 essentially included the base hardware of the PS1. Processor included. Since this is the comparison made by the root post I think the point is that MS could have included a full PIII class processor for backwards compatibility.

        Taking this approach its far from impossible. Expensive yes, impossible no.
      • The Xbox 360 uses a treo of PowerPC processors to run games...

        WOW this is totally incorrect. first of all, the XBOX 360 doesn't use a treo at all, to run ANYTHING. where the hell did you hear that?? second, the latest treo's use either intel's PXA270 chip or an ARM processor...and get this, the fastest of of those two processors is just 312 MHz!!! i'd like to see you play doom3 with that. and THIRD, even if MS decided to use a freakin' TREO in the XBOX 360...which as i said is totally ludicrous...how the
    • Uhh, Pretty sure NVIDIA has given Microsoft the finger and stopped producing the NV2A GPU... no true hardware emulation there. I'm guessing NVIDIA lawyers have already been annoying M$ lawyers on how they intend to emulate any proprietary GPU features in the NV2A.

      Intel would've killed the custom P3 CPU they were using if M$ couldn't get the GPU's for the boxes, so they'd need to stick in a real x86 CPU. All I see from Intel is "LETS COOK EGGS UNTIL MID WAY THIS YEAR". AMD, pfft, can't supply enough right no
    • Why not? Sounds reasonable, yes? Aside from, you know, requiring a hard drive (extra 100$), you mean?

  • Software Emulation (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Station (621731) <marose@nosPaM.vt.edu> on Saturday November 12 2005, @07:50AM (#14014915) Homepage
    Looks like the entire thing will be (as expected) run off of software emulation. Really, considering the technical challenges involved (I know, software emulation isn't impossible, but the fact that it can run the system at full speed on a completly different hardware type is nice) I'm pleasently surprised at the number of games already available. I also like the fact that the system will run all your old games in HiDef and add a layer of FSAA (almost like the old Sega 32x).
    • That's exactly what the 360 needs to make it a resounding success: More features that cause people to draw direct comparisons between it and the Sega32x.

      Wait... that can't be right....

    • I'm pleasently surprised at the number of games already available.

      Actually, there is a very interesting point behind the fact that *NOT ALL* Xbox games are immediately runnable on the 360's emulator. There are two issues here.

      - Firstly, if not all Xbox games run under the emulator, this clearly implies that the Xbox emulation is incomplete. If it were complete, then any Xbox title wouldn't even know that it's running under emulation, and all games would run by default. So, it's not complete, currently.

      -

      • Re:BLAH! (Score:4, Informative)

        by NanoGator (522640) on Saturday November 12 2005, @04:50PM (#14017004) Homepage Journal
        "They could've just included an XBOX subsystem inside the 360, just like the Commodore 128 had a C64 subsystem."

        And add even more to the cost + having to buy chips from both NVida and ATI? Heh. There's a brilliant move.

        "And didn't the SNES have (to be bought separately) a NES adapter?"

        No.

        "Can't the Gamecube play GBA games?"

        No.

        "Frankly I can't understand why the decision of software emulation. But well, this is Microsoft."

        Cost and practicality.

  • What they've done is incredible! (Score:3, Funny)

    by J. T. MacLeod (111094) on Saturday November 12 2005, @07:57AM (#14014930)
    Yes, they've manage to not include in their list a SINGLE game I care about!

    Seriously. Wow.

  • Pretty screwed up (Score:3, Insightful)

    by external400kdiskette (930221) on Saturday November 12 2005, @08:04AM (#14014946)
    It's going to look bad marketing a machine with backwards compatability when the backwards compatability consists of the emulation of *some* games assuming you have the more expensive xbox and the *hope* of more support in future.
  • I was honestly only expecting maybe a few dozen of the most popular titles, so I'm pleasantly surprised at the quantity of supported games. Now if only they can work on the quality of the supported games...

  • My collection (Score:5, Informative)

    by ninjakoala (890584) on Saturday November 12 2005, @08:07AM (#14014951)
    Just to give you an idea of how bad it looks at the moment, here is my collection divided into working and not working:

    Working:
    Amped, Colin McRae '04, Dead or Alive 3, Fable, Forza Motorsport, Fusion Frenzy, Halo, Halo 2, Jade Empire, Phantom Crash, Sega GT 2002, Knights of the Old Republic, Knights of the Old Republic 2, The Thing

    Not working:
    The Bard's Tale, Blood Wake, Burnout, Dead or Alive Ultimate, Dragon's Lair 3D: Return to the Lair, Morrowind, F1 Career Challenge, Project Zero, Gunvalkyrie, Knockout Kings 2002, Links 2004, Mechassault, Outlaw Golf, OutRun 2, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Phantasy Star Online I+II, Project Gotham Racing 2, Rainbow Six 3, Rallisport Challenge 2. Jet Set Radio, Serious Sam, Shenmue 2, Splinter Cell, Taito Legends, Unreal Championship, Wreckless, Yager

    And here I was thinking "oh, ok, a couple of my games won't work... worst case scenario half won't work". This is just crazy though. I hope they boost the compatibility in a big way, or I just can't see my self upgrading, since that would mean I would have to keep the current black box under the tv as well.

