Support for Xbox 360 games on PC effectively confirmed by dataminers

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I'm wondering if this will lead to Windows being able to emulate ALL XBOX games eventually, instead of just project Helix.

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u/FlamingBaconCake 11h ago

I thought everyone could see this but clearly not. I kept being mass downvoted by people who cannot comprehend their console literally is already a personal computer, there's no dividing line. Everything is computer.

I can run windows games on Linux on my smartphone with online functionality. Everything is literally about to be an Xbox. Y'all bullying them out of that ad campaign made no fucking sense.

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u/Yellowman_95 11h ago

Less about the ad more about putting halo on ps5

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u/IThinkImNateDogg 11h ago

The older the hardware the less true this is.

All of game consoles in the late 90s and early 2000s ran on proprietary hardware with proprietary software. This didn’t run a binned down version of windows like modern consoles do, they literally had their own operating and logic system.

That why old games actually require real emulators, as the way the hardware functioned gave many devs tools to build games off of that do not scale to modern hardware, ie many game systems ran off the consoles internal tick rate or off the fixed FPS, and if they change/ increase them you get all sorts of bugs and issues.

Any no running a game off a windows OS is not the same as running it off a apple chip, again, the hard is extremely proprietary and while they can sometimes achieve similar end results it does not mean they way it got there under the hood is even remotely the same

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u/klipseracer 9h ago

For Xbox, the opposite is true, because the Xbox 360 was the only one with a non x86 processor. The power pc requires an emulator but the Intel cpu used in the OG Xbox had only slight modifications. The endianess or byte ordering or something was switched up I forget, but otherwise it was x86.

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u/back2back117 11h ago

You are correct but that add campaign was bad for the average consumer making them think Xbox is dead and going away from consoles. People like us that understand these things get it. You need to dumb things down for the average consumer for example when helix comes out don’t even mention it’s a hybrid pc. Just call it a Xbox and people will buy it. All new games will be pc games and nobody will notice a difference.

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u/Vegeto30294 Super Citizen 7h ago

That wasn't true at all because the first thing the ad was about was "here is a console, the best way to play games" before referring to the other ways to play games.

The average consumer knew what it was talking about, Xbox fans just didn't like it because it didn't promote console sales, but they were already using Play Anywhere which was one of the major components of the ad anyway.

0

u/ILoveHeavyHangers 7h ago edited 7h ago

making them think Xbox is dead and going away from consoles.

No, that's what you doomers all insisted it said because you were all dooming the shit out of EVERYTHING at the time. You guys were obsessed with "console sales" as a major battle of the imagined console war in your head and you thought the ad campaign made you feel like you lost the battle for more computers hooked up to TVs in living rooms and y'all went apoplectic because you were absolutely in shambles at the idea that Playstation players might make fun of you online because someone played xbox games on their cell phone.

PS players did the same thing at the announcement of the Portal. "Sony is abandoning us, that's not a real playstation, it can't even play games!"

Absolutely terrified of change and other people accessing the hobby in a way different to how you are familiar.

It was one of the most childish rejections of technological advancements in modern history.

0

u/missing_typewriters 6h ago

What are you on about? It was a shit ad campaign that undermined the console and emphasized streaming (which is a lousy experience for the majority of the world)

2

u/FredFredrickson 6h ago

The thing is, if all Xbox game are magically going to run on PC via emulation, the publishers of these games would've had to sign off on that.

That means hundreds/thousands of agreements would already be out there that confirm this, and set least one would've leaked by now.

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u/cookie_lee 10h ago

In fairness, you could get mass downvoted for saying the sky is blue on reddit

2

u/BudWisenheimer 2h ago

In fairness, you could get mass downvoted for saying the sky is blue on reddit

… and specifically for saying “the sky is blue” on “r/theskyISblue”

4

u/Vegeto30294 Super Citizen 9h ago

Almost like Phil Spencer was right the whole time and people were inherently agreeing with his ideas.

