Here's What's Included In The Xbox November 2020 Update

I really like these new features, Especially the HDR feature..

Didn't know about this family settings for Xbox. I definitely need to research more about that as my son gets more into gaming. Need to find out if there is a way to enable voice chat, but only for people I've approved as his friends. He's got a few friends that play Minecraft/Roblox, and it'd be nice if he could talk to them (but not anyone else).

Adding my Wife to the console so she can help me out in Overcooked 2

So the "November" update is just mere hours away from being a December update, then.
That aside, looks decent enough. I was wondering when the next XSX update was coming.

Looking forward to the new dynamic backgrounds. Shame I don't have an S yet though. Waiting until I can walk into GAME and buy one, then carry it home in a Herons or Oops shopping bag.

Nearly 10 years later and they still haven't added back in local accounts so I don't have to set up an email address for my 7 year old so he can play on the Xbox as himself.

2 consoles later and we still don't have features the 360 had. 😔

I can tell when a game is using Auto HDR, because my TV switches to HDR mode. Dead giveaway, that. If XSX was always in HDR mode like the PS5 is this feature might make some sense.

All good looking features. Though the one I still really want is something to better monitor/manage quick resume. And, of course, also the quick resume update that makes it work with the games that disabled it.

@AJDarkstar PS5 could use it for HDR/non-HDR though since it switches out of HDR for non-HDR games.

"To make it easier to see which of your games have been optimized, we’ve added an 'X|S' badge to their tiles in My Games and Apps, in both the Games and Full Library views."

But those were there the day I got my Series X (10th November).

Where's the Series X goes to a black screen every time it gets turned on for the first time that day fix.

@NEStalgia that's the thing though, it doesn't. Check your TV settings in a non-HDR game, and you'll find it's still outputting an HDR signal. I checked after noticing there was no brief black screen to signify the change. Non-HDR games don't seem affected, but it is curious.

@AJDarkstar interesting. So they're just mapping the video into the full size header regardless. Sort of auto hdr, but instead of guessing where range values should be, it just sets everything to sd ranges.

Otoh I've noticed weirdness on ps5. Audio hiccups at moments on the short wire setup, and full dropouts on the long cable even with amplifiers in the chain. Xsx otoh doesnt have the drops. It did originally until i added more amplifiers on the wire in just after the consoles. Then xsx was fine. Ps5, still has too-often occasional drops and frequent audio hiccups. Even a fiber optic cable wasn't helping.

@NEStalgia seems to be the case with the SDR games, wonder whether you can still choose SDR or HDR in-game in RDR2. SDR still looks best.
Odd about the audio. I briefly had no audio on PS5, but put it down to the HDMI cable shifting slightly as I was trying to get the external drive working on one of the rear ports. Checked it was in properly, and the audio came back. Had two system crashes recently too, once after turning the system off without closing SM:MM first, and another after using rest mode to complete a download. I'd really hoped the last update had taken care of those silly errors, but nope.

Must be update day because I updated my Switch and I'm updating my X1!

@AJDarkstar I remember some controversy with rdr2 hdr. I don't remember what was wrong with it though. I didn't have an hdr display at the time.

It's not patched, so if the option was there before, it should still be there. But what was bad about hdr in it?

Maybe i should shimmy the cable in the back...i know it's not the rest of the cables on the one setup since xsx isn't having that particular issue... But the long cable run setup, both consoles were blinking out.... Boosters fixed xsx, but I'm mostly running yakuza there, and that's not hdr, so it's possible an hdr game would push the bandwidth like an ps5 is doing. I know on that setup both consoles have been wonky at times on it, so it's something about the length and signal chain still. I have a booster now after each console before the first switch and that fixed xsx, but not ps5. I put a booster between the 2 20ft runs from switch to switch....ps5 still intermittently drops. I tried expensive exotic fiber optic cable... No fix. I'll try another booster at the end of the line before the last switch, but if that isn't it, I'm out of options for that location i think. the weird one is the closer setup. It's only a 6ft cable from an ps5 to the final switch. No video drops, but occasional audio drop. I do have psvrV2 still on that chain though... Maybe that's related.

Heh, I've been using rest mode with mm running (no external hdd though) and it hasn't been particularly catastrophic, but I've had several system crashes while playing. Even after a full reboot....

Then again rest/instant on in xsx isn't that great either. I don't use it due to the fan running always, but occasionally i do for downloads. Yesterday i left it in instant on to dl borderlands 3 which bought on the sale. I started it up later and the controller went unresponsive for minutes at a time several times. Then when i went to fight shiv, the screen blacked, somet sounds played, and the system shut down. Happened in fh4 once too. Needs some Nintendo stability on both machines i think! (Then again my switch did a crash that shut down and wouldn't come back up again until some miracles happened during launch window with SF2. Seems like a launch tradition!