    • Re:My collection (Score:4, Informative)

      by RogueyWon (735973) * on Saturday November 12 2005, @08:26AM (#14014984) Journal
      I've got a 360 on pre-order, which I'll be picking up the day it comes out. I've been a vocal defender of the X-Box and the 360 for some time. Even I have to admit that this list is not good enough. The impact of this on my own games is:

      Working

      BG: Dark Alliance 2, Battle Engine Aquilla, Crimson Skies, Forza, GTA3, GTA:VC, Halo, Halo 2, Jade Empire, KOTOR, KOTOR 2, Spyhunter 2.

      Not working (*s indicate games whose inclusion here frankly defies belief, as they've been major titles)

      Area 51, *Burnout 3*, *Burnout Revenge*, *Chronicles of Riddick*, Colin McRae 04, *Full Spectrum Warrior*, Mechassault, *Mechassault 2*, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Secret Weapons over Normandy, *SW: Republic Commando*, Wallace & Grommit.

      The titles I've starred there are some of the biggest games on the X-Box. A good number of them are relatively recent releases. As far as I'm concerned, there's no excuse whatsoever for them not being included. All I can say is that this will need to change by the launch date.

      • Re:My collection (Score:5, Insightful)

        by GizmoToy (450886) on Saturday November 12 2005, @09:17AM (#14015114) Homepage
        It occurrs to me that some of those titles may not be scheduled for backwards compatibility because they are to be release native for the 360. Burnout Revenge comes to mind, and I'm sure a Splinter Cell will make it. Perhaps Microsoft is trying to force everyone to buy the latest version (native to the 360, of course) of many of the popular series titles?

    • Patience, grasshopper (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Namarrgon (105036) <namarrgon AT gmail DOT com> on Saturday November 12 2005, @08:26AM (#14014985) Homepage
      From the interview:

      Xbox.com: What criteria do you use in choosing which Xbox games will be backward compatible on Xbox 360? How far back into the Xbox game library are you going to go?

      Todd: When we say Xbox library, we mean the entire Xbox library. This ranges all the way from our launch in 2001 up to games that haven't even shipped yet.

      If they can do 241 games in a few months, including writing the emulator, I don't imagine the rest will take that long. In the meantime, you'll just have to be content with running your Xbox games on your Xbox, tough as that is.

      • Well, of course they get the big demanding games running first and a lot of the others will work automagically. But that's why I was expecting a much larger percentage. Well, at least there are no launch titles that are really pulling at my wallet yet and I'm far from done with my current catalogue, so 360 will have to wait. Let's hope Revolution doesn't get out before I'm ready to upgrade or I bet 360 will have to wait a while longer. Mmmm Sin & Punishment ^_^

        It's probably not as easy as you make it se

    • Re:My collection (Score:5, Funny)

      by JPyun (911266) on Saturday November 12 2005, @03:25PM (#14016625)
      Wow. You have a lot of shitty games.

  • If they were smart (Score:4, Interesting)

    by LaughingCoder (914424) on Saturday November 12 2005, @08:11AM (#14014955)
    The could offer some sort of trade-in program where you could get the new version of the game on the cheap if you turned in your old disk. Of course most of these games are non-Microsoft products, so such a program would need to be offered by lots of different companies. In the long run this would probably have been cheaper than trying to implement backwards compatibility. Many times the best solution to a technical problem isn't technical.
    • ...to a completely different architecture, of every single Xbox game, with all the associated debugging, testing etc - and that's assuming they can get ahold of the source code to the third party games too (yeah, like studios are going to hand over their IP lifeblood, to Microsoft at that).

      It's a lot smarter for them to write an emulator.

      • I think you haven't grasped exactly what I was saying. The game doesn't have to be identical - I would think the next generation of the "same" game (eg Madden 2006 for a Madden 2004 tradein) would make people very happy. The vendor could decide what the tradein was - Microsoft could "mandate" (ie subsidize) that *some* title was offered in trade for every old XBOX title (and when I say in trade I mean for a significant discount, not for free). For zealots who want the exact same gameplay, well they will jus
        • Actually the certification of the games mean that they run as well or better than on the original Xbox. Better quality video output and potentially higher framerate (assuming it isn't locked in code). Besides that gameplay should be identical.

  • Wow, Microsoft IS all-seeing! (Score:5, Funny)

    by tgd (2822) on Saturday November 12 2005, @08:18AM (#14014963)
    Its like someone looked at my rack of XBox games and picked everyone one I've finished to be compatible, and every one I haven't to not be.

