While Microsoft Shutters Emulation Apps On Xbox, It Confirms Claims Of Nintendo’s Doing Is Inaccurate

While Microsoft for more than a generation has pioneered legacy emulation for its platform its not perfect. Unlike its PlayStation counterpart, there is no official Achievement support for its platform for original Xbox titles. Even more, the Xbox firm has also stated to officially close support for more games over a year ago to be added to the program.

However, this does not change the position Microsoft holds for emulation. In fact, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer shared being in favor or it being embraced by the industry. When speaking to Axios Gaming, he expressed that legal emulation is a feature that more companies should enable for its users as legacy titles are not accessible without the original hardware.

But, as for the string of emulators that were available on the Xbox Store, that has changed now too. In a line of findings recently, @gamr13 on Twitter shared this discovery. Being a distributor for the app ‘RectroArch’, the discovery came to be a large surprise for many users within the emulation community for this sudden change of heart from Microsoft.

In a statement to Kotaku, a Microsoft spokesperson said this: “We continually evolve our mechanisms for reviewing and taking enforcement actions on content distributed to the Store to ensure alignment with our Microsoft Store Policies. Per 10.13.10, Products that emulate a game system or game platform are not allowed on any device family.” Elsewhere online, many believed that Nintendo was to blame for this recent action by the Xbox firm.

But speaking to IGN, it is said that is not to be the case. “The information currently circulating on Twitter is not accurate. Our actions are based on a long standing policy on content distributed to the Store to ensure alignment with our Microsoft Store Polices. Per 10.13.10, Products that emulate a game system or game platform are not allowed on any device family.” Currently, similar emulation is only achievable setting your console to developer mode rather than retail.

What surprises you most about the recent decision from Microsoft?