There are now games from the original Xbox available to play on the Xbox One

1 months ago

The imminent arrival of the Xbox One X is undoubtedly the biggest gaming release still to come in 2017, but it’s not the only good news for Xbox owners.

Gamers tend to be a nostalgic bunch, with memories of classic titles on obsolete consoles elevating those games to the same level as even the best new releases.

Now, thanks to the Xbox One’s backward compatibility, a whole host of games from the first ever Xbox are playable on Microsoft’s latest console.

Titles including Black – the EA first-person shooter that was lauded as having the best graphics for a game of its kind at the time of its release – are available to download from the Xbox Games Store.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, Dead to Rights and Red Faction II are just a few of the 13 games now playable. They can even be accessed via the original Xbox discs, if anyone still has them.

In making the games compatible Xbox has also improved the graphics, due to no longer being restricted to 480p, which was demonstrated with Star Wars KOTOR.

Not every game that was released on Xbox can be made compatible for Xbox One – mostly because some publishers no longer exist, or there are problems with licensing songs used in them, Xbox platform lead Bill Stillwell told IGN.

But, with more key games from the Xbox era to be released next year, this first wave is a good starting point.