I just with they return the newsfeed of my closest gaming friends in the app. I loved seeing what activity they did and which achievements they got...

@NEStalgia RDR2's HDR forced SDR to HDR, making bright elements disproportionately bright. It wasn't proper HDR, so Rockstar just shouldn't have bothered. Rockstar patched in an alternate HDR mode that improved things somewhat, but SDR still looks best. I had an HDR set when I played and didn't realise it wasn't right at first. It was only when I switched it to SDR that I realised it looked better that way.
Could be the PSVR causing issues, I've heard they're a bit of a nuisance with regards to HDMI, but I have no experience with that, nor with daisy-chaining through so many things. There are so many places where it might be going wrong that troubleshooting it must be a right pain.
I've used rest mode on XSX without issue, just to complete downloads (which actually stopped downloading on my first attempt), no issues like the fan still running or anything. No crashes yet either, but brief flashes of either white or black on Gears Tactics loading screens. My PS5 crashed once on MM, just completely froze on the menu screen when I was checking skill points, etc. The system eventually reset itself and it was fine. But it definitely needs a good system update or ten, and MM needs some patching too.

@AJDarkstar That's so strange....it's not like HDR was new when they did RDR2 at that point, X and Pro had been out for a while and other games did it right by then. Bizzarre that one of the top budget games couldn't manage to fix it even in a patch.

PSVR1 is the famous one for being a pain....the breakout box didn't support HDMI 2.0, so no 4k or HDR support through it. The V2 box fixed that (excellent planning by Sony as usual where the left hand has no idea what the right foot is doing - see also PS5 PSVR support) But it's always possible it's not reacting to PS5 well. It's not the problem with the long cable run setup since I took it off on that setup, but the audio hiccups could be it (it certainly isn't cable length.)

And yeah, I never had a problem with the long cable run with the 1080p setup. I changed it all over in Sept when I upgraded to 4k/HDR and had tons of blackouts, both consoles. I tweaked and tweaked until I finally got stable output, using 1X and 4 Pro to test....but I wasn't playing for long durations, just 15 minute tests or so where it previously blacked out. But apparently I never got it right still. 4k60HDR doesn't love runs over 20ft....and worse with all the switches. But apparently, on PS5, even 4k30HDR isn't too happy. Which is weird...shouldn't it be using half the bandwidth? That shouldn't strain the bandwidth at all. Could be a wonky switch, they're all new and don't have problems with Nin Switch at 1080p though.

I think Borderlands 3 is a buggy mess on XSX right now. I tried it again. Shiv battle played fine, but upon victory it stalled for like 140 sec again before continuing normally - it seems like maybe it's problems with whatever online features it's tapping or something? Weird. It didn't crash to off, but I thought it was going to. Rest/instant on mode might not have been involved in that yesterday, after all. Seems borderlands goes crazy all by itself. Though I did manually run the OS update after that, so it could be something the big system patch fixed.

I've had a few weird XSX issues. The one seems to be OS level. It did it in borderlands, but also in FH4 and Yakuza sometimes, if you hit the Guide button and bring up the menu, then get out, then try to go back in, sometimes it just doesn't respond. The game inputs work, but it won't bring up the menu again...you can keep pressing, press and hold...nothing, it's as though you didn't hit it...then eventually the shutdown/reboot screen comes up like it finally recorded the presses as one long press. I've noticed that frequently. I've had 2 or 3 shutdown crashes. Borderlands, FH4....might have been one other. PS5 has crashed more. There's some noise in the audio over HDMI at times when the UI is displayed. Could be hardware interference. It doesn't affect gameplay. I had the machine the first week go REALLY weird after being in instant-on, then in eco mode for a few days...all sorts of things weren't responding and were acting weird. A true reboot was needed (apparently eco isn't truly causing a full reboot either....it's sort of in between instant-on and off, but it's still not rebooting when you restart. I bet it's doing a "quick resume" for the OS! - so if you have glitches requiring a reboot, eco mode won't fix it, you have to actually select "restart."

Both systems are showing some roughness for now. But XSX is mostly glitchy roughness with Windows-type software glitches, though that was before yesterday's OS patch. PS5 just feels incredibly unstable in general in the OS right now.

Makes sense, XSX is literally Win10 so it'll have all those annoying Windows bugs but is still a far more mature OS than PS5s. MM got a patch the other day, but I'm not sure what it did. It definitely didn't stop the crashing, that's for sure....

@NEStalgia I've found a weird bug with 360 BC. I'll occasionally pop out to the home screen and when I get back into my 360 game the color will go all sorts of trippy. I kinda wonder if it's related to the auto HDR. It's only done it a few times though. Twice with Banjo and once with FF13. But it just takes restarting the software to fix it.

