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I Bought a New Xbox 360 in 2021

dcx4610

Member
On a whim (the stimulus didn't help), I decided to purchase an Xbox 360. I've never owned a 360 as I was mostly a PC gamer and preferred Sony systems since they mostly had the same multi-plats and a ton of exclusives. At the time, I just didn't like the idea that the Xbox used DVDs with less storage space than Blu-ray (making some games use multi-discs) and potentially less powerful hardware overall. Also, the then idea of paying for Xbox Live to play online or even use a web browser or apps was absurd to me as a PC gamer.

Fast forward to 2021 and for some reason, the 360 is fascinating to me. Despite the PS3 being more powerful, the 360 was easier to program for and the multi-plats tended to be better on the 360. Also, this era for PC gaming was rough. With the 360 being PowerPC based and the PS3 using cell, PC games had to be completely programmed specially for PC. It's not like now where everything uses x86 and it's a quick and easy port between all 3 platforms. Almost without fail, the PC ports from this era are garbage or don't play well on modern computers.

With this being the case, I decided I'd like to get a 360 as a companion piece to sit alongside my PC. Thus the search began for a 360. I'm guessing due to COVID, all game systems are hard to find. I went to numerous local shops and no one had any. I took to eBay and I can't believe how grody most of the listings are. How in the world do people treat their systems where they are scratched to hell in that rough of shape? I eventually found a listing for a still sealed 250GB S model at a reasonable price and bit on it.

All of that out of the way, what are most must play games and especially games that have rough PC ports that would be definitive? I definitely want the Gears of War games and Red Dead Redemption since they don't have PC releases. I'll probably grab Call of Duty 3 as well since it never got a PC release. Anything else I should be on the lookout for?
 

Beer Baelly

Al Pachinko, Konami President
netflix antonio GIF
 

ShirAhava

Plays with kids toys, in the adult gaming world
Xbox 360 PC emulation has gotten really decent I just put my Xbox 360 away for good (unless I want to play Brute Force)
 
I still buy games for it, as they tend to be really cheap.

Dishonored 1 on PS4? £20! Dishonored 1 on X360, £3. (it's not compatible with Xbox One, and those games are usually even cheaper)

Quite a few others.


More recently I bought Prey 2006 and Fallout New Vegas. And I'll play Witcher 2 on it one of these days too.
 
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AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
That's... one way to do it I guess.
 

cireza

Banned
I think that it is a good console to plug it on a CRT with a SCART RGB cable, and if you hack it to get some games that aren't available anymore, such as After Burner Climax or Outrun Online Arcade.

Playing on a CRT, that offers perfect motion clarity, will compensate the fact that many games are 30fps on the console. For example Sonic Unleashed. And of course, best setting to enjoy all the shmups.
 
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I would get these exclusives:
  • Amped 3 - the last AAA winter sports game, with a wacky vibe.
  • Lost Odysee - A masterfull JRPG from Mr. SAKAGUCHI with a dark and deep story.
  • blue Dragon - A 3D jrpg also from the creators of FF. The colorfull arstyle let this game age very well.
  • Chromehounds - A Mech action game from FROMSOFTWARE
  • Fable 2 with the Pubgames - Best Fable and the Pubgames are way to addicting.
  • Kingdom under Fire - Very unique mix of RTS, HacknSlay and RPG elements.
Have Fun :messenger_beaming:
 
Ok. Fair play. As someone who owned a 360 (and PS3) and played it daily for 7 or so years, the Series S shits all over it, picks it up, flips it over, fucks it like a porn star and then never calls again.
Sure, but does it read the game discs? No.

Otherwise I would agree, Xbox One S with disc drive reaps most of the Xbox 360 benefits, as does One X and Series X. (most, because not all games are compatible, like the already mentioned Forza 4, and PGR4)
 

Naked Lunch

Member
Even with XB1/Series S/X Backwards Compat - there are still plenty of 360 games only playable on the 360 console itself, and quite a few digital only.
I recently sorted and re-downloaded all of my 360 digital exclusives. I forgot I even bought or owned half of this stuff - not having a box to look at. Pretty sad the new digital age we live in.

It was a pain in the ass going thru my digital downloads thru the xbox360 dashboard. I would recommend to anyone who hasnt kept their library up to date to get on it.

Since I literally just documented this stuff from my collection to remind me what I own is actually exclusive to 360, here's my picks:

360 digital exclusives - not yet on XB1/Series X/S BC:

Bangai-O Missile Fury, Bionic Commano Rearmed, Rez HD, After Burner Climax, Fez, Under Defeat HD, Raystorm HD, Marvel vs Capcom Origins and 2, Darkstalkers Resurrection, Street Fighter III Online Edition, Deathsmiles 2X, Shooting Love 200X, Xmen Arcade, TMNT 1989 and Reshelled, Sega Rally Online, Poker Smash

360 exclusives you can get physically - not yet on XB1/Series X/S BC:
All Cave shmups (many are region free), Raiden Fighters Aces, Virtual On Force, Eschatos, Ginga Force, Lollipop Chainsaw, Bionic Commando 3d, Binary Domain, Tenchu Z, Eternal Sonata, Nier 1, Chromehounds, Armored Core 4/5/For Answer/Verdict Day, Ace Combat Assault Horizon, DoA Xtreme 2, Ridge Racer 6, Sega Rally Revo, Anarchy Reigns, Forza 4

Original Xbox Games BC on 360 but not yet on XB1/Series X/S BC:
Outrun 2006 Coast to Coast (runs pretty flawless on 360, vanilla OR2 does not)
Jet Set Radio Future (update: the sega GT/JSRF combo disc DOES work with 360 BC - i just checked - I didnt know this for years at this point till now)
Daisenryaku VII Modern Military Tactics
Fatal Frame 1 and 2

So yeah, plenty worth keeping the 360 hooked up.
I didnt even know I owned some of this stuff like Under Defeat and Raystorm. I must have bought them when they were on sale for like 3 bucks.
I completely forgot Rez HD is still only on 360 - I thought it was on XB1 BC for some reason.
 
