How Do I Play Original Xbox Games On the Xbox 360?
Is there anything special I must do or can I just insert a xbox game into a 360? I'm most interested in playing the original Halo and the Call of Duty games.
Only certain Xbox games can be played on the 360. Luckily, the Halo series and Call of Duty series were popular enough to get Xbox 360 support.
You must have an Xbox 360 hard drive on your Xbox 360 in order to play original Xbox games. (Most Xbox 360s sold in the last couple of years were bundled with some amount of internal storage)
You may have to have an internet connection available to your Xbox 360 in order to download the correct software updates in order to play certain titles. You cannot play online with any original Xbox games. Unlike certain other online/downloadable features of the Xbox 360, you don't need to spend any Microsoft points or be subscribed to Xbox Live Gold in order to download these software updates.
You can play local multiplayer (ie, the original Halo supported 4 people using the same console, and this works fine on the 360), and some people have reported that you can use System Link mode for LAN play, even between an Xbox and a Xbox 360. Regardless of your Xbox Live status, you cannot play these games online any more.
Otherwise, though, they work fine and can be lots of fun to play.
Steps
- Sign into Xbox LIVE.
- Insert Xbox disc.
- Run game. If the game is supported, any relevant emulators will be downloaded from LIVE.
- Enjoy.
Good news:
- Basic LIVE features like friends (if supported by the game) should still work.
Caveats:
- No online multiplayer or matchmaking supported.
- Guide is disabled.
Sometimes or some games require you to have an Internet connection to download the emulation drivers that older games need to run on the 360.