Xbox One adds Xbox 360 backwards compatibility

Unlike The Wii U, essentially 100% of everything Wii related works, no relicensing bs etc.

Same as Wii, Phat PS3, and PS2. It's hardware-based BC which gets around the licensing thing. Phat PS3 had an emotion engine chip on it as example. Wii had the gamecube components on it.

The one I don't know how they get around it is PS3 + PS1 software emulation.
 
And you also have to worry about licensing on top of ALL of that.

Meaning only the popular and mainstream games can be guaranteed to succeed

Yeah, any delisted games are already basically confirmed to not be getting any emulation, regardless of whether you own a disc. Since they're technically distributing "new" digital copies, the licenses and everything have to be active for MS to be able to.
 
Yeah, any delisted games are already basically confirmed to not be getting any emulation, regardless of whether you own a disc. Since they're technically distributing "new" digital copies, the licenses and everything have to be active for MS to be able to.

Which is a shame and a real problem in the digital era. :(

It's too bad they can't make it so you don't have to download the game and it translates the code on the fly so you can use ANY disc regardless.


I really hope Sony comes out with PS1/PS2 software emulation that supports all discs. I'm sure they could make it work if they wanted at just original native resolution upscaled.

Seeing what they did with PS1/PS2 software emulation on the PS3. One can only think the PS4 COULD do it!
 
I wonder how many people are going to sell their 360's or buy a bunch of 360 games (seen a lot of statements like the one above me about buying 360 games on sales) based on this poorly illustrated feature?
 
I also believe there was a Wiiware game that wasn't on the Wii U vWii eshop until recently

That wasn't a rights issue, but a glitch. Because of that you couldn't transfer it to Wii U. It seems to have been a game bug, because you had to download the latest version to be able to transfer it.

The game was "Lost Winds" and this issue was fixed 14 months ago, so not "until recently".
 
I really want a XB1 now. I'll wait and see what games get added later on, but as of right now it truly looks like it's just a matter of time before I drop the money on this.
Crazy, this BC announcement came out of nowhere!
 
That's not going to happen though with this model. There is barely any incentive for publishers to ask MS to recompile/republish those games. There's going to be many with licensing issues. It's just a bad solution.
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Not going to happen based on what? How is it bad when the publisher doesn't need to do anything just opt in? Your speaking nonsense I'm sorry.

The 360 BC required substantial amount of work, this really hampered efforts for other games, this method isn't like that given the amount of titles already availablw and the commitment of more to come.
 
Same as Wii, Phat PS3, and PS2. It's hardware-based BC which gets around the licensing thing. Phat PS3 had an emotion engine chip on it as example. Wii had the gamecube components on it.

The one I don't know how they get around it is PS3 + PS1 software emulation.

I think the PS3 just used a single, general purpose emulator for PS1, so the status of any individual games is irrelevant. With Xbox One/360 they're individual emulators, so it's a different situation.
 
The one I don't know how they get around it is PS3 + PS1 software emulation.

Because it's still a physical disc. When a licensing agreement runs out, all that means is that they can't produce new discs. Old discs obviously still work perfectly fine, and you can continue making hardware to run it. The PS3 uses a universal PS1 emulator that just accepts ROMs, even disc-based ROMs. But since you don't have to worry about game licensing on disc-based ROMs it doesn't matter. Licensing only matters when you're trying to sell the specific game, not a solution to play the game (especially when Sony has the rights to make a PS1 emulator, which of course they do)

With downloads, every time someone downloads a game it's essentially "producing" a new copy of that game. So when the rights for the game run out, you gotta pull the digital copies, just like you'd have to stop producing discs. Licensing has nothing to do with the emulation solution you're using and everything to do with what you're emulating.
 
So then there's Microsoft's mistakes. Not just running off 360 disc on XB1.

Which makes me think each download will have the emulator compiled into it instead of just the emulator on each machine.
 
So then there's Microsoft's mistakes. Not just running off 360 disc on XB1.

Which makes me think each download will have the emulator compiled into it instead of just the emulator on each machine.

Based on what I read, I think it's a bit like how Nintendo does the Virtual Console. Each download is packed in with an emulator for that specific game. Most of the emulator code is a general console emulator, but there are also specific tweaks to get that specific game running as well as possible
 
If you buy the digital 360 version, you still get the x1 version free, so if you get the digital version by putting in the 360 disc, wouldn't that give you the x1 version too?

