Xbox360 is backward compatible...or is it?

[The_One]

Xbox 360 to play original Xbox games
Published: 1 hours ago; 8:34pm PDT
by Marcus Lai

At the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, Microsoft revealed that the Xbox 360 will be backwards compatible with original Xbox games. The announcement comes after vast speculation that the software maker would include the feature in order for existing Xbox owners to make a smooth transition to the next-generation hardware.
The Xbox 360 faces tough competition against Sony's Playstation 3. Sony revealed the Nvidia-powered system today and said that the new Playstation would be backwards compatible with PS2 and original PSone games.

The Xbox was Microsoft's first entry in the video game market. After acheiving a solid #2 position behind Sony, the company has invested more into making Xbox 360 a full multimedia station. The Xbox 360 will include a progressive scan DVD player, and the option to stream recorded television shows, music, and videos from a Windows Media Center PC.

Microsoft said today that there are over 160 Xbox 360 games in development. It also said that its Xbox Live onling gaming service is close to reaching two million subscribers. Source (http://news.punchjump.com/article.php?id=804) I can only say that this sweetens the deal for future Xbox 360 owners and myself alike :D.

[Brandon]

Thank you very much. I was getting quite worried about this.

[The_One]

Thank you very much. I was getting quite worried about this. Same same... Good thing it will have B/C. Now I can buy all those platinum Xbox games and play them on my Xbox 360 when I get it... hehe :D

[Brandon]

Thank you very much. I was getting quite worried about this. Same same... Good thing it will have B/C. Now I can buy all those platinum Xbox games and play them on my Xbox 360 when I get it... hehe :D
Exactly. ;) I don't think I want to play my PS1 games on PS3. It'll hurt my eyes looking at those old games.

[Tenchi]

Though, they said it would be only SEMI-backwards compatible. Emulation software will be released for the most popular games according to heretic of E-mpire. :wink:

[The_One]

Unless PS3 can somehow drastically make those old games look better... Which I highly doubt :roll:.

[Brandon]

Unless PS3 can somehow drastically make those old games look better... Which I highly doubt :roll:.
The PS2 attempted that, but all it did was cut loading times down and slightly improve textures, which is better than nothing.

[The_One]

All I want is some filters to get rid of the texture flickering and some built-in anti-aliasing to get rid of aliasing! However, at this point, it looks like the PS3 won't even have anti-aliasing :shock:!

[Z]

looks like the PS3 won't even have anti-aliasing :shock:!

now now, don't jump to conclusions. ofcourse PS3 will have anti-aliasing. heck all three systems will. again, keep in mind these are not the final PS3 specs. it is still a bit far from launch. remeber how quickly PSP's originally announced RAM doubled eight times?

Sony will still leave some surprises to keep people intrested till near launch. :wink:

[*G*spot]

Nice to that Bill has a little sense regarding the B/C issue.

[Chris Metal]

looks like the PS3 won't even have anti-aliasing :shock:!

now now, don't jump to conclusions. ofcourse PS3 will have anti-aliasing. heck all three systems will. again, keep in mind these are not the final PS3 specs. it is still a bit far from launch. remeber how quickly PSP's originally announced RAM doubled eight times?

Sony will still leave some surprises to keep people intrested till near launch. :wink:

They haven't even said anything about Pixel fill rate performance, polygon performance etc. So its no suprise to me they haven't announced their full GPU specs yet, included on that list would be nVidia's NSX. Why on earth would nVidia leave out anti-aliasing when they've supported it for years and their latest Sli cards support it. They'd be going backwards in technology not forward.

[Coded-Dude]

Wait a second here!
So will they emulate or add the nvidia chipset(NVIDIA has stated they are stopping fabrication)

Howm much more money do you think MS lost here just to keep up with the competition?

[Charlie]

Its Microsoft... In the end it probably dosen't even matter.

[rev>thanu]

they also mentioned it would be backwards compatible only with the top selling xbox games. so is not with every game ever released. i know you guys mostlikely only play the best of games xbox has to offer, but i think that this is not true backwards compatibility. not everyone loves AAA and best selling games for the console (casual gamer).

[mckmas8808]

Nope not really BC. Kind of like a fake BC.

[Lord Darkblade]

MS are probably paying Nvidia a limited royalty, basically they only support top sellers (say 100K+ sales) and Nvidia charges them a smaller amount... still seems rather sucky compared to what Sony and Nintendo offer us, backwards compatability to the first generation...