    *tinfoil hat*

  • Emulation + (Score:5, Informative)

    by GweeDo (127172) on Saturday November 12 2005, @08:20AM (#14014969) Homepage
    Don't forget that all your emulated Xbox games can now be ran at 720p or 1080i with full Anti-Aliasing as well. This could help a number of games look really nice. Here are some shots [bungie.net] of Halo and Halo 2 in 720p from Bungie. It does make a very nice difference.
  • While there is Halo and Halo 2 support (they would have a lot of pissed users if there wasn't), there is no Project Gotham Racing 2 support. Part of me wonders if there is no support for it due to PGR3 being a launch title. Are there any other launch title sequals with no backwards compatiblity???

    It wouldn't suprise me at all for Microsoft to do this for the money.
  • Here it is. Microsofts first huge mistake. If they were only selling one version of the 360 at launch it wouldn't be a problem, but since the "CORE" package will not be backwards compatible with anything, we're are going to have a lot of unhappy people on Christmast morning when their old Xbox games don't work. This is a disaster in the making.
    Now they have to market it as two different versions of the 360, the backwards compatible version and the not backwards compatible version. Considering the CORE system was to be marketed towards casual gamers, it is these same casual gamers who don't want to spend $60 a pop on brand new games on launch day.
    Are they trying to make the CORE system obsolete before launch? They can't be a wise idea, especialy since price is king at Chrismas time.

  • cracking prediction (Score:3, Interesting)

    by BushCheney08 (917605) on Saturday November 12 2005, @08:57AM (#14015069)
    In the interview, he mentions that people who don't have the Live service will be able to download the new binaries to their computers, burn a cd, put that in their 360 and it'll update. I predict that this is the exact mechanism that will initially be exploited to allow arbitrary code to run on these things. Just a hunch...
      • Ever heard of digital signatures?

        Ever heard of buffer overflows in crypto handling software or update mechanisms?
  • If you own a XBOX game, that usually means you own a XBOX. If you want XBOX360, go buy it. But if you want to play your old XBOX game, play it with your old XBOX.
    Secondly, most game publishers will release XBOX360 version of their "still selling" existing titles.

    I'm not even sure we ever need an emulator here although it's definitely a good thing.
  • The first Xbox was an nvidia chip, the new one is ATi - some games contain hardware specific optimizations, and nVidia refused to license them to emulate their hardware, for anyone that actually read up on the issue.

  • Finalized = Not really? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by eagl (86459) on Saturday November 12 2005, @01:20PM (#14016070) Journal
    If an emulator must be specifically coded for every title, it doesn't sound backwards compatible at all. It's a bit like calling a wintel box "commodore 64 backwards compatible" since you can code an emulator, but worse since each game needs separate work and a piece of non-standard hardware (the optional hard drive) to work at all.

    • your xbox isnt magically going to vanish, you know?
        • Selling working hardware with games you love to get a shinnier box that doesn't play the games you love? Who's the dumbass again?

          And just who is going to be buying all these xboxes? Anyone who ever wanted an xbox has one now, and once the 360 is out, everyone will want THAT instead of the old one. Looking at ebay [ebay.com] shows an awful lot of xboxes already for sale, and most of them seem to be selling at less than $100. You can see lots of xboxs with people asking $200 plus for 'em, and most of those aren't getti
    • Because they didn't know the specific architecture of the Xbox 360 when they made the original Xbox games?
      • In theory, that doesn't matter. You could just make an extensible fat-binary format. The Xbox would boot the binaries that were tagged as being "XBOX" and ignore any other binaries. Likewise, the 360 could load the binaries tagged as "X360" or whatever.

        I just can't imagine why they would bother. The devs for the OP's games wouldn't have bothered to make the games also available in a format for a console that didn't exist when the games were released, at no extra charge. It would have been a huge amount
    • if apple devs can bust out with universal binarys why cant you

      Erm... Maybe because a universal binary isn't. It's two binaries - one for x86 and one for PPC. (Not sure if they're both rolled into the same file, but that's not really relevant).

      You have to compile an application as a universal binary - it doesn't magically become that way.
    • I was more curious if it would run xbox media centre :)

      It's a shame that MS doesn't embrace that project - it's the only thing that would make buying a 360 worthwhile for me right now. Games are fine and all, but a media player that's constantly evolving and compatible with all major formats is an easy-sell.

      Microsoft really should partner up with the XBMC folks and just offer free updates of it over xbox-live. Would generate sales from people like me. Heck, I'd probably even buy a few games for it too if
    • This is so that you could, oh, sell your XBox if you wanted more cash.

      Or, so you could get a 360, and play (some) XBox games, even if you didn't have an old XBox.

    • Now we learn that they will be making the emulators long after its release, and most likely ANY NEW XBOX game will come with a 360 emulator. This is a big plus for gamers.We should be happy to see the MODEL being used. I've seen too many 'that sucks' and complaints and it really surprises me... well... I guess its important to know the audience on this site.

      So what incentive does the developer have to actually write a 360 game? They can just write for the XBox, following the emulator guidelines, and then

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