No and no.

Not sure where you're getting the "free upgrade" bit from, since that expired a few months ago.

Technically. How is this possible?

Emulation.

How do achievements work exactly with this and digital games? If I have castlevania can I just download it to the One and it just boots up and works? And then Achievements will pop up like normal?

It's a virtual 360. Achievements work like they do on the 360.

Sounds like they're recompiling the games then, rather than emulation on the fly. He said if you insert a 360 disc it will then download the game.

If they were recompiling these would be ports. Not emulation.

What, exactly, makes you think that these are ports?

I wonder if region locked X360 games work on any Xbox 1.

Also this news blew me away and I was sooooo happy at first but then I went all sad thinking that all of my Cave's shmups goodness will probably never be available considering there's a voting system and those games ain't popular enough and Cave themselves are probably not interested (and barely alive at all) :(

Depends on what region setting is configured in the virtual 360. As I pointed out a page or two back, the 360 region setting is a config file in the system. There is no reason that a virtual JP 360 couldn't run on a US One.

Select titles and you will have to download the digital version after putting your disc in. Read below.


It doesnt seem like they're emulating a 360. From Anandtech - http://anandtech.com/show/9382/xbox-at-e3-new-controller-game-emulation-and-plenty-of-exclusives


So it's not full blown sw emulation - you insert the game, launch the emulator and voila.

Sounds like it'll be very limited (100 titles based on popular vote) and even then Microsoft may have to prune the popular choices based on the feasibility of code conversion. Overall, looks like a very expensive endeavor for them. Hope it pays off for them.

That Anandtech quote is horrible. For one, it really doesn't say anything. At best the quoted bit simple describes an emulator in high level terms. But it isn't making a technical judgement based on fact.

I thought the point was that for the pubs it wasn't any work. They just had to give approval and have all the rights to the game and Microsoft would package it up free of charge

That's what Microsoft said. Pubs give the OK, they drop the file into the emulator and push it onto XBL.

Which XBLA games work?

I need to know.

Xbox.com has a list. So does the OP.

Yup, I agree, I would be super happy with 80-90% and would let it go.

That's not going to happen though with this model. There is barely any incentive for publishers to ask MS to recompile/republish those games. There's going to be many with licensing issues. It's just a bad solution.

How does Sony get around the whole licensing thing and allow all PS1 disc game support on PS3 via emulation? I mean Wii, Wii U, Phat PS3, and PS2 had hardware BC, but Slim PS3 + PS1 is software BC, and it doesn't need to deal with this issue.

The most likely answer is because PS3 BC runs off a disc. Xbox One doesn't run any games off the disc. Installing is making a copy. Default rights likely wouldn't cover that. Licensing can be a tricky business. That's why you don't see every PS1 title automagically on PS Now.
 
So then there's Microsoft's mistakes. Not just running off 360 disc on XB1.

Which makes me think each download will have the emulator compiled into it instead of just the emulator on each machine.

How's it a mistake? The X1 doesn't have a 360 inside it to make that shit possible. You're taking the piss.
 
Not going to happen based on what? How is it bad when the publisher doesn't need to do anything just opt in? Your speaking nonsense I'm sorry.

The 360 BC required substantial amount of work, this really hampered efforts for other games, this method isn't like that given the amount of titles already availablw and the commitment of more to come.
Its free money for the pubs if the licensing isnt weird, like soundtracks. Youll get people buying 360 games digially on x1 with little to no effort on the part of the devs or pubs.

Id buy like 5 games if theyre under $20 if they make the list eventually. Not even counting xbla
 
How's it a mistake? The X1 doesn't have a 360 inside it to make that shit possible. You're taking the piss.

People just mentioned how PS1 played off disc which allowed it to get around licensing issues. PS3 doesn't have PS1 hardware, it's only software emulation (Well Slim PS3 that is).
 
How's it a mistake? The X1 doesn't have a 360 inside it to make that shit possible. You're taking the piss.

They could simply have the emulation program with configurations for any supported game installed on the XBO and it just runs that configuration for any game in the drive. If the game isn't supported, simply paste a HUGE warning that the game isn't officially supported and may and probably will have problems!

