Welcome to the 18th and most likely final iteration of Backwards Compatibility Voting. I know, I know, I said final. Don’t be sad. It’s just the natural order of things. After four months, it’s time to tabulate, evaluate and then move on. There will still be a weekly column probably, but there is no sense (with Microsoft closing out ideas on their site now) to keep going in the same direction. Oh and we have a new #1 weekly. Now that’s the way to close it out!
If you would like a copy of the file that these votes are stored in, please click here: Backwards-votes
Top 19 Weekly
| Name | Difference Weekly | % | |
| Outrun Online Arcade | 71 | 8.86% | 1 |
| Deadpool | 626 | 8.78% | 2 |
| Driver: San Francisco | 138 | 7.62% | 3 |
| Diablo III: Reaper of Souls | 261 | 6.92% | 4 |
| Overlord 2 | 111 | 6.90% | 5 |
| Overlord | 107 | 6.31% | 6 |
| Crysis 3 | 805 | 6.30% | 7 |
| Raven | 21 | 6.25% | 8 |
| Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga | 57 | 6.24% | 9 |
| Sherlock Holmes vs Jack The Ripper | 22 | 6.20% | 10 |
| Telltale’s Tales from the Borderlands | 72 | 6.03% | 11 |
| Gun | 88 | 5.99% | 12 |
| NCAA Football 14 | 692 | 5.92% | 13 |
| Dragon Age 2 | 761 | 5.82% | 14 |
| Murdered: Soul Suspect | 26 | 5.74% | 15 |
| Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments | 18 | 5.73% | 16 |
| Alice: Madness Returns | 301 | 5.67% | 17 |
| Saboteur, The | 118 | 5.64% | 18 |
| Borderlands Pre-Sequel | 319 | 5.63% | 19 |
Top 20 Monthly
| Name | Difference Monthly | % | |
| Deadpool | 2132 | 37.93% | 1 |
| Outrun Online Arcade | 195 | 28.80% | 2 |
| Driver: San Francisco | 395 | 25.42% | 3 |
| Diablo III: Reaper of Souls | 798 | 24.68% | 4 |
| Crysis 3 | 2475 | 22.27% | 5 |
| Telltale’s Tales from the Borderlands | 220 | 21.03% | 6 |
| NCAA Football 14 | 2148 | 20.99% | 7 |
| Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga | 168 | 20.92% | 8 |
| Dragon Age 2 | 2311 | 20.07% | 9 |
| Raven | 57 | 19.00% | 10 |
| Sherlock Holmes: Crimes & Punishments | 53 | 19.00% | 11 |
| Borderlands Pre-Sequel | 954 | 18.97% | 12 |
| Alice: Madness Returns | 889 | 18.83% | 13 |
| Silent Hill Homecoming | 525 | 18.75% | 14 |
| Murdered: Soul Suspect | 75 | 18.56% | 15 |
| Overlord 2 | 267 | 18.38% | 16 |
| Dragon Age Origins | 2912 | 18.30% | 17 |
| Two Worlds II | 185 | 18.07% | 18 |
| Crysis 2 | 1320 | 18.03% | 19 |
| Overlord | 275 | 18.01% | 20 |
Well, after 17 weeks at #1, Deadpool has been thrown from its royal stature to #2. I find this also a little funny because the Deadpool remaster came out this week for Xbox One and Playstation 4. It was replaced by a very worthwhile new leader, the delisted classic, Outrun Online Arcade. It’s funny that these two will probably never be made backwards compatible, but they are both apparently very popular.
By the way, I watched about twenty minutes on Twitch of the Deadpool remaster. NOTHING is Different, I kept trying to find something, anything and really…Activision took a big giant crap on everybody and said…pay us $50 to play the same game that you probably only paid $20 for on the PS3/Xbox 360. (I think I bought it for $30, but I digress) Ridiculous cash grab.
