During today’s Xbox 20th anniversary event, Xbox announced that 70-plus games are being added to the Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S backward-compatibility libraries. It confirmed that the games support Auto HDR and many will receive resolution enhancements. On top of that, 11 of the titles are getting a frames-per-second (FPS) boost.
Since the Xbox 360, Xbox has had a preapproved library of backward-compatible games that can be played on current-generation consoles. The list of supported titles is now up to 76 with today’s announcement.
Many of the added titles are fan favorites that have been continuously requested. Those titles include the entire Max Payne, F.E.A.R, and Skate series on the Xbox One and Series X/S. The library also includes more than 20 original Xbox games including Dead or Alive Ultimate, Star Wars: Jedi Knight II, Star Wars: Starfighter, and the Otogi franchise.
Xbox confirmed that Original Xbox games will receive a resolution increase on Xbox Series X/S and Xbox One consoles connected to supported displays. The resolution increase will differ depending on the console.
The games included on the FPS boost list are:
Players will also be able to toggle on and off the HDR and FPS Boost in games’ management menus. You can find a full list of backward-compatible games on the Xbox website.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Gaming laptops and I have a complicated relationship. One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it. I was a broke college kid, and that was the best I could afford. So trying out high-end gaming laptops is always fun. But ASUS' ROG Zephyrus G14 is a lot more than a laptop that can run AAA games. It is portable, so you're not lugging around a 2.5kg machine everywhere you go. It is built well, none of that plastic chassis, and can even function as a normal laptop outside of just gaming.
Google Play is borrowing one of the Nintendo Switch’s most useful little tricks. A new Sidekick tool called Playbacks captures a short clip after something interesting has already happened, sparing players from running a screen recorder throughout an entire game.
Playbacks is part of Google Play Store v53.8 and keeps saved clips on the phone. Google first announced it earlier this month, but the new Play Store update marks its arrival for players. Anyone who has watched a perfect win vanish because the record button came too late already understands the appeal.