@NEStalgia you'd think a company with the resources R* has could get it right, but there are 4k blu-ray discs blighted by bad HDR, notably Goodfellas, which is reportedly too dark, so I went with normal blu-ray. It could be R* fell into the same trap; whereas SDR can be optimised by computer, but HDR can't. It has to be done manually by someone with a good eye.
On PS5, have you disabled HDCP? If not, do so, it causes problems. Try disabling HDMI device link too. On XSX, if the option for better compatibility with older HDR TVs is still there and enabled, disable that too. I had trouble with that on X1S and it took me a while to figure out what was causing the brief signal losses (on FH4, oddly enough).
Odd that I still haven't had any XSX crashes yet, but mostly just been playing Gears Tactics. Considering it's basically the same OS as X1 you'd expect it to be more robust, but given this is Microsoft it's not surprising. I'm more baffled as to how the PS5 OS is such a buggy mess. It really shouldn't be this bad. And it's certainly possible its compatibility with PSVR isn't problem-free just yet. I was aware PSVR2 fixed the HDR pass through, but having not used it, wasn't sure whether there were other issues that might still persist. The different departments of Sony don't seem to work together at all. Indeed, Steve Jobs was baffled by the fact that Sony didn't beat Apple to the punch with iPod.

@AJDarkstar It's just amazing when a big company releases a top tier game at top budget and gets a major visual setting wrong....and then still doesn't fix it! This is the company that's had their trashy b-grade game be the top seller for almost a decade....

I haven't disabled HDCP....I'd tried that once on 4Pro when troubleshooting without effect. I thought it had to be on for...some feature other than video to work. But maybe not. I'll give it a try. I don't expect that's the problem in this case - if the signal is getting weak enough that HDCP is being renegotiated, the signal is weak enough that it's going to get dropped anyway, it might just make reestablishing the link faster when it blinks out without HDCP. I have noticed the 15ft cable does take longer than the 10ft cable to reestablish (longer as in, if I split the signal to both, the shorter cable is back up and running while the other one is still blacked out - same display model. Just 5ft can make that kind of difference.... HDMI REALLY sucks horribly.)

Haha, yeah, Windows is going to be Windows, and the bugs from X1 that never got ironed out just carried over. I expect the hard crashes are due more to driver failures for the hardware than the OS itself though. Windows-proper, since Vista, shifted to minidriver "plugins" explicitly to fix the problems with nVidia/ATI drivers crashing Windows over and over. That made life a lot better than the chronic BSOD era of 98 and XP but made a mess of drivers on Vista until they all got brought up to date. But I'm betting XBox, since it's standardized hardware, bypasses the minidriver (yes...the meme...the pun.... ), and goes straight to the hardware like Windows of old. Makes sense, but also brings back the old BSOD games until AMD gets their drivers ironed out for the new hardware.

PS5 being a buggy mess makes sense. They reinvent the wheel every time, and system software has never been Sony's strong point (their DVD players and VCRs were always a total mess, and every one was unique...) It's inconceivable how Sony can be so disconnected internally. They operate like a telecom carrier, it seems. The fact that the monolith was designed by a designer in complete absence of any hardware information as to what the housing was being designed for is rediculous. Who says "you, over there, design me a chassis for custom electronics" and when he comes up with a design says "oh, that's just too huge for the hardware" - how is the chassis not designed for the hardware rather than having one team design hardware, another team design chassis, and when they're both done put them together and say "sure I guess it fits!"? They ultimately make a decent console, and decent games, and decent batteries that only explode some of the time, but it baffles me how they can actually turn a profit at all with how clueless uncoordinated they appear to be.

@Kefka2589 Yeah, that sounds AutoHDR related, probably. I haven't tried any 360 BC games yet on the XSX, though FF13 trilogy is on the list to get back to!

@NEStalgia FF13 is so far the best One X Enhanced title I've laid eyes on. It easily looks better than even a large majority of last gen games, especially with the auto HDR. I liked the game when I was younger, but as an adult replaying it, I really think it caught way too much flak. I'm nearly to "disc 3" and so far I can't put it down. To boot, MS apparently went the extra mile and SE even helped them out and replaced the crummy compressed 720p FMVs with 1080p source videos. So every aspect of it feels fresh and new. Gamestop sells used copies for $2.99 nowadays, and I somehow lucked into a really nice copy. Now to get the other two!

@Kefka2589 Oh yeah, I haven't tried it with Auto HDR yet. I should do that! That's a game that definitely should benefit from it.

I was so hyped when they announced that series at XO18 I bought the whole trilogy the next day digitally at full price. And then like 3 days later they cut the price in half for Black Friday.

I played it at launch on PS3, super hyped, and was among those woefully dissappointed. It's actually a really good game, and I'd say the fact that there's fixed numbers of enemies, it has the most strategic combat of any FF game - everyone reaches every enemy at the same level, after all. But it's not what any of us expected from a new FF at the time. And Snow is freaking annoying. Wesley Crusher Hope is obnoxious, and Lolli...err...Vanille is a painful trope. But they kind of grow on you the second time around. I have to get back to that and play through again and really get into the two sequels. I played the first part of both sequels. IMO they actually fixed most of what felt wrong about the base game and make some really great FF games. Plus Snow, and even Hope unexpectedly become cool. Definitely one of the best "Xbox exclusives" I have to revisit.