While still giving the option to install if you want.


How hard is that??

People just mentioned how PS1 played off disc which allowed it to get around licensing issues. PS3 doesn't have PS1 hardware, it's only software emulation (Well Slim PS3 that is).

None of the PS3s have PS1 hardware. It's all software emulation and it's the PRIME example of how software emulation based BC should be done.
 
It should be noted that if a title is still for sale on XBL, it will most likely be okay in regards to licensing to be made available on Xbox One. Since if any licensing had expired, it would have been pulled from the store
 
I thought the point was that for the pubs it wasn't any work. They just had to give approval and have all the rights to the game and Microsoft would package it up free of charge
They dont, it's all work for Microsoft, which is what I said.

They don't need to "share the code". And it's not like 1:1 emulation competes with remasters. People need to stop saying this.
Err, the whole point of remasters is now a thing because one of the reasons is no BC. The other upgrades you get are just bonus selling points.

That Anandtech quote is horrible. For one, it really doesn't say anything. At best the quoted bit simple describes an emulator in high level terms. But it isn't making a technical judgement based on fact.
Please enlighten us then.
 
In his world, having your Xbox One play half your Xbox 360 games is worse than having your Xbox One play none of them

The guy is talking out of his ring piece. He's determined to hate and devalue Xbox BC.

Ask PC gamers about their Steam back catalogue. I have a few old games on Steam myself and it's great having them in the same place. This is what Xbox is moving towards and it's brilliant.
 
They dont, it's all work for Microsoft, which is what I said.


Err, the whole point of remasters is now a thing because one of the reasons is no BC. The other upgrades you get are just bonus selling points.


Please enlighten us then.

Emulated BC doesn't increase performance, nor visuals.
 
The guy is talking out of his ring piece. He's determined to hate and devalue Xbox BC.

Ask PC gamers about their Steam back catalogue. I have a few old games on Steam myself and it's great having them in the same place. This is what Xbox is moving towards and it's brilliant.

I've actually consciously decided to buy less console games in leu of PC games for that EXACT reason. I don't like my purchases being tied to a specific hardware platform that I may not own in X amount of time. I was also set on never owning an Xbox 360 and not buying an Xbox One

Guess what just changed because of this announcement?
 
The guy is talking out of his ring piece. He's determined to hate and devalue Xbox BC.

Ask PC gamers about their Steam back catalogue. I have a few old games on Steam myself and it's great having them in the same place. This is what Xbox is moving towards and it's brilliant.

He's basing his arguments on factual events and things that ACTUALLY happened. How Microsoft has handled this kind of thing in the past. And it's in no way at all unreasonable to be skeptical and have reservations about it based on said experience.

They burned us on OG Xbox compatibility on 360.

Imagine if the 360 had perfect Xbox compatibility, no need to keep that massive ugly black slab out anymore and would be by far the best way to play OG Xbox games for years to come. No need to deal with all the compatibility problems and bs from the select games that received versions.
 
They could simply have the emulation program with configurations for any supported game installed on the XBO and it just runs that configuration for any game in the drive. If the game isn't supported, simply paste a HUGE warning that the game isn't officially supported and may and probably will have problems!

While still giving the option to install if you want.


How hard is that??

It's very stupid to say the least, considering to the end consumer having maybe two additional titles work in comparison to the thousands of games which don't launch, have an extreme plethora of rendering issues or don't even make it past the title screen, it would only make the whole thing look very bad regardless of the warning.
 
They dont, it's all work for Microsoft, which is what I said.


Err, the whole point of remasters is now a thing because one of the reasons is no BC. The other upgrades you get are just bonus selling points.


Please enlighten us then.

There's not much to enlighten.

"converting the code to run quickly on the much different hardware" is the general definition of an emulator.

Yes, speed can be highly variable depending on the quality of the emulator, but running code on different hardware is what emulators do.

You made the claim that the quoted bit meant this wasn't an emulator. What led you to make that claim?
 
Emulated BC doesn't increase performance, nor visuals.
And who said that? Maybe you are not following the conversation properly.

There's not much to enlighten.

"converting the code to run quickly on the much different hardware" is the general definition of an emulator.

Yes, speed can be highly variable depending on the quality of the emulator, but running code on different hardware is what emulators do.

