Is the 360 considered retro by this point?

[Frozone212]

I was at gamestop a few weeks ago and the dude said the 360 is now retro. But how can that be? It's barely 5 years old.

[AtariBrian]

Barely five years old?? It came out seventeen years ago, where on earth do you get five years old?

[Austin]

Even the Xbox One is nearly nine at this point, heh.

 

The 360 is old, and on one hand, yeah, it's at the very least close to being "retro" because of its age. On the other hand, I am conflicted in labeling it that because the style of games on it largely have not changed a lot from then to now. Certainly not like the way games evolved up to and through the PS2 era. I feel the "retro" label being applied to the 360 is a bit of an arbitrary one because of that.

[digdugnate]

Sigh.  The XBox 360 came out November 22, 2005 so that makes it almost 17 years old.  By comparison, the Nintendo Switch came out in the US March 3, 2017, so that would actually make that console five years old.

 

I digress, though; at this point and probably a dozen other points in time the word 'retro' is largely arbitrary.  You could make an argument for pre-2000 systems and post-2000 systems, but it's still an academic exercise (largely in futility).

Edited June 19, 2022 by digdugnate

[Cobra Kai]

Not retro. Not until at least the system goes completely offline. As of now, you can still automatically log in on the 360, and still sync games with it between other Xbox models. I don't play multiplayer so I can't say about server status, but I think there might be active leaderboards for shmups and other games.

 

Hard to describe something as retro when that thing is still on uninterrupted service since launch day. 

[Crazy Climber]

I don't think the xbox 360 will ever feel "retro" to me, maybe if VR takes off (and improves) but for now the 360 just feels like "an old computer" in a sense...we've kind of reached the peak of this style home consoles aside from minor performance/graphic enhancements. @Austin summed it up nicely above.

 

For instance, one of the DELL computers here at work is 15+ years old, but we also have a much newer computer. I often have to bounce between the 2 for projects/etc. The newer one is of course "better" in it's own ways but they are essentially the same so the 15 year old DELL doesn't feel "retro" at all...and probably wont until we have a huge leap in how we use them and what they are capable of (VR headsets, etc..)

[Blazing Lazers]

I still regularly play in my 360, though a lot of that is simply finishing off games from my extensive backlog and Achievements that I should've done years ago. The online servers for quite a few games are still up and have some action, arguably better now that only serious fans are still playing the games. For example, I still enjoy World at War online multiplayer and have become very familiar with a lot of the other players still on it.

 

It should also be noted that while the 360 first came out 17 years ago, the last retail game for it (FIFA 19) was released just barely 4 years ago. The 360 was still getting a few physical games well past the 10 year mark, and it certainly doesn't feel like it was very long ago that I still saw them on store shelves.It really hasn't been gone from retail environments long enough to be considered retro, and with good backwards compatibility on the successor systems the games themselves are still a long way from being considered retro. 

[Blazing Lazers]

On 6/18/2022 at 12:39 AM, Frozone212 said:

I was at gamestop a few weeks ago and the dude said the 360 is now retro. But how can that be? It's barely 5 years old.

I've also had that same feeling, and five years ago there were still a few new games getting physical releases for the system. Or at least it seems that way. 

 

Out of curiosity, I just looked it up and apparently 2018 saw the last two releases in FIFA 19 and Just Dance. I have a FIFA (it's apparently rare in NTSC form) but not Just Dance. I'd overlooked that one, but it looks like in the years preceding that there were only a few new titles each year.

[MrMaddog]

Only retro by zoomer standards...

 

BTW, all games (that aren't retro style) from the PS2 era onwards have the same modern gameplay style inspite of the different display resolutions which now define the console generations.

 

Plus looking back, it's funny how people were once quick to throw out old cart & CD based consoles when the newer ones came out.  But games that are digitally downloaded on the Xbox 360 can still be played on current Xbox consoles with the 720p screens scaled up on 4K displays (720p x 3 = 2160p or 4K).

 

So yes I still play Backwards Compatible 360 games on my current Xbox and yes I still keep my 360 around for the non-BC titles.