Also, if you want a real treat with 1X enhancement, and I haven't even tried auto HDR, try the original Assassin's Creed. IT was the best in the series anyway...and looks absolutely new on 1X/SXS. It uses the PC textures and seems entirely modern as a result.

@NEStalgia this is the same R* that relies on P2P connections for GTAO, mind, so it shouldn't be too surprising.
HDMI is weird in how it really won't carry well over long distances, considering it's a digital signal. My longest cable is 3 metres, for occasionally connecting the laptop to the TV, and works without issue.
I don't get why Sony didn't just use a modified version of the PS4 OS for PS5. They use a Unix-based OS anyway, which is at least more reliable than Windows, and you'd think they knew enough by now to iron out such ridiculous bugs for a console launch. They could easily afford to hire a few decent coders. But as you said with the whole chassis thing, they do things a very weird way. They really should get things together. Hiring Mark Cerny is one of the smartest things they ever did, they just need a few more like him to get the company sorted out.

@Kefka2589 I have the FFXIII trilogy on my Xbox wishlist. Had XIII & XIII-2 on PS3 but sold them years ago. Didn't pull the trigger when they arrived via BC on sale. Perhaps next sale, but it's been a while now.

@NEStalgia In a sense, I feel like a lot FF13's cast was deeply inspired by prior entries. Lightning is Cloud, Sazh is Barrett, Vanille is Selphie, Snow is Zell, and Hope reminds me a lot of Tidus. I often feel like sometimes FF characters are supposed to be literally unlikeable at first, as a mechanic to allow the character to grow throughout the plot. But I'd go out of my way to say that I really don't dislike any of the cast. I don't think they're any more or less annoying than the cast of 7, 8 or 10. But I also love how tactical the combat is in 13. The stagger system has it's flaws, but it was definitely the prototype for a newer style of ATB system, that I think they've gotten more worked out at this point. The biggest gripe I remember I think was really the linearity of 13, which was no doubt a direct response to 12 being way too different, and production constraints. So they reverted back to a more FFXish formula and people still weren't happy xD. Which really isn't bothering me now because I forgot how much I like the plot in this game. I played 13-2 and remember liking it pretty well, but God the overtime those poor programmers surely had to pull to modify Crystal Tools to accommodate the combat system of 13-2 and Lightning Returns. Which, those are both on my list to scoop up, but first I've gotta lay hands on Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey.
I really would treat these X Enhanced titles as a proper exclusive. For all intent and purpose they're "remasters" of games people wanted remastered that we never really got. They really feel like new games after the love they've been given.

And I'll nab up AC1 when I see it. I'm sure I can buy a copy for less than a cup of coffee these days. I miss when Assassin's Creed was actually Assassin's Creed. Not that the newer entries are bad games, but somehow I feel Valhalla would have been an even better game if they forgot that Assassin's and the Animus were a thing.

@AJDarkstar I looked up the sale history for these games and from what I can tell they hadn't been on sale on the xbox store even once this year. Nor have a lot of the other desirable BC JRPGs. So I'm resorting to the physical route since it's actually cheaper.

@Kefka2589 If Microsoft charged $70 for FFXIII Remastered (Console exclusive) the internet would praise Xbox's great library!

And yeah, AC1 was AC. AC2 started going off the rails but was still AC. Then after that Jade Raymond left and the series went off the rails and became UbiSandbox Creed. They're good games. But they have little to do with AC beyond the aesthetic and some shoehorned Templar story.

@AJDarkstar True. Then again, it's only GTA....it's not like latency...or connection stability matters much

HDMI is a trainwreck. Always was, from day 1. It's a video transmission format designed by lawyers based not on it's effectiveness for transmission but on it's DRM. And then it has the silly versioning that isn't really backward compatible but they pretend it is. And then they keep compromising it by shoving more data through it endlessly. The fact that anyone had to invent "fiber optic converters embedded in the cable ends" to work around the horrendous UHF attenuation problems is the clearest sign of a total failure I can think of. 2.1 shouldn't be trying to re-use this stuff. It should be a new format. 4 twisted pairs just can't shove 48Gbps through them like that....we're ending up with like 8foot real world limits on cables with 2.1. That defeats the whole point of cabling. It's ultimately an analogue transmission of a digital format, which was never smart. For 1080p it was ok, you could hit 35ft or so with no problem. 2.0 never should have happened. It should have started a new format at that point.

Sony hates doing the same thing twice...they want each thing to be a clean break from the thing before it. It scores marketing points....but the engineering demonstrates why it's a bad idea. But Sony's always been weird. Minidisc, Betamax, UMD, SACD. They've always done things odd ways. Usually to their own detriment outside PS though.