[KKS]

Man if it's software emulation and the code gets leaked, some good programmers may be able to emulate x-box on PC!!!

(There already is an xbox emulator but its not very good)

[*G*spot]

MS are probably paying Nvidia a limited royalty, basically they only support top sellers (say 100K+ sales) and Nvidia charges them a smaller amount... still seems rather sucky compared to what Sony and Nintendo offer us, backwards compatability to the first generation...

:shock: talk about slimy :evil:

[mckmas8808]

Yeah thats some dirty stuff to do to Xbox fans. So did M$ lie? People said that Sony lied about what the game will look like due to KZ and others, yet did M$ actually lie for real? Only top games, why? I think M$ should explain themselves.

[stanDarsh]

E3: Xbox 360 "backwards compatibility" explained

Ellie Gibson 05:07 19/05/2005
Current-gen Xbox games to be "recompiled" for Xbox 360

Following earlier indications that the Xbox 360 will only be backwards compatible with some Xbox games, Microsoft has admitted that existing software will need to be recompiled before it can be run on the new console.

The problem, it says, is down to hardware incompatibility - since the current Xbox uses an Intel processor, but the 360 will use IBM's PowerPC architecture, while NVIDIA's graphics solution is being replaced with an ATI one.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=8996
As many commentators have pointed out over the last few months, this means backwards compatibility problems. The solution Microsoft has reached is apparently to recompiled current-gen Xbox games so that they can be played on the 360. First on the list, it says, are the best-selling Halo titles.

The news has raised more questions than it answers, however, as it suggests that gamers may need to purchase titles they already own in order to play them on an Xbox 360 - and almost certainly means that only a sub-set of Xbox games will ever be playable on the new console.

Sony and Nintendo have already confirmed that their next-gen consoles - the PS3 and Revolution - will play all the games in their respective back catalogues, offering consumers a huge choice of titles at launch. Microsoft was unavailable for comment at the time of writing.

[Z]

so technically X2 isn't BC. if you need to remake/recode games and sell them again to insure they run on X2, that isn't really BC. that is another negative on MS's side. Ninty said Rev is BC to the whole 20 years of Ninty gaming, while PS3 is fully compatible all the way to PSOne.

[stanDarsh]

Yeah, if this story proves to be the case, and MS don't find a better solution, it's pretty disappointing and may detract some people from buying it.

[*G*spot]

E3: Xbox 360 "backwards compatibility" explained

Ellie Gibson 05:07 19/05/2005
Current-gen Xbox games to be "recompiled" for Xbox 360

....The news has raised more questions than it answers, however, as it suggests that gamers may need to purchase titles they already own in order to play them on an Xbox 360 - and almost certainly means that only a sub-set of Xbox games will ever be playable on the new console.....

That's just nuts.... :twisted: If this turns out to be true, they'll have Xboxers jumpin' ship, left and right. :roll:

[Z]

they actually need to change the title from "backward compatibility" to "buying remakes". I wonder what Xbots have to say about that?

[gnznroses]

E3: Xbox 360 "backwards compatibility" explained

Ellie Gibson 05:07 19/05/2005
Current-gen Xbox games to be "recompiled" for Xbox 360

Following earlier indications that the Xbox 360 will only be backwards compatible with some Xbox games, Microsoft has admitted that existing software will need to be recompiled before it can be run on the new console.

The problem, it says, is down to hardware incompatibility - since the current Xbox uses an Intel processor, but the 360 will use IBM's PowerPC architecture, while NVIDIA's graphics solution is being replaced with an ATI one.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=8996
As many commentators have pointed out over the last few months, this means backwards compatibility problems. The solution Microsoft has reached is apparently to recompiled current-gen Xbox games so that they can be played on the 360. First on the list, it says, are the best-selling Halo titles.

The news has raised more questions than it answers, however, as it suggests that gamers may need to purchase titles they already own in order to play them on an Xbox 360 - and almost certainly means that only a sub-set of Xbox games will ever be playable on the new console.

Sony and Nintendo have already confirmed that their next-gen consoles - the PS3 and Revolution - will play all the games in their respective back catalogues, offering consumers a huge choice of titles at launch. Microsoft was unavailable for comment at the time of writing.


ahahaha, that's pretty funny. "backwards compatible".... no, not really...

