Some of your favorite OG Xbox titles may finally be available on PC, 26 years after they first hit the scene. It’s a move that makes the current-gen Xbox consoles seem even more like relics of a dying ecosystem. That’s because Xbox needs to bring its entire library, past and present, to a future PC-like console.
The backwards compatibility team at Xbox is first bringing four games, rolling out today, that you certainly remember from your days on the original Xbox: Fuzion Frenzy, BLiNX: The Time Sweeper, Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge, and Conker: Live and Reloaded. None of these games were ever made natively available on PC prior to now, at least without resorting to console emulation.
Coming to PC also means that these games will be compatible with Windows-based handhelds, like the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X or the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+. This Xbox Backward Compatibility on PC program will get an early release starting today through the Xbox app, though each game is also up for grabs if you have a Game Pass subscription. Previously, PC gamers could only play these original Xbox titles via Xbox Cloud Gaming.
Xbox is further promising it’s enhanced each title for PC, with customizable graphics settings, upgraded anti-aliasing, and upscaling for up to 4x from the OG Xbox’s native resolution of 480p. That doesn’t mean the games will necessarily support widescreens, but they may appear a little more crisp on modern monitors. Xbox said it also plans to add achievements to each original Xbox title in the coming months.
Will I enjoy the chance to play Conker again? You can bet your bottom dollar, considering just how much of an impact that game made on my youthful subconscious (and my all-too raunchy sense of humor). But the timing for this move is more important than the games themselves. Xbox is planning to completely reinvent its console platform with Project Helix. The next-gen console will act like a PC and run on a version of Windows. Xbox has promised current console titles and—likely—other marketplaces like Steam should be compatible with the future hardware.
Unless Xbox wants to use emulation through its PC app, like Nintendo does for its Classics collection on the Switch, then the company needs to port its games for the sake of Project Helix and—more broadly—the future of Xbox. Jason Ronald, the VP of the next-gen Xbox, wrote that “we expect our library of games to move forward with us and to be able to play them in entirely new ways.” He has a point there, considering how the vast majority of past games, close to 90%, are unavailable to purchase by any legal means, according to the Video Game History Foundation.
Xbox’s focus on game preservation is entirely welcome, even if it means you’ll have even less reason to use your current, far too expensive Xbox Series X. Project Helix will hope to abandon the failed current-gen consoles in favor of more open PC hardware. Now Xbox has to figure out how to deal with the whole disc dilemma, perhaps by letting users digitize their libraries to make them playable on PC through their Microsoft accounts, as previously reported by The Verge.
Read the full article here