@NEStalgia I pretty much fell out of UbiSandbox Creed after 4. 4 was a great game, but god every second I spent in the Abstergo building was unbearable. Lol

That's a weird thing about Sony. They excel in the gaming division but they seem like they really struggle with a lot of their other products. I feel like when I was a kid we had all kinds of Sony devices. But ever since their Korean neighbors really turned up the heat, I don't really own much of anything from Sony anymore. Outside of my PS4 and I think a bluetooth speaker? It's kind of a shame really. That new Xperia 5 II looks like a killer phone. But I don't expect it to be much more than a niche item.

@Kefka2589 Oh, yeah, back in the 70's and 80's Sony was THE electronics company. Somewhere along the way they screwed up badly. They went premium and started pricing themselves out of the market, doubling down on smaller and smaller niches. And then those Korean giants just wiped the floor with them. Truthfully, Sony would have gone bankrupt before PS4 went big had Japan not had a state policy of funding their national treasure companies. They pretty much failed on the electronics front. Which is a shame. They had good stuff...but then they just tried to see themselves as a lifestyle brand that could charge any price. They're still a name in TVs and low-end audio. Cameras through buying out Konica-Minolta (and then going niche with it.) But that's about it. They do have a lot of niche industries they're in though. Chips and batteries, displays, etc.

Even in the 90's I remember walking into Sears and you could get a nice feature loaded VCR from Magnavox, or RCA, or Toshiba, or a half dozen other companies, all good ones, for like $95-120. The comparable Sony unit would be sitting on the other shelf for like $247. Just because it's a Sony.... (And probably because they were bitter about VHS eating Betamax alive )

@NEStalgia I honestly had no idea Japan had funding like that. That's interesting. I don't think a lot of people truly don't realize how financially catastrophic the PS3 days were. They see how many units shipped and that it was a hair more than the 360 and proclaim victory. But by the time those 2013 financials came out, they were in dire straights. Of course their electronics business steadily declined over the years, but the PS3 following the success of the PS2 was essentially a head dive first from the highest building. Which I love the PS3, warts and all. And thanks to people like Kaz Hirai they lived to fight another day. Along with them actually listening to Mark Cerny and engineering a console built on x86 that didn;t have developers yanking their hair out. The Cell was neat, but power isn't very useful if it's bordering on untamable. Don Mattrick probably did them some favors too. xD

@Kefka2589 Yeah the short of it is that Japan doesn't allow big Japanese companies to go bankrupt if they're deemed important. There's a scary reality that a LOT of Japanese corporations are really state subsidized and are otherwise operating from the red and fully insolvent.

Then again in the States we don't officially subsidize - we just have quiet backdoor taxpayer money shuffles..... I bet half of the NYC financial firms have been in the red since the 80s. So the only real difference is Japan is honest. Because Japan. We lie through our teeth while the public exists to funnel their wealth into corporations.

But yeah, the Sony fandom loves the units shipped figure. Sony always wins the war! They may have leaked money like it was uraniaum at Fukushima, but it doesn't matter, they moved more units! Even when Sony themselves openly said it was so bad they'd have shut down PS if PS4 didn't take off (and MS would have shut down XB if Phil didn't sweet talk Nadella after X1 didn't take off.)

Hirai single-handedly saved Sony. Between PS and Sony Pictures, their money makers were in the toilet, they were selling off real estate like it was candy.....it was bad. Real bad. Hirai turned it around...and then inexplicably walked out. ahem. "retired." Well, ok, Don Matrick single handedly saved Sony. Hirai helped a bit though. If X1 hit the ground strong instead of dying at E3 before preorders opened, Sony would have been done with PS, almost guaranteed.

@NEStalgia Nadella was probably best thing that ever happened to MS. It's safe to say that Steve Ballmer was not on his A game there toward the end. That guy has done for MS what Phil has done for Xbox. Bill is really fortunate to have executives like those guys around.

I'm absolutely convinced that had Mattrick not basically internally sabotaged the Xbox One the future of the PS4 would have been a lot different. But that's the past of course. The tide of the gaming industry has never been higher and I'm pretty optimistic that no player currently is poised to do poorly. Which is certainly a nice change from the last two generations. We've seen too many flops or near flops to last us for a while.

@Kefka2589 I've considered picking them up cheap from CEX perhaps, but I'm in no rush. BC stuff rarely seems to go on sale; only recently has MGS HD gone on sale, but without Peace Walker I'm not so sure. If I can find a TV unit with a bit more space I'd probably hook my PS3 up again, though my controllers don't hold a charge anymore. Could possibly just use my DualSense or get another. I hope Sony is secretly beavering away on PS1-3 BC on PS5, but I doubt it.