Anyway, I’ve relented on and on about this for the last umpteen weeks, but its not going to change things. Activision is hard-pressed to include anything up for BC, even the Xbox Live Arcade port of Wolfenstein 3d which they don’t even own the rights to anymore. But Michael, you say…Wolf 3d is backwards compatible. The Bethseda re-port is. The one that not too many people bought because the already owned the Activision port instead. Yes, they are “technically” two different games. Microsoft is trying to get Activision to act like a team player and sort this out, but who knows. Let’s move on..rant postponed.
Driver comes in third with another very strong week. I expect this one to be in the December release of games, it’s way overdue. So are the two Overlords and Crysis 3 which come in at 5-7 respectively. I’m glossing over on purpose of Diablo III which is silly at this point at #4. By the way, still playing my wizard…3 bounties away from 500 and level 36 (34 levels away from my last level 70 character). The Wizard character is not interesting me at this point so its become something of a struggle. I think I was spoiled by the Demon Hunter, Witch Doctor and to a smaller extent Crusader characters.
Moving on, we have some fun ones through the rest of the weekly 19 including Divinity II which has had a nice surge all of this month along with Gun, Dragon Age 2, Alice: Madness Returns, and the Saboteur. NCAA Football 14 which simply never stops the momentum still came in this week at #13. I’m really happy with this week’s voting. It was still very strong, we had a new #1 and even though there are some week titles in the top #19 (Raven, Sherlock Holmes, Murdered: Soul Suspect)…those weak titles have been there before, so its relative.
Moving on to the top 20 for the month, it’s pretty much the same list as the weekly, just shuffled. Silent Hill is in here, so is Dragon Age Origins, and Two Worlds II. But it’s a carbon copy more or less so there is not very much point spending too much time on it. I think what we should do is break straight into the Top 20 All Time.
Top 20 All-Time
| Name | Difference All-Time | % | |
| Deadpool | 6691 | 630.04% | 1 |
| NCAA Football 14 | 7815 | 171.19% | 2 |
| Outrun Online Arcade | 495 | 131.30% | 3 |
| Fable Anniversary | 8751 | 95.51% | 4 |
| Diablo III: Reaper of Souls | 1737 | 75.72% | 5 |
| Crysis 3 | 5843 | 75.43% | 6 |
| Overlord 2 | 702 | 68.96% | 7 |
| Driver: San Francisco | 794 | 68.74% | 8 |
| Gun | 628 | 67.67% | 9 |
| Overlord | 722 | 66.85% | 10 |
| Telltale’s Tales from the Borderlands | 506 | 66.58% | 11 |
| Silent Hill Homecoming | 1327 | 66.42% | 12 |
| Dragon Age 2 | 5494 | 65.94% | 13 |
| Mafia II | 6948 | 64.63% | 14 |
| Crysis 2 | 3375 | 64.09% | 15 |
| Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga | 374 | 62.65% | 16 |
| Rumble Roses XX | 498 | 62.56% | 17 |
| Wolfenstein | 1380 | 62.33% | 18 |
| Leisure Suit Larry | 201 | 62.23% | 19 |
| Borderlands Pre-Sequel | 2295 | 62.21% | 20 |
Now here is what probably some of you have been waiting for. 18 weeks, 4 months, and a pretty nice top 20 list chock full of statistics. Aptly, the Three Amigos as I have called them for most of the time, are 1,2, and 3. See when you spend a lot of time with this sort of thing, you pretty much know the ones that are going to be near the top. However, what you don’t know is the ones underneath.
Fable Anniversary is very high, however I still protest that was some kind of glitch from the first to second week where the sucker climbed by some 37% and set the whole thing off. It still did decent in the weeks since then, but nowhere near that one week total. From there, we see some familiar favorites from Diablo III to Crysis 3 to the Overlords, and recent surging title, Driver. Then two of my personal favorites, Gun and Silent Hill finish at #9 and #12 respectively.