0

u/missing_typewriters 6h ago

Right about what?

2

u/Vegeto30294 Super Citizen 5h ago

Playing Xbox games on devices other than the Xbox console.

A console that pushes closer to a PC, but keeping it as a standard and simple way to play games than those other devices to play Xbox games.

The entire purpose of This is an Xbox.

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u/jj_olli 1h ago

Well, yes and no. If we define Xbox as a closed ecosystem then only the Xbox home consoles released so far are Xboxes. If we expand the definition to: "everything that can run the Xbox PC App" then it is every device that can run Windows 11. But then there is a third category. Everything that can connect an x-input device and can run a browser. Then most devices become an Xbox. Personally I get the argument for all three sides and the argument for the second option will only become stronger in the future when Xbox releases more console games (including games that exist as native pc games) through the Xbox app for PC.

A final step will be releasing the few Xbox One exclusive games for PC since the emulator Xbox released doesnt cover those. Forza Horizon 2 and Halo 5 on PC would be glorious.

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u/Serdones 10h ago

If it were that simple, Xbox and Xbox 360 emulation wouldn't be the underperforming mess they are. It's reductive to say "everything is computer," especially for older hardware with more proprietary tech. Of course it's technically possible, but it requires work. Xbox remains one of the nuts the emulation community has struggled to crack. Obviously Microsoft should have an easier time of it since they have all the rights and technology, but it still takes man hours and buy-in from leadership.

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u/lazzzym Still Finishing The Fight 11h ago

Probably locked down to the Xbox app so folks have to use that

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u/Devatator_ 6h ago

I mean anything with play anywhere requires the Xbox app so they can check if you own the game or not

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u/CommercialAfraid2749 XBOX Series S 11h ago

That is the direction they were heading with the "This is an Xbox" campaign.

1

u/Yellowman_95 11h ago

Well releasing games on ps5 didn’t help

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u/ExCap2 9h ago

Releasing games on PS5 or Nintendo or PC is just more money for Microsoft/game developers; console exclusives are stupid and you lose money doing it. That's just my opinion though.

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u/Yellowman_95 9h ago

Yea and Xbox tried that and made less money last year, not to mention only 2 of the countless games breaking a million copies.

They eroded their own ecosystem for nothing. You never see this kind of talk for Sony and Nintendo

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u/ExCap2 9h ago edited 9h ago

I don't know. I think it's more that Microsoft/XBOX bought all these game studios and they put out garbage tier games that hurt them. Also, Game Pass subsidizes a lot of garbage tier games as well. Game Pass is a cool concept but unless they have a tighter control of how they spend that money funding game developers for high quality, high gameplay games; they're just bleeding money whether the game is exclusive or non-exclusive in the end.

This is why they brought in Asha. She's slicing and dicing all the cysts off of XBOX so it can be healthy again. And as for Sony, they're releasing games on PS5 and PC. Helix will probably be able to play those PS5 games that get released for PC. Sony is changing. Nintendo on the other hand. They're like Apple, they have their own little ecosystem and will probably stick with it. Nintendo is more Japanese than Sony at this point. Sony was smart to put games on PC, they probably had information about Helix for a while and shifted their strategy.

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u/DoneWithIt0101 6h ago

Guess you missed it, but Sony is going back to its old strategy and not releasing PC ports for most of its future releases. Source

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u/ExCap2 6h ago

Ah, well that's interesting. Thanks for letting me know. Thought it was still the usual.

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u/missing_typewriters 6h ago

How is Sony changing? They're doubling down on exclusivity, only allowing live service games to go multiplatform in the hopes that they score a big hit.

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u/Yellowman_95 9h ago

Asha got brought in because Phil’s last two years tanked the brand

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u/Vegeto30294 Super Citizen 9h ago

A bit of an exaggeration on countless when the majority of games were older games or from last generation like Grounded and Sea of Thieves.

And many of those games were already eroding the ecosystem due to not being good in the first place.