@NEStalgia I've never had any such HDMI issues, but I haven't tried to do anything particularly ambitious with them. I'm sure there must have been a smarter approach to HDMI 2.0 that could have supported more data without doing so in such a ridiculous way. I must admit, I've never heard anything about HDMI being an analogue transmission of digital data - everything I've ever read about it says it's purely digital, with no signal conversion (or anything like it) being necessary. Unless you just mean that the reduction in effective transmission over longer cables is akin to how it was in the analogue days? I would say perhaps HDMI needs to be more like USB, which seems to work fine with its own backwards compatibility, but dang it if they haven't made a right mess of the numbering system in USB 3.

And yeah... Sony just gotta be Sony.

@AJDarkstar I thought it was weird that it's like that on the shop. But 2 and 3 came on one disc and Peacewalker was on a seperate disc. So I guess that caused them to get split up digitally, which makes sense. I can find physical copies online for $15ish. So those are def worth it. The 9.99 for 2 and 3 was tempting, but I can't see that Peace Walker has been on sale this year, so I'm not messing with those.

RPCS3 is all the proof I need that PS3 emulation is completely possible. Publishers surely have to make some decent money off of their BC games MS sells, I would think anyway. I think EA Play on Xbox is really great example of why BC matters. I think the service on Xbox is fantastic, but it's a bit lackluster on PS imo. There just isn't as much selection. It's nice to be able to have all those old Bioware titles and stuff on there. But, I'd say you are placing your doubt in the right place. I don't see Sony backpeddling much on their BC commitments. Which really bums me out.

@Kefka2589 Yeah, I saw the games were split that way on 360. Peace Walker doesn't even work on BC by the look of it, which is very strange. If it did, I might pick up a physical copy. The fact that Konami didn't release a PS4 compilation along with Twin Snakes and Guns of the Patriots is also baffling.
I wish I'd known years ago that Sony would drop BC going into PS4, and MS would eventually support it much more. Would have bought more multiplats on 360.
I can totally see how the PS4 CPU couldn't emulate the ridiculous architecture of the Cell processor, but I'd be amazed if the Zen 2 couldn't do it. I'm only hopeful because of the leaked info regarding older BC texture improvements, and the fact that MS lied about X1 BC for so long before finally unveiling it. The PS5 may well contain a similar chip to the one on the X1 mobo, allowing PS1-3 compatibility. But such hopefulness is rarely rewarded.

@AJDarkstar Peacewalker does. For whatever reason it's listed really oddly in the store. Its literally "MGS PW HD". No idea who came up with that brilliant title, but it's hard to find. But the whole HD Collection works and I'm pretty sure is all One X enhanced.

Yeah, there's no way that Jaguar could have pulled it off, but the hardware in the PS5 could absolutely demolish it. Far lesser PCs can run enhanced patched PS3 games in RPCS3 now. Killzone 3 with upped resolution at 60fps is really a sight to behold. The thing is, MS has sank so many man hours into BC. I really don't know if Sony is going to make that commitment. As we get further into this gen and MS really gets cranking with adding more titles to BC now that Series X is done and in the wild, I think BC is really going to be a secret sauce for them. The average gamer is in their 30s. So I'm sure there's plenty of demand for these games, especially if they're coming with modern enhancements. As far as I see it every BC title I can play on my XSX that I can't on a PS5 is a Series X exclusive in my book. Like you mentioned, my TV stand is also jam packed. So dragging out the old consoles without the modern bells and whistles to play older titles just isn't as luxurious as what the XSX offers.

@Kefka2589 interesting. I didn't see it on the official BC list, only 2&3, and neither showed on the X enhanced list, but I noticed a few other games missing from those lists too. I wish all 360 games ran at 4k on XSX, GTA4 looks so ugly despite running at a silky smooth 60fps. Given how that reportedly breaks the final mission, I'd much prefer 4k30. I should check whether the options each game offered on 1X exist on XSX.

@AJDarkstar Ah yeah, they aren't One X enhanced. I couldn't remember for sure. The list might need tweaked a bit then, because Peacewalker 100% is compatible. It wasn't at first when 2 & 3 were and they added it later. It's listed on the store as Xbone and SeriesXS.
And yeah, 4K or at least 1080 or above on all of them would be really nice, but that seems... Complicated. GTA4 definitely deserves a One X enhancement. Because as it stands it doesn't really preform better, it just runs faster, and in this case that isn't good. But it seems like the minority as far as BC goes, it's just a shame it's that one and not something else. But now that they've got the XSX pretty well straightened out, the BC team is supposed to be getting back to work on more games. So there's plenty more to come I'm sure. The way Jason Ronald has worded it makes it seem like MS themselves are working on a ton of 60fps patches for Xbone games, FO4 being one. I need Skyrim in 60fps in a really bad way. You can use that mod, but it disables achievements, so boo.

