Cognition Dissemination: Yes, the 360 Store Closure Is Bad Too

Microsoft confirmed this week that the online Xbox 360 Marketplace will close in July 2024. The store first opened alongside the console’s launch in November 2005. (To reiterate: It’s been nearly eighteen years since the Xbox 360 launched.) But only Xbox Live Arcade games were provided for purchase at its start, alongside small downloadable content for larger games like, you know, the legendary horse armor for The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. As Microsoft started providing more proprietary hard drive expansions, more publishers received the option to sell their larger AAA titles digitally as well as physically.

It was tempting to think that much won’t be lost here when this news was announced. Microsoft, after all, has been proactive in preserving their titles after making multiple 360 games backwards-compatible on subsequent Xbox platforms. This is contrary to Sony, as PlayStation 3 games were left on the console due to hardware incompatibility issues, while the company was bullied into ceasing a plan to close the PS3 digital store in 2021. (They did make it harder to purchase games on it, though.) It’s extremely contrary to Nintendo, which closed the Wii store several years ago and closed the Wii U (and 3DS) stores this year; they could not be bullied into doing otherwise. I can’t blame anyone for initially thinking that the 360 store’s impending demise isn’t a big deal.

It is a big deal, though. There are more 360 games still available on the store that weren’t given the backwards-compatibility treatment or ported to other platforms than several people think. Most games that didn’t receive that treatment were never available on the store in the first place, including Ninja Blade (removed from the Steam store for mysterious reasons over a year ago, interestingly), Lollipop Chainsaw (available on the digital store… in Japan, though a remaster is coming), and NieR (Gestalt). But several games released digitally, and some released only through the digital channel, will vanish.

The 360 version of Fez was remarkably never given the backwards-compatibility treatment despite its popularity. It fortunately remains available on other platforms, but anyone who will desire to play it on an Xbox platform in the future will be out of luck. The same applies to Rez HD, soon to vanish from the Xbox ecosphere.

Several games since delisted from the store for licensing issues will also no longer be playable on Xbox platforms without a prior purchase, thus making them more difficult to preserve. Outrun Online Arcade is among them, delisted from every storefront in 2011. Hopefully anyone who enjoyed it purchased the PC version too. A stream of Konami arcade games are on the list, specifically The Simpsons and X-Men arcade games, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Arcade Game. The last one there is at least available as part of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Cowabunga Collection package… while that lasts.

Another notable game on this list? The legendary Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes, one of the most memorable fighting games in gaming history. Like several other licensed games mentioned above, there’s no telling when or if it will be made available again.

A number of larger-budgeted games either first distributed at retail or released simultaneously digitally and physically will be lost too. Bandai Namco and tri-Crescendo’s Eternal Sonata will be among them, as will Armored Core: Verdict Day. The PS3 is the only other platform both games were released for, and it may not be so easy to bully them into not killing the store a second time around if, or when, they give it another shot. Several Forza games will be lost too, most previously delisted due to licensing issues with the cars used and music. There’s also a game like Batman: Arkham City, the remaster-of-sorts for which on Xbox One being considered inferior thanks to its altered lighting and texture quality. This older version will fortunately remain available on PC, and we’ll find out which iteration was used for the Switch port this fall.

The number of games being lost here will be notably lower than those on older PlayStation and especially Nintendo platforms, but the point remains that some titles will vanish without ports available on modern platforms. Video game preservationists are hopefully finding a way to save many of those that will disappear, to ensure they can still be played on 360 hardware in the future if (or when) the dreaded day where purchased games can no longer be downloaded arrives. Video game preservationists shouldn’t need to exist, but they must when publishers have little incentive to preserve these titles themselves.

This situation makes it even clearer that no digital software outside of PC will remain available forever, that even companies which have done a better job of keeping their titles around compared to others can nonetheless engage in digital purges. It’s fortunate that this is far from the worst case, as most games available on 360 will still be playable on future Xbox platforms if they haven’t been ported to other services. But spare a thought for the titles we’re losing.

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