Xbox 360 Games No Longer with Games With Gold After October 2022
The original Xbox console may have been one of the more unique systems to come out at the time, with a controller that more closely resembled the Sega Dreamcast over a modern controller for its time, such as the Sony PlayStation’s smaller, less bulky controller. The Xbox also had hit original games exclusively available such as the original Halo, “Halo: Combat Evolved”, “Fable“, and others. However popular, or unpopular, the original Xbox was to some, especially compared to PlayStation, a company that was already on its second-generation console, the Xbox 360 was a groundbreaking and memorable console with its poppy menus, wacky avatars, other customizable options, and library of fun, memorable and addicting games. Recently, Xbox, unfortunately, announced that Xbox 360 games would no longer be offered with Games With Gold after October 2022. Below, we’ve gone over what that means for Xbox Gold and Xbox Game Pass subscribers, as well as what the future could look like for the service, and exactly why Xbox won’t be supplying games from possibly their most legendary era yet: the Xbox 360 Era.
Xbox 360
As stated above, the Xbox 360 era of Microsoft led to a large uptick in overall houses with an Xbox console over PlayStation 3, but this was a time when different titles would hit the different consoles, and players had to choose their side between the two. Even now as Microsoft and Sony acquire brands, studios, IPs, and more in order to bring players to one console over the other, it doesn’t feel like it compares to the different games offered by Sony and Microsoft back in the Xbox 360 era. Today, players of either console are likely to wait it out as little as 6 months for a game that’s released on Sony to come to Xbox, or vice versa, depending on the individual title. Compared to the original Xbox, the Xbox 360 offered smaller, wireless controllers, introduced music and video options, and many other features, and overall, the console was updated regularly for 11 years from 2005 to 2016.
Xbox 360 Fades Away, For Real?
While the original Xbox was home to some incredible original popular games, that have gotten offered just as easily for Games With Gold as with the Xbox 360 titles, recently Xbox has announced that they are physically unable to bring any more games from the Xbox 360 era to current consoles with Games With Gold. Although the Xbox One was released in 2013, and the Xbox 360 was supported until 2016, Xbox found a way to keep as many games from the era alive as possible with Games With Gold.
Xbox 360 No Longer Offered Games With Gold Come October 2022
Games With Gold was a rather small offering and idea when first brought to gamers, but every single month since it debuted in June 2013, it provided gamers with 4 brand new games a month, and once the Xbox One launched, Xbox offered Xbox One titles, which started a year later, in June 2014. Most recently when Xbox announced that Xbox 360 games wouldn’t be included in the service, the upcoming 360 games of July were, “Thrillville: Off The Rails”, and “Torchlight“, two franchises that have long been loved and enjoyed by gamers enough to have multiple entries throughout the years, meanwhile the most recent Xbox One offerings from Xbox were, ” Beasts of Maravilla Island” and “Relicta”. However popular any game that Xbox has offered in the past may have been, or not as there have always been secret treasures that Games With Gold have helped push as well, Xbox has stated that they officially can’t update Games With Gold with Xbox 360 titles anymore due to various restrictions out of their control.
The Announcement
Xbox officially announced in an email to subscribers the changes to Xbox Games With Gold set to come into play in October 2022, and exactly why the changes are set to happen, “From 1 October 2022, the monthly games provided to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and Xbox Live Gold members via Games With Gold will no longer include Xbox 360 titles. We have reached the limit of our ability to bring Xbox 360 games to the catalog; however, Games With Gold will continue to include exciting Xbox One titles and exclusive savings each month. This will not impact any Xbox 360 games that you downloaded before October 2022. Any Xbox 360 games that you can redeem via Games With Gold before that time are yours to keep on your Xbox account, regardless of whether you continue your subscription.” While Xbox stated that games secured before October 2022 will remain forever yours, the exact reasoning for the future lack of Xbox 360 games from the Games With Gold program was that they literally could no longer add any other games due to various “licensing, legal, and technical constraints issues” that prevent the company from adding them.