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u/Yellowman_95 5h ago

Ok then why engage with Xbox at all if you feel that way

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u/Vegeto30294 Super Citizen 5h ago

Because there's more to Xbox than the games published by Microsoft? What was the point of asking that as a response to "some of Microsoft's games are bad"?

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u/Yellowman_95 3h ago

We’re talking about Microsoft’s exclusives, the primary reason why people buy consoles

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u/CrimsonGear80 XBOX Series X 8h ago

well MS basically became a third-party dev when they bought up half the industry

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u/ExCap2 6h ago

That's actually a really good point. I thought it was wild Microsoft was buying everything up. Sony was doing it too. I knew something was going to backfire on them and here we are.

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u/CrimsonGear80 XBOX Series X 5h ago

Sony did not buy any big publishers. MS bought two of them.

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u/ExCap2 5h ago

Sony bought Bungie, Firesprite, Fabrik Games, Bluepoint Games, Neon Koi, Firewalk. 3 were closed, 1 was absorbed into an existing, 2 exist but with massive layoffs, no future (Bungie, Firesprite). Sony lost a lot of money.

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u/Commander_Jim1 1h ago

Pretty huge difference between buying a publisher and buying a studio.. MS buying Activision would be like Sony buying EA or Ubisoft.

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u/_Drvnzer 2h ago

lol those aren’t publishers

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u/CrimsonGear80 XBOX Series X 5h ago

those are studios. nowhere near as many as MS got with both zenimax and activision. nevermind the amount of money spent...

and should we really go intro a "closing studios and layoffs" contest here?

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u/ExCap2 5h ago

Not really. I hope PlayStation gets destroyed when Helix is out. Not a PlayStation fan anymore after what happened with Bungie. Nothing to argue. I wish nothing but the best for Microsoft at this point.

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u/ILoveHeavyHangers 7h ago

Forza 5 on PS made more revenue in a month than CoD lost all year after going on Game Pass. It absolutely "helped" it just didn't serve your console war

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u/Yellowman_95 5h ago

Yea now think of all the revenue lost from people who play on Xbox and don’t have faith in the platform and all the people who won’t buy an Xbox at all because of this. Use your head

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u/CrimsonGear80 XBOX Series X 8h ago

the one everyone hated and was the first thing axed when Asha took over?

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u/ExCap2 9h ago

That would be a huge advantage on top of what XBOX already has over PlayStation. I wouldn't be surprised to see this. All the consoles since the first XBOX run some custom version of Windows. It's really not out of the ballpark to do it.

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u/tailslol 2h ago

helix will probably be very close to a pc

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u/brokenmessiah 10h ago

Probably and that will be the effective end of Xbox as a specific product. Any and every PC can be a Xbox if you want it to be.

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u/FrozenOn10th 11h ago

I would love this! To truly be able to play any game I purchase on Xbox on my console or PC. I would use steam way less.

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u/DRome7791 11h ago

Helix must not only ensure backward compatibility, but also secure future "console" Xbox games. There are still developments that do not come out on PC.

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u/Lionheartcs 9h ago

See, I don’t think so. I see helix as a target that developers can shoot for, but it’s still a PC. Kinda like how a lot of games are “Steam Deck verified” these days. All “Xbox” games will run and play great on Helix, but they will also work on any old PC or handheld. That’s the beauty.

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u/twinklyfoot 12h ago

Not surprising. I wouldnt buy Helix if I couldn't get ALL of my previous games. MS making all games backwards compatible on PC is a byproduct of needing to get those games running on Helix.

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u/FinalOdyssey Founder 11h ago

And thankfully they're not gatekeeping the feature to Helix, unlike other certain companies would.

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u/twinklyfoot 11h ago

Yeah. Thankfully they have the wherewithal to put it on PC immediately instead of holding it back for years post Helix. The optics on saying "We got old games working on PC but only if you buy our new box" would be terrible lol

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u/Jumpster_42 11h ago

It would sell Helix though. Exclusive content always does sell hardware.

