MI-80

I'm not sure how many of you are gamers, or how many own a XBOX 360, but if you do have you noticed how terrible the backwards compatibility is? Sony and Nintendo with their next generation offerings have given amazing backwards compatibility. The Nintendo Wii will work with Gamecube games, controllers, and memory cards. The Playstation 3 will play both PS1 and PS2 games. Both systems will feature downloadable games from older systems. I love this all. Why did Microsoft implement such shitty software support? Where as Sony and Nintendo will surely find and document a few games that don't work, Microsoft has taken the opposite approach. They have a very, very short list of original XBOX games which they've written software backwards compatibility support for. The result is that each game requires about a 10MB patch (the 360's hard drive has 12-14GB available upon opening), and you've got to have Live to get it. It also ensures that some games that are supported aren't perfect. Jade Empire has some missing textures that greatly detract from the gameplay for example. Furthermore some of my favorite games of all time, which sold well and got great reviews, don't have support on the 360! The Chronicles of Riddick and Psychonauts are two excellent examples. These are FANTATIC games. They're original, polished, and most importantly fun! But because they don't have Halo in the title they don't have support? This is a huge let down. I honestly wouldn't have gotten a 360 if I knew it was this bad. A full one half of my original titles do not work on the 360. It gets even worse. Microsoft appears to be pushing people to buy sequels by not supporting older titles. Burnout 3, Dead or Alive 2 Ultimate, and both the first and second Brothers in Arm's titles don't have support, and all of them have or are getting 360 sequels. These are only a few examples of a huge problem that I simply can not believe is by accident. I'm also pretty pissed hardware wise. The first XBOX used USB controllers, they were just jerry rigged to look special and unique. The 360 just has USB ports on it, so why can't I play Steel Battalion? It's a beautiful Mech game with a massive 40 button controller that I've invested $250 into, I AM keeping my original XBOX solely for that if nothing else. Sadly there appears to be plenty else to make me keep it. So I'm getting a PS3 and a Wii. And I'm likely never buying another Microsoft console. Good job Microsoft, you just killed the one product you sell which I was still willing to buy. Speaking of, I think I'm going to grab the old original XBOX and play some Chronicles of Riddick and Psychonauts. They beat the pants off most of the 360 games so far. Plus they don't lie to me (Peter Jackson's King Kong claims to have multiplayer on the back but doesn't, and Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Double Agent claims to have 1-3 player offline cooperative play but doesn't, but don't get me started on that...that's an entirely different and very, very bitter rant. I wouldn't have bought Double Agent if the back had been accurate.) The worst part is I feel stupid. I've been burnt by Microsoft so many times before on so many products, but I figured what the hell I'll give em a shot, and dammit if I didn't get burnt again. That's what I get for trying to be fair. The worst part is that this is all sheer greed. Microsoft won't profit from this. They'd gotten enough of the big name titles supported to where they can throw “Backwards Compatible!” on the 360's box with an asterisk. They've already sold you the original XBOX and the games, so where's the profit for giving these games 360 support? It's greedy, but then again much of the game industry is at this point. Look at how many sequels and rehashes Electronic Arts will be putting out this year, and how close their releases are getting. No longer does a sequel take 3-5 years, try 8-12 months. It's sad, and it's killing gaming.