@Kefka2589 yeah, I'm curious to see what the BC team does next. Still so many OG and 360 games I'd love to see make the jump. Really curious about the enhanced updates for X1 games too, PS5 is doing that too but possibly not on the same scale. Days Gone runs at 4k60, for example. But support for older games would be appreciated. I have Skyrim on PS4, which runs at 4k30, which is fine for me, as hopefully the extra power will help smooth out the odd frame drop (Borderlands GOTY on PS4 has no screen tearing at last on PS5, too, which is a bonus). It'll be interesting to see how this gen plays out with regards to BC, considering both companies have put a lot of effort into it.
I found Peace Walker on Xbox.com, and like you said it advertises forwards compatibility with the new consoles, it's just really cheeky how the package was split up to be sold at a higher price digitally.

@AJDarkstar I wouldn't say it's quite cheeky, the way the physical copies install wouldn't have worked without them being separated. When you put a 360 disc in it simply downloads the digital version from the marketplace. So it surely was a result of the system needing to detect the disc to acknowledge the license. If both physical disks could access all three games you could essentially separate one physical HD collection and have two copies of the game. But really, you could buy all three for $25 right now. Considering the pedigree of those games they're being pretty reasonable, I think.

@Kefka2589 in theory you could do that with any multi-disc game, like Rage, Mass Effect 2&3, etc. The GOTY versions of Fallout 3 & NV only require the expansion discs to be inserted to play, so you could share the vanilla games with someone. Bioshock Collection came on two discs, but buying the digital version gets you the content of both discs; only later were the three games made available separately. They've taken a collection that was sold as a single purchase and made it two for no reason besides greed. At the very least they could offer a complete version. They could still offer that and require either disc for whichever game you're playing, as with Bioshock. Over on PS3 the games all came on a single disc, and if you sub to PS Now, they're still available in that single package. It's very unusual to do this sort of thing.

@NEStalgia I work for a unspecified bank back in the day. And the Government asked us to purchase one of the failing financial businesses because they didn’t want another Enron. They gave us money as well to do this. The hilarious thing is that my position was fairly entry level but everyone knew what was going on. Yeah, it happens here to. (We sold it as soon as we could but at least the people didn’t lose their savings. )

P.S. the whole reason I got back into X box after Mattrick was FF XIII BC. O.O to me it’s the Xbox of Final Fantasys; everyone likes to rag on it but there is some incredible mechanics to it.

@AJDarkstar I'm honestly not 100% sure about that. I have FO3 GOTY and I had to put disc 2 in to download the addons from the store and I have to have disc 1 in to launch the game. Same with FF13. It will only launch with disc 1 inserted. The Metal Gear Solid games weren't really multi disk games per say. 2 & 3 where just bundled on one together, and Peace Walker stood alone on another. So the disk images exist that way, and that's what you are basically downloading from the store. So even if they were bundled you would still be buying two separate titles. Kinda like the Bethesda bundles with Skyrim and FO4 GOTY.

@mousieone LOL on both fronts. That's just depressing how we're a full-on Socialist Utopia masquerading as a free market....even if I already knew it

And also the BC. Over on Push Square there's devs (that may or may not be Sony employed currently, and was apparently once MS employed) going on about how BC has no value, the data shows few people ever use it, they download games and play them for five minutes but never run them and it all exists as good PR and marketing but has no real value in the market and every company knows it - time moves on, #dealwithit. And here we have you saying you bought XBox Specifically for a BC series for a series that everyone claimed to hate It's a fun dichotomy here.

@NEStalgia Backwards compatibility was my main motivating factor for wanting an Xbox. Then you know, I got both consoles and I was really quick to eject one from my home. How could Sony even have any real data on BC? They haven't really offered it in a console since the 80gb launched in 2008. Are they trying to say that 70% of the PSNow library is just dumpy PS3 games that no one really wants to play? Or do they not realize if those PS3 games were installable and actually playable that PSNow would probably have a lot more subscribers?

@NEStalgia pfft statistics are manipulatable. If no one buys old games then why is Mario All Stars a thing? A sought after thing actually. I mean it’s no extra bells or whistles just a bunch of old Mario games, it’s emulated, and it selling fine. Kind of makes you wonder about that “old games don’t sell” tag line.

Truth is Remasters often sell pretty well to. (They can not but oft times they find new users) look at the Bioshock collection? FF games on the Switch? It really just depends on the game (and price) in my opinion. Of course, no one is going to buy pretty pretty princess remaster but a classic sure. And now with the advent of better software/hardware a lot of things can be done without the devs lifting a finger. X enhancements coupled now Auto HDR, and better hardware, are making remasters of these games, so all the publishers have to do is set the price. And I’m pretty sure the BC team has some more auto tech up their sleeves like that double frame rate they are trying.

Speaking of FF XIII it rarely goes on sale in the digital store, why is that? Square Enix just forgot or is it because it’s actually making money at that price point. I have a feeling it’s a bit of both.