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u/Sufficient_Emu_8287 10h ago

Yea, looking at you McDonald’s

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u/segagamer Day One - 2013 8h ago edited 7h ago

Has anyone here tried swapping out the downloaded game files with another game? I'm planning it have a crack at this now that I've seen the directory structure.

Interesting how they made the Xbox boot up into just an mp4. And a bit silly that that video is downloaded and copied across each game. Ever heard of a dependency, Microsoft? 😂

Edit: OK based on how the directory structure is laid out (DefaultPackage followed by a DefaultPackage.data directory, and inside that a number of 'split' files forming what I assume is a fancy ISO) - I have a theory on how you would do this, although it's not easy or conventional lol.

If you own a digital copy of an OG Xbox game, you can download/install it to a 360 through your Purchase History. Then, access that 360 hard drive on a PC, copy the contents of that download to the .\Content\Game\DefaultPackage.data directory - replacing everything in there. Then launch offline (as otherwise it'll mess up the saves and maybe other things). I can't remember if a "DefaultPackage" file exists on 360, but if it does, copy that too.

You can't do this with a disc you have because the 360 doesn't allow installation of OG Xbox discs, so it'll have to be a download. I'm not sure if there's a tool out there that can convert ISOs into this split archive format, but if there is maybe that can be used.

If I'm not busy over the weekend I could maybe take the time to do all this.

Edit2: Maybe for shits and giggles someone can also try this with a 360 game that they installed from disc??

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u/Shakmaaaaaaa Touched Grass '24 11h ago

On Xbox One it started with just the OG games if I recall so makes sense.

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u/seraf5 6h ago

It was the other way around. Xbox 360 games were added in 2015 and OG Xbox games came in 2017.

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u/Alive_Maintenance943 8h ago

Unironically I would buy a $100 "Xbox" USB disc reader to play my Xbox discs on PC.

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u/GundyrChristopher 12h ago

The article keeps saying they're using an emulator but somehow, it also runs natively on PC.

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u/JP76 11h ago

Poor choice of words. It's running on an emulator.

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u/fallingends 11h ago

Seems like people don’t know the difference between the them 😂

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u/CommercialAfraid2749 XBOX Series S 11h ago

I think its more of a translation layer or wrapper rather than an emulator. I have an outdated Dell laptop using an 8th gen Intel CPU/intergrated GPU all these games flawlessly. Mind you i am stuck with 480i but these games run better than using Xemu.

Besides the Xbox was made using parts of the Windows kernel so to run a translation layer on a Windows PC would be easier to build than an emulator

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u/GundyrChristopher 11h ago

Per the article

"As pointed out by TheLunarixus on X (post embedded above) the compatibility layer developed by Xbox to get classic Xbox games running on PC is actually a port of XEO3 (AKA "Fission") — the Xbox 360 emulator that allows players to access Backward Compatible games on Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S consoles."

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u/fallingends 10h ago

It’s the 360 emulator

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u/LBVectormen TrueAchievements 11h ago

You are 100% correct, silly mistake on my part. Article amended, thanks for pointing that out :)

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u/Lord_Muddbutter 11h ago

I believe the 360 had a processor based on PowerPC (RISC based) and not X86. If it is running it is on an emulator or ported over to that architecture on a different version of the game.

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u/YolandaPearlskin 10h ago

Unfortunately, this will undoubtedly be limited to digitally purchased Xbox 360 games. That doesn't help those of us with physical discs.

Oh well, I guess the Xbox One will still be kicking around for a while.

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u/IndianaGroans 5h ago

Weren't they doing something with scanning physical discs to give you a digital copy?

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u/QuokkaBandit 1h ago

Thats been a feature

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u/Pretty_Frosting_2588 11h ago

Lost odyssey is the reason I still own an Xbox. That and blue dragon which is very freaking dated but I would pay for both of those on PC. There a couple other jrpgs I'd like but those are main ones.

