13th June 2006, 8:17 PM
(This post was last modified: 14th June 2006, 12:34 AM by Dark Jaguar.)
BC=Backwards Compatibility
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3151454
Uh....huh...
Well, at least I can play Silent Hill 4 on it, I guess.
Not Silent Hill 2 mind you, but 4 (and 3 was never ported to XBox, annoyingly enough, as I would have liked Xbox level load times for that one too).
So let's see. Of the games I have, these are supported:
Jade Empire
Knights of the Old Republic
Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
Halo 1
Halo 2
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Fable: Lost Chapters
Ninja Gaiden Black
Silent Hill 4
And those that are not supported:
Silent Hill 2
Panzer Dragoon Orta
Prince of Persia: Warrior Within
Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones
Blinx 1
Marvel vs Capcom 2
Lord of the Rings: The Third Age
Mech Assault 1
Time Splitters 2
Shenmue 2
So yeah, that's about half and half. They better make "the rest of my list" work right.
I wonder how they'll make that one game with the GIGANTIC control center accessory you need to fully and "realistically" control a giant city smashing robot work? That was a game that was too rich for my blood anyway though.
Other than that, there's issues with games they "already made compatible", in terms of the odd skipping in movie files in a couple games, and the odd skipping in the game play in a few others. I wonder if they'll resolve those issues or if they consider those games "done" for good?
And there's the issue of letting the system's memory manager copy XBox game saves to memory cards, and letting the games actually SEE the memory cards (those that supported them) at that. Sure it'll be limited slots (two compaired to a maximum of 8 on the original), but they can just map the two built into the 360 to be the A slot on controllers 1 and 2, respectively (anything in "B" might mess up compatibility with the microphone since that was used in the B slot, and due to grooves could ONLY physically fit in that slot).
The last issue is one I REALLY wish they would resolve and I know exactly how they could do it. I want to COPY/MOVE ALL MY SAVED GAME FILES TO MY 360!
They can't do it with hardware. You can't use the original memory cards in a 360, and there's not a USB slot to be found on the original system, and the controller slots (both on the "breakaway cables and on the system) are incompatible. But, there's one compatibiliity, the networking cable. They don't have to waste bandwidth on XBox Live for this either (if that's the concern). It could support a direct network cable connection between the system (and one fellow needing to switch the video output back and forth between systems, or use two TVs, but I think a little uncomfortableness will be worth it).
The plan is simple, but it'll take adding the software support to BOTH system's OSes. You turn on your XBox, it updates it's software via XBox Live (the last update ever released for the old system), and a new option appears in the memory manager. When you select to "move" or "copy" a saved game, it gives a new selection, XBox 360. Select it and it'll see if one is connected (either directly or connected on the network via a router, both are supported already as I know by my experience with playing Halo 1). If it can't find one, it'll tell you it can't (and you get to play network doctor, but oh well). If it can, it'll "negotiate" with the XBox 360 (which you should also have updated on Live before you started this, because during it only one system will be able to be connected on one account at a time anyway) and send the data over. The 360, programmed to be able to connect with an XBox in this fassion (for security purposes, they should probably force you to confirm access on the 360 end (and also on the XBox end for sending the files the other way) and give you a system option to ignore such requests to prevent spamming of them over a network. (You see? I got it allll figured out.)
Once this is done, the XBox will send the file, The 360 will create the save on it's end, process over, everyone's happy, the day is saved.
One last thing. The XBox patch should resolve one little issue with Bioware (and a few other company's games) saved data. Namely, some just can't be moved, at all. It's not a memory card limit. I've seen files that are bigger than my XBox mem card max storage capacity, they STILL have a copy/move command. I'm talking Bioware's saves for both Jade Empire and Knights of the Old Republic that are flagged as "immovable". There's no reason for this flag! You can "cheat" by making as many backup saves as you want ANYWAY, and there's no chance of someone "stealing" the game by taking save files. I can understand why downloadable content can't be moved betwixt systems, some of that has to be paid for. I'm not expecting that because I can easily just redownload that content the second I play the game on the 360 anyway. Anyway, the patch should make it so that unless the saved data is one of those green checkmarked "downloadable content" items, it can always be copied and/or moved.
