Welcome to the 3rd iteration of Backwards Compatibility Voting. Some old titles, some very new titles, some I am still scratching my head about and wondering who…pray tell who was voting for these. But numbers don’t lie, unless they are in a crowded bar and had four shots of tequila. Then they start to tell you all sorts of things and want to sleep around with punctuation marks. It escalates quickly, and nobody is spared. Let’s move on, shall we?
If you would like a copy of the file that these votes are stored in, please click here: Backwards-votes
Top 15
| Name | Difference | % |
| Deadpool | 461 | 19.30% |
| NCAA Football 14 | 478 | 6.50% |
| Outrun Online Arcade | 30 | 6.49% |
| Murdered: Soul Suspect | 16 | 4.89% |
| Sherlock Holmes vs Jack The Ripper | 12 | 4.72% |
| Leisure Suit Larry | 16 | 4.53% |
| Rainbow Six Vegas II | 308 | 4.02% |
| Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga | 24 | 3.76% |
| Silent Hill Homecoming | 83 | 3.75% |
| Mafia II | 453 | 3.73% |
| Rainbow Six Vegas | 227 | 3.65% |
| Dante’s Inferno | 247 | 3.62% |
| Phantasy Star II | 25 | 3.59% |
| Crysis 2 | 209 | 3.56% |
| Orange Box | 725 | 3.52% |
Bottom 5
| Lost Odyssey | 208 | 2.18% |
| Alan Wake | 474 | 2.03% |
| Killer is Dead | 22 | 1.80% |
| Sega Vintage Collection: Alex Kidd | 9 | 1.76% |
| Stranglehold | 13 | 1.70% |
Comments and Analysis
Deadpool, fresh off a new teaser and a pair of redband/greenband trailers for the new movie, is still in first place. The percentages are not quite as good but its still such a big discrepancy that it’s going to be hard to slow down the Merc with a mouth. The big question that is still present in everybody’s mind though is Activision going to be part of this backwards compatibility parade? At Gamescom this week, they announced just about every big name was going to have at least a few games in the backwards compatible camp except one. Activision. So no Call of Duty, no Prototype, No Gun (huge frowny face) and no Deadpool. Now if that changes even for COD, I’ll be more hopeful.
NCAA Football 14 and Outrun Online Arcade are still going strong. I’m still trying to figure out why does Outrun show up every week when its a delisted game. Also of note, this was a Electronic Arts sports sale week on Xbox Live and NCAA Football 14 was nowhere to be found. That doesn’t bode well with the college football season right around the corner. It still has hope obviously and I’m still wrapping my head around the licensing aspect as well. But then NCAA Football 13 and 12 are still being sold digitally on Xbox Marketplace too. So maybe.
It was also nice to see Mafia II, Crysis 2, Orange Box and the Rainbow Six games as well get their usual places in this list. But then something strange happened. Primarily Murdered: Soul Suspect, one of the Sherlock Holmes games, Divinity II, Phantasy Star II and the Leisure Suit Larry game, really? That turd? Now, Divinity II and Phantasy Star II, those are darn good games, but raise your hand if you have actively played those titles? And playing PS2 on the Genesis does not count. That’s what I thought. And keep in mind, these are percentages so a few people voting does make more of the difference than the usual tally say Red Dead Redemption gets. But still, it’s bloody fascinating.
One last note, Silent Hill Homecoming drops into the Top 10 even. Why? Because Konami released a brand new….Pachinko game with Silent Hill’s likeness this week. I’m not even kidding. So sad…so very sad.
Moving on to the bottom five. The first two titles do not even count really…why? Because they are Microsoft titles. We know that Alan Wake and Lost Odyssey are making backwards compatibility, it’s just a matter of time. I think more importantly are the two titles that almost made this list. I’m looking at you, Eternal Sonata and Deadly Premonition. Eternal Sonata especially I would consider to be on the cusp of making it or not making it. It’s been consistently weak every week after getting to roughly 3,000 votes. I also thought there would be more of a cult following to vote for Deadly Premonition too.
The other three which are in the bottom five continue to be titles which have little to no hope of making backwards compatibility. Killer is Dead (which was last the previous week), one of the Sega Vintage titles (poor Alex Kidd) and Stranglehold. Stranglehold has not even amassed one thousand votes and it is deeply unfortunate when the game was very well done and captured John Woo’s creativity close to perfect. But Midway isn’t even around anymore, they went into bankruptcy and the assets went to Warner Bros. The studio that built Stranglehold was reformed into NetherRealm Studios. NetherRealm basically only cares about Mortal Kombat. Yeah, Stranglehold isn’t even on the radar.
Anyway, hope you enjoy that little piece of history in software making, join us next week for hopefully a few more announcements in backwards compatibility land and since its been five weeks, maybe a monthly analysis too. Later.