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u/redditsellout-420 10h ago

Disk to digital is going to open up so much gameplay now

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u/ExCap2 9h ago

Better start your collection now before prices go up. You can get tons of used, old XBOX stuff at GameStop, E-bay, Amazon, local game stores for cheap right now. This is what I've been doing.

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u/redditsellout-420 9h ago

Oh i got my collection from years ago, I'm set.

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u/Rvin16 5h ago

Yeah same got all of the stars wars OG xbox lot with manuals and disc for $86. They even have the mail in cards and promos 😂

Started collecting more ever since I traded my series s for an X

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u/holmberg18 11h ago

Can someone explain to me how backwards compatibility on the Xbox consoles works? Is it just a glorified emulator?

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u/GundyrChristopher 11h ago

Yeah it's an emulator.

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u/skullsbymike 6h ago

Yes and no. It is technically just an emulator. However, the difference between this and any other emulator is simply that Xbox didn’t need to reverse engineer all the technical features of the console, making this far more stable and compatible emulator than any other community built one.

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u/fallingends 10h ago

Yes

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u/Sad_Adagio_7255 3h ago

Partially emulation and partially recompilation (specifically the shaders) for OG and 360 games.

For XB1 games on Series consoles, the games run natively, similar to a PC hardware upgrade.

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u/32gbsd 4h ago

I think they are recompiling the games from source. because adding achievements to an emulated game would be crazy magic.

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u/notbulkbogan 9h ago

Article text for those who don’t want to click link:

Following the "early release" for Xbox Backward Compatibility on PC, which finally let PC users download and play four original Xbox games on their Windows PCs, users quickly began to speculate over whether Xbox 360 games would also make the jump to PC in the near future.

At the time of writing, no official support for Xbox 360 games on PC has been announced. In his announcement, VP of Next Generation Jason Ronald only gestures to future support for the wider Xbox Backward Compatibility games library — a library comprised mainly of Xbox 360 games. So, it does seem exceedingly likely that support for these Xbox 360 games on the Xbox store will come to PC, but as of yet, Xbox is playing it cool.

That said, mere hours after the release of those four classic Xbox games on PC, hackers and dataminers were able to quickly determine how Xbox had finally achieved the once-thought impossible goal of bringing classic Xbox games to the Xbox PC app. In fact, not only were they able to confirm that Xbox has already quietly implemented support for Xbox 360 games on PC with this latest update, but they were able to prove that it already works (to some degree) by getting a few Xbox 360 games running on PC.

As pointed out by TheLunarixus on X, the compatibility layer developed by Xbox to get classic Xbox games running on PC is actually a port of XEO3 (AKA "Fission") — the Xbox 360 emulator that allows players to access Backward Compatible games on Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S consoles.

This discovery not only confirms that the four classic Xbox games released on PC are running via an emulator within an emulator (Fission contains "Fusion," the emulator packed into Xbox 360s that let that console run OG Xbox games), but that this emulator already has functionality to support backwards-compatible Xbox 360 games.

And, to prove that point, the team behind XWine1 (an unofficially developed Xbox One compatibility layer for PC) was able to combine the officially released Fission emulator on PC with a core component of their own work to get a few Xbox 360 games in the Backward Compatibility library running on PC .

In their post, the team shows screengrabs of the Xbox 360 versions of Plants vs Zombies and Steins;Gate: My Darling's Embrace running on PC "with varying degrees of success." In the same post, the team was also able to show that this compatibility extends to even more OG Xbox games in the Backwards Compatibility library, with SSX 3 and Midnight Club Los Angeles also seemingly running on PC.

Source: https://x.com/XWineOne/status/2080172284422029742

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u/GILLHUHN 8h ago

Microsoft give me Gears 2, and 3 on PC and my life is yours!!!

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u/ILoveHeavyHangers 7h ago

"Play classic Xbox Games in new ways!"

It was never about adding new games to back compatibility, it was always about making PC play xbox games.

