Microsoft’s Bill Stillwell has posted a long statement on his Twitter account to address the challenges of making backwards compatible games work for the Xbox One. He continually gets requests all the time and wants to clear the air.
He wants to single out impatient people that request games to be added all the time, but he wants to make sure that getting games isn’t easy all of the time. This is the main reason he wants to speak out on the situation.
It’s a long statement so we’ll do our best to summarize it. Anyway, he said big games are still coming, but not every month will be able to bring in bi-weekly titles. Barriers stop them from adding games in a timely fashion and this includes technical problems and even things like IP ownership.
He said releasing a BC game isn’t always easy because publishers love to choose when they want to release games to maximize sales. Microsoft doesn’t want to anger publishers by releasing a BC game too early or something like that. For example we may see Black Ops 2 become backwards compatible only when Activision feels its right to release it.
Licensing issues also become a factor as these things expire or another company may own a specific IP. He goes on to say that Black Ops 2 is the most requested game so far, but it’s not Microsoft’s fault that they cannot deliver it on time. He says once Black Ops 2 is delivered, another game will take its place as being the most requested anyway.
He says it would have been easier if the whole Xbox 360 catalog was compatible on Xbox One, but this is not the case. He loves doing what he does for work, but he cannot reveal when certain games will be out. In other words. please be nice to him on Twitter and be patient when it comes to BC announcements.