 

[dudeguy]

I think people associate "retro" with "antiquated". There is nothing antiquated about the 360, PS3, Xbox One, or PS4.

[Zoyous]

Yeah, I think I would classify retro more in terms of evolution of gameplay mechanics than simply by the passage of time. I remember during the late 80s/early 90s, when newer 8-bit and 16-bit systems would have occasional ports of older games. Like when Ms. Pac-Man came out for the Genesis. Although I always liked Ms. Pac-Man, my focus at the time was on the latest games and my gaming budget was so limited, I didn't want to invest in a "retro" game. Even if, at the time, that game was only something like 8 years old. Similarly, when Montezuma's Revenge came out for the Master System, even though I had loved playing it on the Apple IIe, I considered it somewhat outdated compared to the newest games of the time... even though it was maybe 5 years old. Nowadays, a 5-10 year old game is barely distinguishable from a brand new game from a design standpoint. The only things that are changing are incremental changes in resolution and material/lighting effects, and to a lesser degree (in terms of the number of releases that feature them), physics simulations - and those changes are usually so minimal it takes a big marketing effort to educate the public on what's different, supplemented by a cottage industry of analysts like Digital Foundry who provide specialized viewing tools to discern the extremely slight differences between generations of platforms. The changes that occurred from 1980-1990 and from 1990-2000 were immense and obvious. The changes that have occurred since the era of the 360 are a lot more nuanced.

[TheGameCollector]

What about the original Xbox for that matter? It's kind of odd that 6th Gen systems like Xbox, PS2 and Gamecube don't have their own subforums in either modern or classic. Is it just because Albert doesn't know what to call them or do with them? All three systems are very popular and I'm sure there would still be tons of discussion. Game Boy Advance as well.

Edited July 9, 2022 by TheGameCollector

[+Gemintronic]

As a rule of thumb if you have a system that can emulate another classic system then it's not "retro".  I've played NES games on my Xbox, PS2, Dreamcast and beyond.

 

UPDATE:  Super Mario Bros on the genesis doesn't count as it mostly converts the instructions to something the genesis can handle as opposed to pretending to be an entire NES.

[TheGameCollector]

On 7/8/2022 at 5:30 PM, Gemintronic said:

As a rule of thumb if you have a system that can emulate another classic system then it's not "retro".  I've played NES games on my Xbox, PS2, Dreamcast and beyond.

 

UPDATE:  Super Mario Bros on the genesis doesn't count as it mostly converts the instructions to something the genesis can handle as opposed to pretending to be an entire NES.

PS1 can emulate arcade roms included in compilations as well as Atari 2600 and Intellivision. It can also run an NES emulator from a burned CD. The program is called ItMightBeNES.

Edited July 10, 2022 by TheGameCollector

[+Gemintronic]

2 hours ago, TheGameCollector said:

PS1 can emulate arcade roms included in compilations as well as Atari 2600 and Intellivision. It can also run an NES emulator from a burned CD. The program is called ItMightBeNES.

 

 Yeah.  I do think N64/PS1 is modern in that sense.  You're totally on point.  My rule of thumb isn't as clear cut as I'd like.   There are classic systems that could pretend to be other systems by tricks other than straight up emulating another CPU.  Like the aforementioned SMB to genesis converter.  Or, that Palm Pilot app that let you run gameboy games.

[+GoldLeader]

I realize any answer I might give will probably be outdated in a few years anyway...

[NinjaFlicker]

There's absolutely no reason to consider all the screen tearing bloom abuse and ridiculously boring color palettes retro, unless you have eyes and aren't a hypocrite.

 

It's like claiming the Neo Geo wasn't considered retro in 2008. Just because something aged gracefully, doesn't mean it hasn't aged.

 

Really, the only reason people refuse to consider it retro at this point is because they want brand new rules to prevent PC influenced console gaming from tainting their Nintendo/Sega/Atari influenced nostalgia. I wonder if UK gamers raised on C64/Spectrum/CPC/Amiga/ST gaming have the same ridiculous hang-ups? Because those games directly inspired the modern AAA sandbox.

Edited September 6, 2022 by NinjaFlicker

[MrMaddog]