Moving on, we do see a trail of 2’s with Dragon Age 2, Mafia II, and Crysis 2 and Divinity II. Then the next three are probably titles that won’t end up in any BC list anytime soon; Rumble Roses XX, Wolfenstein (since it’s Activision) and Leisure Suit Larry. Capped off at the end by Borderlands Pre-Sequel which has surged in the past few weeks at end at #20. Interestingly enough, Skyrim is #24 in this mix which in addition to my physical copy, 2 guide books, I bought a digital copy this week too. Seriously, it’s one of my favorite games ever, and the fact it has not been released as BC is ridiculous. Which brings us to a question many of you probably have had over the last four months. I have over 130 games on this list, Of the ones left not voted to Backwards Compatibility(or are confirmed for next month)…which ten games if you could wave a magic wand would you vote for to BC. Only 10…not a hundred plus.
Here they are:
1. Elder Scrolls Skyrim – without a doubt, my favorite game of the Xbox 360 era.
2. XCom: Enemy Unknown/Enemy Within – This is cheating a little, but most fans know they are very close to the same thing (but at the same different enough that both should be included). But this game elevated my love of Turn Based Strategy to a whole new level.
3. Mafia II – Perhaps the most underrated open world GTA style clone there is. Amazing story, amazing voice acting, and great gameplay. There is a reason I played through the whole story, and all of the DLC (which I rarely do), it’s awesome start to finish.
4. Fable Anniversary – This is a shoe-in, I’m sure but since Fable II did get the nod to BC, I’d be remiss not to include the game that started it all on the original Xbox which received an excellent port to the Xbox 360. Henceforth, the game needs to be on Xbox One to come full circle.
5. Gun – Sure, it’s by Activision, sure it has vey little chance, but the voting has been very strong, there is love for this western classic. It’s another full circle type game as it was on the original Xbox, was then ported to Xbox 360 and now needs to complete the final leg of its journey to the Xbox One. Activision, make it happen…fix the Wolf 3d mess and release this one to BC, there is no money to be made, just do it.
6. NCAA Football 14 – Because Snoop said so. Seriously, it’s the last of a breed, college football games. It was a darn good one too, I’ve been playing the digital copy in spots and as long as I own a Xbox 360, I will play it whenever I am needing something to satisfy that football itch. Truth be told, I can’t stand watching college football, but something about managing a dynasty, something about playing this game makes me love this game. And that’s the best type of game, really.
7. Silent Hill Homecoming – This is also part of a series we will probably no longer see for quite sometime. Silent Hill Homecoming wasn’t the best of the series, but it was the best of the 360 era. (Downpour just didn’t measure up and the Origins collection was a buggy mess) Therefore, people need to remember what big scares and a tense storyline are all about from one of the originators of the concept.
8. Darkness 2 – Rarely does a pure first person shooter game bring out this deep of a love. The story to this game was fantastic start to finish and impressed me so much that I picked up several graphic novels in the series. Sadly, the graphic novels don’t live up to the game which I keep my fingers crossed that we might get a third one someday. Let’s bring it to the Xbox One so others can see what this masterpiece is all about.
9. Phantasy Star II – Before the Fallouts, Fables, Elder Scrolls and other great RPGs, there was Phantasy Star, and more importantly Phantasy Star II which received a solo release from Sega and Xbox Live Arcade quite a few years ago. It was honestly largely ignored, but the game is a true classic and deserves to see some love in the Xbox One. Furthermore, with all of the Sega titles from the first update (even a delisted Golden Axe), this doesn’t seem like an unreasonable request.
10. Deadpool – I have spent the better part of four months seeing this game at #1 (except for this week) and wondering what Activision is really thinking. Besides the dollar signs aspect. The truth is, that’s the only thing I can think of. Deadpool was a game that you had to give a chance to. Sure, the comedy comes strong out of the gate, but once you get ten or so hours into it, you realize this is really a fun game. The powerups start to mean something, and those hammers are not nearly as useless as you thought they were. (Most powerful weapon in the game, bar none). The story never takes itself seriously, and Nolan North steals the show with the best voice acting I have ever seen in a Superhero game. The achievements are well thought out, and convey the exact same message the story does, fun, funny but challenging too. Maybe in six months when they realize the port was a failure, they will quietly release Deadpool on the 360 for backwards compatibility.
Anyway, hope you have enjoyed these analyses, I have enjoyed doing them. For the next week, enjoy your turkey, and I hopefully will be enjoying mine. Take care.