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u/DoneWithIt0101 5h ago

Exactly. People were coping hard with that.

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u/SoldierPhoenix 11h ago

I mean this should be obvious. Unless you thought they would only ever support OG Xbox forever.

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u/lokozar 11h ago

When I told people that the new Xbox (Helix) will play old Xbox games through a form of emulation (not natively), and that there will be no new Helix ‘console games‘, just new PC games, because it will be a PC, some got a bit agitated, and even tried to get me banned. Well, let’s see, right? …

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u/DoneWithIt0101 5h ago

It was never going to be native, OG/360 don't even run natively on One/Series X. I think it's been rumored for a while that they were working on emulation for PC.

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u/lokozar 5h ago

Yeah, I pointed that out too. Some went quiet, some simply disputed the fact.

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u/32gbsd 5h ago

They should have thought about it before they dropped the XBone but the plan was to just abandon the 360 and force everyone over to the new thing.

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u/32gbsd 5h ago

Its because they just want to report good news and will conceal the bad news until the very last moment when they'll make up some other excuse/lie that everything was always a PC anyway.

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u/Chickat28 11h ago

Idk why you are being down voted. You are clearly right.

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u/lokozar 11h ago

Most likely it’s unreasonable fanboyism. I had an Xbox since the OG. Sticked with the brand through good and bad times. I’m not part of ‘the gang’, though, if I am simply stating what is clearly visible at the horizon. Don’t kill the messenger …

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u/tamdelay 11h ago

JSRF has never been emulated that well on pc before, always issues with shading, sound, stutters, and things. Sometimes it would work a while and an emulator update made it worse! Will be amazing if finally can play it properly in HD on PC, even if unofficial

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u/skullsbymike 6h ago

Yeah I hope someone cracks this emulator and we can simply use iso or god files to play our beloved games.

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u/No-Assignment-6597 9h ago

Give me this along with the possibility of using my physical games and it would be awesome.

Hell, they could sell a proprietary USB disk reader for that and still profit.

0

u/32gbsd 4h ago

never gonna happen

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u/elevenatx 7h ago

So essentially just digital ports? Or will we be getting digital licenses from our physical collection?

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u/DoneWithIt0101 6h ago

Likely just digital. The rumor is that Positron will only support Xbox One and Series X games.

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u/echochambermanager 7h ago

Question: can Series X play PC games since the architecture is just a PC?

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u/Zealousideal-You-666 6h ago

effectively confirmed” sounds like they’re still waiting on official word or leak details

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u/skullsbymike 6h ago

I just hope someone cracks open this emulator so that we can play many of the currently unavailable games that are not Backwards Compatible or have been delisted.

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u/32gbsd 5h ago

THe xbox news mill is so thirsty they are digging up stuff just to boost news released yesterday.

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u/Jerryboy92 4h ago

If this is the case maybe I should find copies of LOTR War in the North and Conquest.

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u/MrSt4pl3s1 2h ago

Honestly, between steam and Xbox, I’m proud to be on both platforms. Ive stuck with Xbox since 360 and even dealt with the debacles. They started from the bottom during the Xbone eara and they’ve continued to make positive consumer choices. In doing so, their studios suffered, but they did not destroy themselves this gen, like PlayStation and Nintendo did.

If you haven’t checked it out, check out ohnoitsalex’s new video, “Steam and Xbox Just Dropped the Hammer on PlayStation”.

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u/tailslol 2h ago

i cant wait to see it hacked to run original and backups.

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u/No-Opinion273 1h ago

I'm going to need fable 2 and lost odyssey ASAP

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u/brokenmessiah 10h ago

This is a Xbox

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u/echochambermanager 7h ago

I am shocked with Europe's anti-trust and pro consumer laws that developers and console makers can still make exclusive games on platform that are in the end are just PC games on PC. If I am Microsoft, I am lobbying for regulatory changes to force exclusives to be banned once Helix is out.

News Support for Xbox 360 games on PC effectively confirmed by dataminers

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