It’s not been out for that long, but already there are users messing around with emulation software on the Xbox Series S. The console is apparently a brilliant piece of emulation hardware, as long as you know what you’re doing. It’s also not perfect, but it might be what retro enthusiasts have been waiting for. Here we have a modern console that’s able to run older games, and run them better than almost all of the retro handheld devices out there. It’s something that I’ve been interested in for a while, but now it just seems crazy.
This is all actually possible on the Xbox Series X as well, which makes it very tempting for me. As you can see in the video, there’s a developer mode in the consoles that allows a retro emulation software called RetroArch to be run. This software is widely used in devices such as the Retroid Pocket 2, and many other handheld retro consoles. It’s extremely useful in the preservation of games as well, which is why so many people are using it to store and play their old games. Digital copies are just so much easier to preserve than physical copies.
There’s a catch though, the files have to be under 2GB in size. If they’re larger, then RetroArch isn’t going to run them. This is a limitation that’s basically in place because most old games aren’t any bigger than this. PS2 games though, they definitely are. Still, you can clearly see games such as God of War, God Hand, and Shadow of Colossus running on an Xbox Series S using emulation software.
One thing that many people won’t have thought of is what this means for the PS2 exclusives. Those games are, for the most part, trapped on that console. You can’t do much else with them, other than run them on PC through emulation software. Now though, you can have PS2 exclusives running on an Xbox Series S, which blurs the lines of console exclusivity so much that they basically don’t exist. I love this, and if I could have been told this back when I was battling with my best friend over which console was best, I’d have told you that you were crazy.