You made the claim that the quoted bit meant this wasn't an emulator. What led you to make that claim?
Maybe you should re-read the part where Anandtech said that Microsoft was converting the code on their back-end, it's not happening on the fly on the Xbox One. The converted code then is downloaded to the Xbox One and then you can "emulate" it. Hence, my comment - not a full blown sw emulation.
 
People just mentioned how PS1 played off disc which allowed it to get around licensing issues. PS3 doesn't have PS1 hardware, it's only software emulation (Well Slim PS3 that is).

Yea, but the PS1 is super simple to emulate, was super simple on slow PC's back in the day, and even wasn't too much of a challenge for the Dreamcast, let alone a PS3.

The 360 on the other hand is a completely different matter, and at this time yesterday was generally considered outside the realsm of possibility for the XBO to emulate. Hardly comparable.

They could simply have the emulation program with configurations for any supported game installed on the XBO and it just runs that configuration for any game in the drive. If the game isn't supported, simply paste a HUGE warning that the game isn't officially supported and may and probably will have problems!

While still giving the option to install if you want.

How hard is that??

None of the PS3s have PS1 hardware. It's all software emulation and it's the PRIME example of how software emulation based BC should be done.

Well this is why many of us don't believe that the X1 is simply able to run the 360 code, and why you need to download the game even with the disc in, rather than install that game from the disc. We don't actually know that the file MS send you is the same data as what's contained on the disc, and to be honest it actually seems rather unlikely given the approach they've chosen.
 
Err, the whole point of remasters is now a thing because one of the reasons is no BC. The other upgrades you get are just bonus selling points.

The "whole point"? No, the "whole point" literally is the "other upgrades".

You're deluded if you truly think anything close to the majority (or even a notable minority) of people buying remasters are doing so only because of the lack of backwards compatibility. If literally all these people only cared about the mere ability to play their older games, they'd simply keep their old consoles. They wouldn't be selling them for $100 so they can rebuy a fraction of their last-gen collection at $20-$60 a pop.
 
Finally I can play Tales of Vesperia, since the PS3 version ain't coming out anytime soon.

See, this is another example of people getting the wrong impression.

Just assume your game won't be BC and then be surprised if it becomes available. It's not a part of any of the announced lists and/or previews (like all the titles from the video).

I doubt Namco Bandai wants to enable BC on Tales of Vesperia. They rather have you buy the latest Tales game.
 
The "whole point"? No, the "whole point" literally is the "other upgrades".

You're deluded if you truly think anything close to the majority (or even a notable minority) of people buying remasters are doing so only because of the lack of backwards compatibility. If literally all these people only cared about the mere ability to play their older games, they'd simply keep their old consoles. They wouldn't be selling them for $100 so they can rebuy a fraction of their last-gen collection at $20-$60 a pop.
So you think of all the 1M+ TLoU or pick any other remaster sales and say that people are only buying it for the upgrades? Maybe this is slightly off-topic.
 
gotta get up in about three hours for doctor appointment, don't have a lot of time to read the thread so sorry if this has been discussed many times.
I had an xbox360 that red-ringed in 2010, and never got it replaced (it was beyond warranty)
I had quite a few unfinished xbla games on it. So if I buy a xbone I can just use my old account and get those games back for free once they are available? That's what I'm getting from the op but I'm wondering if maybe there's been a clarification or edit or something that wasn't put in the op yet
Because if thats the way it is, that is ridiculously awesome and a step in making the xbone something I am finding more attractive
 
He's basing his arguments on factual events and things that ACTUALLY happened. How Microsoft has handled this kind of thing in the past. And it's in no way at all unreasonable to be skeptical and have reservations about it based on said experience.

They burned us on OG Xbox compatibility on 360.

Imagine if the 360 had perfect Xbox compatibility, no need to keep that massive ugly black slab out anymore and would be by far the best way to play OG Xbox games for years to come. No need to deal with all the compatibility problems and bs from the select games that received versions.

He's saying it will be a failure and is a waste of time, Microsoft are making a mistake. They didn't have to spend the best part of a year working this voodoo but they have done it because the gamers wanted it. A little is better than nothing at all and having tried Viva Pinata, I can say it works very well and knocks the 360>OG Xbox out of the park. I might not get my Deadpool emulation, or I might. Who knows. But I wont let that ruin it for me as I'm sure there are tons of other games.
 
