The 360 has had a poor track record in terms of reliability and longevity.
http://gamebabble.wordpress.com/2013...compatibility/

But whether you agree with it or not, Microsoft wants it to be a major part of the Xbox One. I could argue that Nintendo should drop the gamepad on the Wii U so I can have a $150 lean, mean, Mario and Zelda machine with a touchscreen I don't want to use, but I'm sure that won't happen soon.

It's like you're not even reading what other people are posting.

Even though i'm defending Microsoft (and Sony, who for whatever reason doesn't seem to be getting nearly as much shit as Microsoft over it), I think most of the gripes regarding BC are pretty valid. Although like other generations, people will eventually get over it.

"Wants it to be" is a good choice of words because everything they've shown has been optional. While their reveal was impressive, once you step back and look at what they're offering isn't all that impressive. You can navigate the dash with a controller. You don't have to hook your cable box up(can the x1 even access your DVR recordings? If not, why bother?), negating all the tv crap. If you aren't into sports, the fantasy sports thing is a waste. Bing while watching TV?

On the positive side, speaking what channel you want is fucking awesome. Only, it's 10 years too late. Other than sports, or special events, who watches live tv? Now if Kinect would let you say "Watch new episode of North America" and it pulls it from your DVR, then they're onto something.

Also, Skype while watching a tv split screen seems like it could be pretty useful for some.

So at the end of the day, IMO, there still isn't a single OMG feature to require Kinect or consider it a "major" part of next gen.

Yeah, my wording was deliberate. If I ever end up getting an Xbox One, the Kinect will get as much use as my current Kinect, which i've used maybe twice to try out Fruit Ninja.

Although I disagree with your assertion on live TV, obviously millions watch shows live.

I'd imagine after the initial "newness" wears off during launch(people trying it out) the tech geeks that get their shows via downloads, netflix, hulu, DVRetc. go back to their normal viewing habits. After that initial period the percentage of people watching live tv will be about on par with their stats of people using backwards compatibility.

Also, do they have stats that show what percentage of homes actually do their gaming in the main tv room to make this tv feature worthwhile? Out of my half dozen friends, only one of us does.

I agree that millions watch live TV shows.

I wonder how many of the customers who own XBox 360/PS3 gaming consoles do?

My gut feeling is that people who game are more likely to stream/DVR shows and not watch things live so they can skip commercials.

I know I hate to waste my time watching things live.

If so it could turn out that these features while sounding cool will be more like trying to market gasoline to people who ride bikes. Wasted effort with little return on investment.

Even people who use DVRs often watch sports live, which is probably why MS featured live sports so much in their presentation.

According to Business Insider, MS is working with Cable Companies to get DVR functionality into the Xbone:
http://www.businessinsider.com/xbox-one-dvr-2013-5
I'm thinking that instead of recording TV to the Xbone, you'll still need a separate cable DVR, but plugged into the HDMI in. Then the Xbone will download a list of your DVR recordings and schedule, and will be able to use remote commands to trigger your DVR to play them or to schedule recordings.

On demand may or may not be directly through an Xbone app or just remotely controlling the cable box again.

As consoles move to be more like PC's it is natural for people to want to continue to play their digital content on them. PC's are easily the most BC systems ever created.

What I'd want is an Xbox where I can say "Xbox, I want to watch Mad Men" and it finds it for me via search across all the streaming and regular television options that I pay for. Take the work of knowing where I can watch things away.

Here's how to get Tie Fighter installed on your PC:
http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.ph...g_Series_Games

PCs have shown remarkable backwards compatibility. Often the issue is more with the OS than the hardware. And since PCs are more or less open systems, people are able to modify the OS or the game to get it working on newer systems.

Only 25 or so steps? That looks like fun.

Just because it's happened before does not make it a good thing. There's the potential for a lot of good games to be lost to history.

Look at all the old silent movies that were lost due to the same sort of mind-set that you're condoning. Why perpetuate such a thing?

It looks like a fairly easy process. The point is it's possible.

It's freaking Tie Fighter! You should be willing to go through 100 steps to play that game!

Yep, I've done that. Didn't work quite right for me (the space textures aren't black).

Point is, there is a point in the life of technology where old stuff doesn't work on new stuff.

So what is your solution? Being able to play Pac Man CE throughout eternity on unchanged hardware? At what point do they get to cut it off and advance technology? Some people will say never.

Moving to x86 now seems like a good move for future compatibility

Really not a fair comparison when talking about 360 to XONE compatibility.

PC's have always been x86 architecture so of course with some hurdles you can get older x86 games to run on newer x86 hardware.

A better comparison is to try and get an original Apple IIc game to run on your brand new x86 laptop.

I'd say two generations. i.e. bought it on the 360, it works on the X1 after that, all bets are off. Buy it on the X1, it will work on the X2. After that, all bets are off. So essentially just the generation prior working on current systems.

There's probably a way to troubleshoot your setup so that Tie-Fighter will run correctly. However, the fact that it runs at all is pretty amazing, considering it's nearly 20 years old (released in 1994). If you used DOSBox for the DOS version, or maybe installed Win95 in a VM and installed it there, it would run near flawlessly.

The irony is that MS moved away from x86, which was used in the orignal Xbox, when they went with PowerPC. That's gotta be a move MS is regretting.

It's not just architecture though. You can't play a Windows game on a Mac straight, similar to you can't swap around DS/Vita/Android/iOS games, even though they all use ARM architecture. What's notable is that Windows has maintained backwards compatibilty with older versions of Windows, and even DOS, for so long.

And even when changing chip architecture, twice, Macs managed to maintain backwards compatibility for a while. Up through OS X 10.6, you could run programs from 1984 on the Mac 68K emulator inside Rosetta, the PowerPC emulator.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_68K_emulator
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_(software)

You can do that with an emulator. In some ways that's easier than trying to get an older Windows game to run properly.

I don't even understand why we're comparing consoles to PCs to mobile phones anymore.

Because some people are using those as a basis for why these consoles should be backwards compatible.

An emulator had to be developed. Which takes time resources and money. Ports take time resources and money. Which I believe is the whole issue.

Actually, PCs were most recently brought up by Draven, who was attempting to use them as an example against backwards compatibility:
So we were discussing that aspect of his argument.
I guess that makes running Apple II games on a PC a bad example for you to have used then, since there are already emulators for it freely available.