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PhaseJump

Banned
I have a 360 S on hand mainly for Virtua Fighter 5 Online.

It's cheap, not on back compat, and the updated Final Showdown version has less features and worse graphics anyway. The PS3 version isn't online and doesn't have trophies.
 

OrtizTwelve

Member
On a whim (the stimulus didn't help), I decided to purchase an Xbox 360. I've never owned a 360 as I was mostly a PC gamer and preferred Sony systems since they mostly had the same multi-plats and a ton of exclusives. At the time, I just didn't like the idea that the Xbox used DVDs with less storage space than Blu-ray (making some games use multi-discs) and potentially less powerful hardware overall. Also, the then idea of paying for Xbox Live to play online or even use a web browser or apps was absurd to me as a PC gamer.

Fast forward to 2021 and for some reason, the 360 is fascinating to me. Despite the PS3 being more powerful, the 360 was easier to program for and the multi-plats tended to be better on the 360. Also, this era for PC gaming was rough. With the 360 being PowerPC based and the PS3 using cell, PC games had to be completely programmed specially for PC. It's not like now where everything uses x86 and it's a quick and easy port between all 3 platforms. Almost without fail, the PC ports from this era are garbage or don't play well on modern computers.

With this being the case, I decided I'd like to get a 360 as a companion piece to sit alongside my PC. Thus the search began for a 360. I'm guessing due to COVID, all game systems are hard to find. I went to numerous local shops and no one had any. I took to eBay and I can't believe how grody most of the listings are. How in the world do people treat their systems where they are scratched to hell in that rough of shape? I eventually found a listing for a still sealed 250GB S model at a reasonable price and bit on it.

All of that out of the way, what are most must play games and especially games that have rough PC ports that would be definitive? I definitely want the Gears of War games and Red Dead Redemption since they don't have PC releases. I'll probably grab Call of Duty 3 as well since it never got a PC release. Anything else I should be on the lookout for?

Don't listen to the haters here, it's never too late to own any console as long as the games are great, and XBOX 360 has tons of great games. You will enjoy it and there are still a considerable amount of people playing 360 online these days across the most popular games.
 

Kuranghi

Member
Speaking of Burnout Revenge: Can someone come to my house and help me complete Burnout Revenge? My decrepit 34-year-old-man hands/reactions aren't good enough to get 5 stars on every race near the engame anymore :pie_lcry:

I feel like I might be doing something wrong because the difficulty spike is insane.
 

Kerlurk

Banned
 
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Dead Space 1 & 2
Lost Odyssey
BioShock 1 & 2
Mass Effect 1 & 2
Tales of Vesperia
Darksiders 1 & 2
Dark Souls 1 & 2
Tomb Raider & Rise of Tomb Raider
Batman Arkham Asylum & Arkham City
 
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S

SpongebobSquaredance

Unconfirmed Member
Get Blur and Driver: San Francisco.

The 360 is an excellent system. Used it myself till last year.
 

evanft

Member
Well that was certainly a weird decision.

If there are Xbox 360 games you want to play, you should first see if they're backwards compatible on the Xbox One. If they are, you should be playing them there 100%, especially if you get an One X. Most of the best 360 exclusives are available to play, so odds are a lot of what you want to get into are playable. Some are One X-enhanced, which means they run at 9x the original resolution. The Gears of War games, RDR1, and Ninja Gaiden 2 are STUNNING on the X and absolutely should be played there, if feasible.

The best reason to keep the 360 hooked up in 2021 is honestly Rock Band 3. It's easily the best Rock Band game (definitely better than Rock Band 4) and Xbox 360 instrument controllers are plentiful on the secondary market. It's also easy to set the game up to play custom songs. You can even bring in songs from other Rock Band games that weren't exportable, like Beatles Rock Band, if you are so inclined.

Something I would recommend, though, is to pick up an external drive and install all your games to it. A firmware update late in the system's life allowed it to work with external drives up to 2TB in size and the 360 can actually install any disc-based game to these drives. This will cut down on load times, make the system quieter, and increase the life of your DVD drive. I have a 256GB SSD hooked up using a cheap Sabrent adapter. You don't need to use an SSD, but I had an extra one laying around and I always prefer to use them if I can.
 

Arkam

Member
Throw it in the garbage and get a Series X.
DO not listen to this person. I ALMOST did this when I got my X1X thinking all my 360 games (which I have a TON) would all work via BC. Most did.... but not the ones I personally cared about (PGR3/4 & just about all the games I worked on at EA that gen).
Get the XSX to play X1/SX games, buy/keep a 360 to play 360 games. So many amazing games on 360 and most can probably be picked up used for peanuts. Have fun OP!
 

BigBooper

Member
There's a lot of licensed games that will be unlikely to get re-released for modern systems like Godfather, Scarface, Lord of the Rings games, etc.

I would really like to be able to play some of the old Incredible Hulk games again.
 
Good work getting a 360 , certainly a top 3 console for me. Not sure why you went with a new one as opposed to a nice used but either way congrats.
I would recommend :
Halo 3
Halo Reach
Left 4Dead 1&2
Halo Wars
Bioshock trilogy
Gears trilogy
Dead rising

Definitely some more but those come right to mind.
 
I still bust out the 360. Since not everything is backwards compatible nowadays.
I recently bought

Transformers War for Cybertron
Xmen Origins: Wolverine
Chronicles of Riddick

i also like the originl Marvel Ultimate Alliance games on 360 and WWE All Stars
 
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