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[water10]

Backwards Compatibility is very important to attract new customers. Just think about PS2/GC users that will consider an xbox2 so they can finally play Halo2/Halo1 plus next gen games! For current xbox users, you can always keep your xbox. Sure it would be good to keep 1 console only, but at least you have an option if you want to keep playing xbox games!

And if you there's no backwards compatibility, you can buy xbox2 and modify your xbox1 and open a whole other world ...

On a side note, I'll always keep my xbox just because it'll be the only console that has Dolby Digital encoder! Being a home theater fanatic, that was the reason I chose an xbox over a PS2 ... It's just sad that next gen consoles, most likely, will never have 5.1 sound as good as we have on the xbox.

[thebruce]

yet, if you think about it, if I owned a gamecube, but I wanted to play Super Mario Bros., I'd still have to go through the trouble of going out and buying a NES, or some other gaming tool/machine that emulates or has a remake... why is that Xbox is the only console really that so many people are expecting BC or it will fail? Sony spoiled everyone
personally, I don't care... I've got an xbox (2 of them). If they make X2 BC, then I've got 1, maybe 2 outdated machines to get rid of... who's going to buy them if you can get an X2 and play X1 games? But without BC, I'll have more space taken up with another console... so with BC, I'll only need one console, again... But the other argument is true too, without BC, you have to get an xbox to play X1 games...

so really, it's up to MS as to which crowd they want to cater to more... there's no clear cut right or wrong answer... and in the end, it's only a smaller fraction of the market that REALLY cares, and I'd say it's fairly even between the BC or bust, and BC-bad camps... a lot, if not most, of the market won't care or know any different, or at least make their purchase decision solely on that factor...

[GWing_02]

The way I see it it's 100% personal opinion. But Microsoft isn't known for spending time, money, or effort for what many consider "fluff" like Backwards Compatability.

[Ranger D]

[thebruce]

[Kagehi Kossori]

[water10]

[thebruce]

[Eclipse]

Wow, very well done!

I read somewhere years ago, just after xbox was introduced, that Microsoft spent 4 billion dollars on Research and Development of the xbox. That money came from their 8 billion dollar a year R&D for the whole corporation(I wish I could remember where I read that from). I would expect them to do no less with xbox 2 either, not so much as spending 4 bill on R&D, but come out with a solid product that can compete with consoles that have a much longer history on the market.

[Feros]

I work at a console lan center and I can tell you X-box gets MUCH more play than either the PS2 or the GC, and I am not only talking about for multiplayer, I am also talking single player.

I have actually been pleasantly surprised with the performance of the X-boxes relative to the PS2 in particular. We have only had to replace one X-box because it was scratching our cd's and there have only been a handfull of first party controllers that have needed replacement We even have one or two initial release X-boxes that are still doing well for their age. The PS2's on the otherhand are performing VERY poorly a great example is GTA San Andreas We have 6 PS2's and the game will only run on 2 of them and even then they freeze on occasion. In general this pisses people off. I mean if a game system cannot even handle a game built for it then it shouldn't be a game for that game system. As far as the Game Cube we havent seen any problems but then again they get a lot less use than the X-box or the PS2, but even then our PS2's do not see that much use(other than DDR) so it leaves us wondering what the hell is wrong with the PS2.

[Kagehi Kossori]

The only point I suppose I was trying to make is that MS' track record has generally been - Pretend to change, then do the same things that anger people all over again. This has reached a point where they even lie about how closely integrated stuff is in the OS on the PC side, then when sued, miraculously decide they can remove it after all. The XBox differs only in that it is designed to 'never' provide the level of interaction or potential complications that prevented them from maintaining 100% control over what people do with a PC or how they use them. With that in mind, you may be completely right. They may manage to avoid the past mistakes, but it will be because they are calling the shots and can do anything they want with it, not because the product is the best one they could have developed. However, with a game system that is *only* relevant if they screw up so badly that someone else comes out with a far superior system and buries them in one shot.

Personally.. I think the best thing they could do as a company right now is stick with such specialized systems and stop pissing people off in the OS market. They can't win in there unless they actually manage to get lobbyists to declare Open Source illegal or they try to patent every damn thing on the planet and somehow their competitors fail to fight back. I don't see either strategy as being successful and I am 100% sure that selling an even more crippled version of XP or Longhorn, for the same prices as open source alternatives, isn't going to suddenly engender love and affection. I have no problem with MS playing in the industries like game consoles that have always been hostile and paranoid. I wish them the best of luck in it. Just keep the proprietary, non-interchangable and non-international complient standards out of my computer, TV, VCR or anything else that I 'want' some control over.

[water10]

[Kagehi Kossori]

On a similar note.. The guys that make Linspire recently tried to license Windows Media for use on it. Prior discussions and announcements from MS "claimed" that they planned to make it an industry standard and license it to "anyone". Lo and behold, MS agreed to only license 'parts' of the Media Player codec for use in Linspire, excluding the most recent codecs and features used in online music stores and others, quoting that they "did not ever intend to license those things cross platform". This will 'probably' extend to all new video codecs in the future as well, making it impossible to play them either.

And so we find ourselves once more we take a another trip through the MS amusement park in a straight jacket while MS babbles, "Where do you want to go today?", in our ear.

[thebruce]

*sigh* once again, a thread-jack, off topic...

We're not discussing MS's PC market strategies here. at least, we're TRYING not to... please, let's stay on topic. If there's nothing more to say about xbox 2's backward's compatibility, then the thread will fall to oblivion as it should

[Kagehi Kossori]

Right.. So should we pretend that a companies overall tactics are irrelevant before or after the new XBox comes out and it turns out, for example, that the only old games that don't work on it are ones that happen to belong to companies that compete with MS in other areas? Just wondering, because the point is, "don't trust someone that has never shown any interest in 'your' best interests."