This should resolve all issues.
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3151454
Uh....huh...
Well, at least I can play Silent Hill 4 on it, I guess.
Not Silent Hill 2 mind you, but 4 (and 3 was never ported to XBox, annoyingly enough, as I would have liked Xbox level load times for that one too).
So let's see. Of the games I have, these are supported:
Jade Empire
Knights of the Old Republic
Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
Halo 1
Halo 2
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Fable: Lost Chapters
Ninja Gaiden Black
Silent Hill 4
And those that are not supported:
Silent Hill 2
Panzer Dragoon Orta
Prince of Persia: Warrior Within
Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones
Blinx 1
Marvel vs Capcom 2
Lord of the Rings: The Third Age
Mech Assault 1
Time Splitters 2
Shenmue 2
So yeah, that's about half and half. They better make "the rest of my list" work right.
I wonder how they'll make that one game with the GIGANTIC control center accessory you need to fully and "realistically" control a giant city smashing robot work? That was a game that was too rich for my blood anyway though.
Other than that, there's issues with games they "already made compatible", in terms of the odd skipping in movie files in a couple games, and the odd skipping in the game play in a few others. I wonder if they'll resolve those issues or if they consider those games "done" for good?
And there's the issue of letting the system's memory manager copy XBox game saves to memory cards, and letting the games actually SEE the memory cards (those that supported them) at that. Sure it'll be limited slots (two compaired to a maximum of 8 on the original), but they can just map the two built into the 360 to be the A slot on controllers 1 and 2, respectively (anything in "B" might mess up compatibility with the microphone since that was used in the B slot, and due to grooves could ONLY physically fit in that slot).
The last issue is one I REALLY wish they would resolve and I know exactly how they could do it. I want to COPY/MOVE ALL MY SAVED GAME FILES TO MY 360!
They can't do it with hardware. You can't use the original memory cards in a 360, and there's not a USB slot to be found on the original system, and the controller slots (both on the "breakaway cables and on the system) are incompatible. But, there's one compatibiliity, the networking cable. They don't have to waste bandwidth on XBox Live for this either (if that's the concern). It could support a direct network cable connection between the system (and one fellow needing to switch the video output back and forth between systems, or use two TVs, but I think a little uncomfortableness will be worth it).
The plan is simple, but it'll take adding the software support to BOTH system's OSes. You turn on your XBox, it updates it's software via XBox Live (the last update ever released for the old system), and a new option appears in the memory manager. When you select to "move" or "copy" a saved game, it gives a new selection, XBox 360. Select it and it'll see if one is connected (either directly or connected on the network via a router, both are supported already as I know by my experience with playing Halo 1). If it can't find one, it'll tell you it can't (and you get to play network doctor, but oh well). If it can, it'll "negotiate" with the XBox 360 (which you should also have updated on Live before you started this, because during it only one system will be able to be connected on one account at a time anyway) and send the data over. The 360, programmed to be able to connect with an XBox in this fassion (for security purposes, they should probably force you to confirm access on the 360 end (and also on the XBox end for sending the files the other way) and give you a system option to ignore such requests to prevent spamming of them over a network. (You see? I got it allll figured out.)
Once this is done, the XBox will send the file, The 360 will create the save on it's end, process over, everyone's happy, the day is saved.
One last thing. The XBox patch should resolve one little issue with Bioware (and a few other company's games) saved data. Namely, some just can't be moved, at all. It's not a memory card limit. I've seen files that are bigger than my XBox mem card max storage capacity, they STILL have a copy/move command. I'm talking Bioware's saves for both Jade Empire and Knights of the Old Republic that are flagged as "immovable". There's no reason for this flag! You can "cheat" by making as many backup saves as you want ANYWAY, and there's no chance of someone "stealing" the game by taking save files. I can understand why downloadable content can't be moved betwixt systems, some of that has to be paid for. I'm not expecting that because I can easily just redownload that content the second I play the game on the 360 anyway. Anyway, the patch should make it so that unless the saved data is one of those green checkmarked "downloadable content" items, it can always be copied and/or moved.
This should resolve all issues.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)