[KKS]

I wonder how PS3 is backward compatible with ps1 and ps2 games when microsoft has to go as far as recompiling the games?

Also i think they'll most probably let the users who already own the games mentioned download the 360 version.

[Z]

just like PS2, PS3 will be fully BC right out of the box. I was impressed when they said even PSOne is supported!
no extra kits, no extra expenses, no nothing. just plug and play baby! 8)

[*G*spot]

....no extra kits, no extra expenses, no nothing. just plug and play baby! 8)


Yes, that's real sweet 8) :wink:

[the legendary ice man]

I wonder how PS3 is backward compatible with ps1 and ps2 games when microsoft has to go as far as recompiling the games?

Sony have their input on the CELL design so obviously made that a feature./

Unlike MS who went from Intel P3 to an IBM PowerPC Core.

[Mordecaii]

The XBOX 360 will have limited BC, but it will not be through recompilation... rather, the 360 will use emulation to play old Xbox games. This was explained here: http://www.majornelson.com/2005/05/19/no-you-do-not-need-to-recompile-your-xbox-games. Apparently this guy has direct access to the higher-ups at MS. So, the 360 will be backwards compatible, but not with every game at first although apparently MS wants to get every Xbox game running on the 360.

[Rallyracr420]

That will be a relief for all the XBox owners out there. Sounds like what they'll be using is the same process UltraHLE used to get N64 roms to play on the PC. HLE stands for high level emulation. This applies because at the time UltraHLE came out the PC wasn't fast enough to fully emulate every opcode the N64 could process. Instead UltraHLE came up with a way to emulate the high level routines like N64_draw_triangle() by dynamically recompiling them to run the same texture data through openGL high level routines.

The X360 won't have enough horsepower to fully emulate a P3 and nVidia chip, but through dynamic recompiling (rewriting the code on the fly) emulation is very feasible. I imagine someone heard the buzzword 'recompile' and completely ignored 'dynamically' when this torrent of misinformation made its rounds.

[Coded-Dude]

Will gamers playing emulated/ported games on their 360 be able to seemlessly play with other online uses using their old xbox......this could be a potential disaster(bet we'll see)

[the_prophet]

Not sure if this was posted/mentioned before


Microsoft has agreed to pay NVIDIA a small royalty to ensure its Xbox 360 will be compatible with “most top selling Xbox games”, according to a report. Microsoft's next-gen console, which uses an ATI chipset, will need to emulate the performance of NVIDIA's chipset inside the original Xbox in order to run a "large percentage" of Xbox games:

Company management stated that the Xbox 360 would be backward compatible for “most top selling Xbox games”, and pledged “support “ for the current generation Xbox “well into 2006”. Two weeks ago, we noted our concern that the Xbox 360 may not be backward compatible with Xbox software due to a change in graphics processor chipset manufacturers from Nvidia to ATI. In a separate meeting with Microsoft management, we confirmed that the company has agreed to pay a small royalty to Nvidia to allow the Xbox 360’s ATI chipset to emulate the performance of the Nvidia chipset in reading certain Xbox games. For games written in a single layer (management assumes that this is a large percentage of Xbox games), the hardware emulation should perform well.

http://www.nforcershq.com/article3153.html

[Coded-Dude]

welcome to the forums! :wink:

Thats pretty interesting NEWS, I wonder what kind of bugs will arise due to emulation failures.
You know there will be some, especially if they don't even know which games will actually work! :?

[Lord Darkblade]

Woot I was mostly right! MS are paying again to Nvidia.... :P

[xbdestroya]

Hey I was right too. :wink:

I knew they wouldn't be able to work around this without NVIdia on one level or another.

[Viper]

I still want to know what is the cutoff point for "Top selling Xbox games"?

That could be very limiting in the BC total.

I'd also like to know how much they are paying because it was the contract with nVidia that caused MS to lose almost $4 billion dollars on Xbox.

[The_One]

I still want to know what is the cutoff point for "Top selling Xbox games"?

That could be very limiting in the BC total.

I'd also like to know how much they are paying because it was the contract with nVidia that caused MS to lose almost $4 billion dollars on Xbox. Well, 2 billion out of the 4 billion loss came from investing in XBox Live alone, so the actual loss due to the "bad contracting" with nVidia was probably not that much (perhaps in the hundred millions in total?)