@Kefka2589 All of the above

Yeah I wondered where all that data that he, and Jim Ryan were talking about came from. If it's PS Now, they'd have to know that PS Now is the problem, not BC. It's not from PS3's PS2 BC because that wasn't even an online essential console. Maybe he's talking industry data from publishers looking at XBox data. But whether the game in question is played much BC depends on what the game is, and if the game also has a remaster out there. And are we talking about Western pubs like EA games, or things like JRPGs that are timeless and rarely remastered?

I always go on the defensive whenever I hear anyone settle on "the data proves X" - Data can prove anything you want it to prove, you just have to get a data sample that confirms it.

The guy over on PS I believe works both 1st party and for the Sony side of a multiplat AAA currently. It sounds like he also worked at MS at one point (and really disliked their product and work environment) - but that also sounds like it was some years ago at the end of the Matrick, early Phil era and may be a somewhat out of date viewpoint given all the recent changes at XB. He's also said that they internally acknowledge Game Pass loses money - but that's a narrow view of "loses" - if that was back when there were few subscribers, of course it did. And even if it still does, a direct loss on one business venture that generates gains across others is only a paper loss. The activity expense generates revenue overall (I.E. leading to more unit sales hardware, unit sales software, subs, etc.)

I like the guy, he has a lot of good insight, but he does have an unusually strong anti-MS, pro-Sony bias, in fairness probably earned by being an employee under Matrick (I'm assuming), that kind of ends up leading some conversations into an appeal to authority that since he's an experienced industry figure, anything he says is simply indisputable fact backed up by statistics. Debate is more or less cut off because he has the data and the inside view and nobody else does. You can't argue against data you don't have access to using data you can't have access to. I don't think he means ill, he seems like an upstanding, friendly guy, and a good POV to have. But the conversations kind of inadvertently go that way. It gives it a Polygon or Rockpapershotgun vibe at times....

@mousieone Yeah, the automation of BC is such a huge win. The manual effort has always been the bottleneck...why would a publisher put a bunch of effort into bug fixing ancient games like new? But to automate it is free money (unless it takes money from new games.)

That's odd. XIII went on sale right after it launched (and right after I paid full price) - I've seen it a few times maybe a year and a half or so ago....but you're right, I haven't seen it since. I assume it's actually making money. It's the only modern console to buy the FFXIII trilogy on. And probably the only one it will ever be on unless PS Now streaming counts. Nobody's going to port Crystal Tools, ever, since those 3 games are the only ones using it, and they're not the most popular games... (XIV Online used Crystal Tools but they rewrote the entire thing for UE with Realm Reborn.)

@NEStalgia Lol Yeah, remember when Jim said lesser hardware configurations aren't successful? He seems to find whatever data he needs whenever he needs it. Because right now, the Series S doesn't seem to agree with him. But I know the fella you are talking about, and I agree. I genuinely like that guy, but your assessment is pretty much on point. It can be tough to get a word in. But I'm a financial accountant by day, so every time I hear someone talking about Game Pass losing money, I'm just sorta like, "Okay? What's your point?" The Xbox division's revenue is way up, like other companies gaming divisions. People fail to grasp the difference between losing money and investing. You've gotta spend money to make money. Look at fast food joints. Dollar menus, app coupons, and LTOs are always loss leaders. But they push those things like crazy. That small loss is worth it to get them in the door. At the end of the day, it's all just tribal mentality. The loudest members of one tribe love to see the other fail. It genuinely blows my mind how cynical the gaming community has become.

@Kefka2589 New Vegas will only let you access the add-ons if you insert disc 2 to play. If you insert disc 1, it warns you that the add-ons can't be played, and that it might mess with your save file if you continue.

@AJDarkstar Hmm that's strange. Maybe I am thinking disc 2 on my FO3? I'll have to check because now I'm curious. But the one's with the DLC disc's do seem to be the real troublemakers though. I couldn't hardly figure out how to get the FO3 DLC to install at first. Then I popped over to the store and I had the option to download it all or buy it. So the disc definitely lets the system acknowledge a sort of license for what is ultimately just a digital copy. Kinda like upgrading a physical PS4 game to a digital PS5 copy, but needing a PS4 disc to play it. Which is neat, but there's surely some loopholes to be found.

@Kefka2589 yeah, confused me at first too. Not the simplest of systems. These things often end up being unexpectedly awkward.

@AJDarkstar I checked on FO3. You're right there. Disc 1 will tell me it'll corrupt my save. I was thinking of RDR1. Disc 1 is RDR1 and disc 2 is exclusively Undead Nightmare. If you try to flip flop them it'll just tell ya to take a hike.

@Kefka2589 ahh, I see. I only have the single disc version of RDR, I bought Undead Nightmare as DLC. I finally finished RDR1 on X1S after finishing RDR2, started Undead but didn't get that far. Will get to it when I find time, it looks so nice in 4k on XSX.