Xbox’s Phil Spencer Advocates For Industry-Wide, Legal Emulation Be Embraced Across All Platforms In New Interview

Across the video game landscape, Microsoft is recognized to be the most open-armed to game preservation with four (all) generations of Xbox playable on the latest console hardware. While not every game is not available and for good reason, the firm is the only one of the major three that continue its endeavor to deliver native support for its user base.

On the 20th anniversary of the platform, Microsoft went on to add an additional 70+ games for Xbox backwards compatibility. However, it is noted to be the last major update for the program, the Xbox company confirmed then. But, legacy releases did receive something else: FPS Boost. Simultaneously, Xbox 360 games such as Fallout: New Vegas and Sonic Generations adopted 60Hz support at the time.

On the matter of widespread game preservation, Xbox boss Phil Spencer already explained to Kinda Funny Games that he is in support for more companies to adopt the ambition Microsoft has. This week from Axios Games’ Stephen Totilo, Spencer asks for industry-wide support of legal emulation of older games.

If we said, ‘Hey, anybody should be able to buy any game, or own any game and continue to play,’ that seems like a great North Star for us as an industry. […] My hope (and I think I have to present it that way as of now) is as an industry we’d work on legal emulation that allowed modern hardware to run any (within reason) older executable allowing someone to play any game.

Already, Nintendo continues to delve into its own route for game preservation. But unlike Microsoft, the latest addition for the Nintendo Switch Online virtual library of Nintendo 64 & Sega Genesis is behind a paywall for $50. It is undetermined the next plans for Nintendo in terms of legacy support for older games.

Currently on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4 is the only platform to receive natvie support for the feature. In the past, Sony Interactive Entertainment President & CEO Jim Ryan confirmed that any form of emulation for PlayStation, PlayStation 2, and PlayStation 3 is not feasible on the latest console. You can read the full report by heading here.

Are you in support of the statement from Spencer?