If they were recompiling these would be ports. Not emulation.

To me it sounds like recompiling the games and Microsoft offers some ability to really simply recompile the games without any other changes needed. Which makes them ports in that sense, although without any real work required.

Bone is simply not powerful enough to be able to actually emulate a 360. 360 used a PowerPC CPU. Bone uses x86. Bone would have to be way way way more powerful to actually emulate the PowerPC CPU of the 360.

And that's why you can't simply download 1 firmware update featuring an actual emulator and then put in the discs and run the games. Instead you download new game code (+ maybe even data) for each game.
 
And who said that? Maybe you are not following the conversation properly.
.

Maybe you lack common sense? Let me remind you of what you said
Err, the whole point of remasters is now a thing because one of the reasons is no BC. The other upgrades you get are just bonus selling points.

The upgraded performance and visuals are the main selling point for many of these for a LOT of people including myself.

Emulation of the game running at sub 720p, sub 30FPS is garbage in comparison.

Just you wait and see how amazing Uncharted 1 is going to look and run on PS4 compared to the original With it's shitty framerate, low resolution, constant screen tearing, lack of anti aliasing. (As an example)

Remasters give these games a 2nd chance, a new life and a chance to find a new audience. In the console space, where you can't simply turn up the settings like a PC. To people like me that means a lot.

But different folks different strokes.
 
See, this is another example of people getting the wrong impression.

Just assume your game won't be BC and then be surprised if it becomes available. It's not a part of any of the announced lists and/or previews (like all the titles from the video).

I doubt Namco Bandai wants to enable BC on Tales of Vesperia. They rather have you buy the latest Tales game.

Once again: if a game is selling on Xbox Live, then that means the licenses haven't expired and there most likely isn't a legal reason it can't be kept from being made BC. If a game is selling on Xbox Live, then it means that there is a general desire to have that game KEEP selling, even with newer entries in the series

People like to harp on Activision and Call of Duty, but if Acti really wanted to force people to upgrade to the latest CoD every year, they'd stop selling the old ones. But they don't, because there's no reason not to.
 
I wonder how many publishers won't enable for their games just so they keep their remaster option open.

I am kinda hoping some publishers use it to reignite the fanbase for potential sequels.

Really impressive stuff from MS. Worked flawlessly for me so far. Just need to hunt out my 360 collection and see what works!
 
And who said that? Maybe you are not following the conversation properly.


Maybe you should re-read the part where Anandtech said that Microsoft was converting the code on their back-end, it's not happening on the fly on the Xbox One. The converted code then is downloaded to the Xbox One and then you can "emulate" it. Hence, my comment - not a full blown sw emulation.

And that is a claim that Anandtech has no source for, and goes against everything MS has said publicly.

If these were ports, then they wouldn't be calling it emulation.

Sure, it's possible that the MS engineers are making it all up and they're not really doing emulation, but what would be the point? If they created magic porting software that could convert compiled code from one platform to another without issue, they'd be shouting that from the rooftops. That would be a massive technical accomplishment.

Getting PPC code to run in a Hyper-V VM on an x64 machine? Good programmers, but not something that is technically impossible, especially when they know the machine they are emulating inside and out.

As has been mentioned multiple times in this thread, the most likely answer is that MS has either licensed Transitive technology or is using something similar developed in house and incorporated that into a VM package. Take the original game image, drop it into the container and run the emulator. That's what makes the most logical sense.
 
He's basing his arguments on factual events and things that ACTUALLY happened. How Microsoft has handled this kind of thing in the past. And it's in no way at all unreasonable to be skeptical and have reservations about it based on said experience.

They burned us on OG Xbox compatibility on 360.

Imagine if the 360 had perfect Xbox compatibility, no need to keep that massive ugly black slab out anymore and would be by far the best way to play OG Xbox games for years to come. No need to deal with all the compatibility problems and bs from the select games that received versions.



Ha! Really? He said earlier:

I hate PSNow's model but it has a lot more games available and had more available on beta.


There's nothing factual about comparing hardware emulation with a game streaming service. It's pretty clear where he stands and his subsequent shit storm proves it.
 
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