Author: Michael Durr

So….we had a major drop this week in terms of backwards compatibility.  76 games in all including Xbox 360 games, Xbox Original, Games that were Physical releases, digital releases and everything in between.  The full list from just Monday is below with notes regarding their physical and digital (with pricing) status.  I also updated the main list which is right here.  – Main List

There are a lot of great games here, most of which I would have never expected.  Binary Domain, the FEAR series, the Max Payne series, a couple of Mortal Kombats, NIER, Risen 1 & 2, Sacred 2, more Star Wars Games, Timesplitters, and One freaking chanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad.  Yes I own that.

Outpost Kaloki X which was a ridiculous fun little strategy game is on the list.  If you were paying attention to me during my numerous articles back when weekly BC adds were a thing, I stressed that you should have already bought a copy of Xbox Arcade: Volume 1 Unplugged on disc.  It’s cheap, goes for $5 to $10 and there were already 4 BC games (Hardwood Backgammon, Geometry Wars, Bejeweled 2, and Texas Hold Em) on this thing.  Well here is one more, tested it on Monday and it has no issues at all.  Now if I can just remember how to play the darn thing, I’d be set.

I always told myself I would get around to playing games like Conan (on sale for $5.99 at the Xbox Store this week btw), Max Payne 3 (remember this one has a ton of FREE DLC) and NIER all of which have been on my backlog longer than some of you have had your driver’s license.  Well I no longer have an excuse.  I might be adding a few more as well with the likes of The First Templar, Risen, and a 50 Cent game of all things.  I had to also laugh and chuckle at RAW – Realms of Ancient War which has been on sale about 20 times and how many times I passed over it because I didn’t think it would be BC.  I was wrong.

However, I would be amiss if I didn’t mention some of the bad from this drop.  There is no Saboteur, no Gun, no Two Worlds, no Risen 3 (which seems a bit odd considering 1 & 2 made it through).  Certainly there are titles missing that would have been nice.  I mean, were people really clamoring for Chicken Little and Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?  But BC has always been full of questionable choices.

Second, not everything works.  I’m having a problem with TimePilot right now.  It shows that I own it on the Xbox Marketplace page (and I certainly remember buying and playing it), but wants me to pony up the $5 on my Xbox One.  I even tried installing it from my app on my phone and then when I try to start it, it’s looking for a license.  I have contacted Xbox Support on that one and still waiting for an answer. I’ve heard that Elements of Destruction and Warlords have had similar issues.

Screwjumper! is on the list and was previously only available digitally.  But now, it’s not even available which means only people who bought it previously will get to replay it.  If you are into TrueAchievements stats, that’s a grand total of 236 people on that service who have played it.  Not a whole heck of a lot.  Also there was an announcement earlier this week that the Skate 2 online servers would be closing.  That is such an Electronic Arts announcement if I ever heard one.  The Max Payne 3 servers also closed in September which is when I pretty much gave up on the game and basically discontinued half of the achievements.   So much for new players discovering that one.

Overall, I realize I am nitpicking just a tiny bit.  But then, this is what I lived and breathed for years and it was nice really to just reflect on this wonderful thing we call Backwards Compatibility.  It also made me sad because it’s also been confirmed by numerous sources that this is the LAST DROP.  Out with one big push and then we are done, back to work on other things.  Anyway, take a look at the list, I tried to provide as much information as possible and hopefully you’ll find as much enjoyment as I did writing about it.  Take care and enjoy.

(if you are ready this thru the summary, please click the continue Reading link for the full table)

Continue reading “Xbox Backwards Compatibility News for November” →

About 2 1/2 years ago, I wrote about the final batch of 360 and original Xbox games going backwards compatible. I thought I had closed down that chapter of this site and that’s when the site started changing into more of a blog and review site. I wasn’t bagging out weekly reports anymore, and honestly content has never quite been the same despite my efforts otherwise.

Well, October was an interesting month for backwards compatibility. There were a couple of articles that I am linking here for you to read about.

Strange MS Store activity could suggest new backwards compatible OG Xbox games

A lot of news to absorb here, the first being that we should be getting actual official news on new titles in November, just a few days away. The second being that titles from OG games are popping up on the Xbox store which usually is an indicator that they will become BC.

Dead or Alive 3, Dead or Alive Ultimate, Full Spectrum Warrior: Ten Hammers, Gladius, Gunvalkyrie, Advent Rising, and Chicken Little were found in the MS Store in their original form as placeholders which used to be a sign that BC was coming for those titles.

The Dead or Alive games are always exciting (outside of the obvious male reasoning) but Gladius was an interesting tactical rpg that I will certainly look into.  Advent Rising and Gunvalkyrie were third person shooters that probably don’t get a lot of love but are worth looking into.  The two least worthy titles are probably Full Spectrum Warrior and well, Chicken Little.  Chicken Little could very well be just a red-herring and that Xbox was testing something.  Hopefully the others are legit.

And then this article today:

Two more Xbox 360 titles spotted on Microsoft Store with backwards compatibility IDs 

The first game mentioned was The First Templar, a hack and slash adventure that from the looks of it was a decent amount of fun and even had a piece of DLC in the Arena.  It is available both digitally ($14.99) as well as physically (an used copy should run you about $10).  As someone who plays a LOT of hack and slash, I’m really surprised I haven’t at least given it a try.

The second game is Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?  which I hope is something of a joke.  Not that I don’t support all BC because I do…but come on.  It’s not available digitally at the moment and physical copies vary wildly in price from $10 to $25 and higher.  Are people really paying rare prices for Jeff Foxworthy gameshow adaptations?  Anyway, I’ll probably try to grab First Templar at some point.

Hopefully this is a continuing trend and I am excited about the potential come November.  While most would agree that these are some odd titles, I don’t expect the actual releases to be all that mainstream.  All of the truly mainstream and sought after titles are already backwards compatible.  I mean, sure I am still wishing for Saboteur, Max Payne 3, Gun, or the Two Worlds games, but at this point of the game I would be just happy for a new batch of titles to discuss.  Stay tuned as I will certainly follow this and report as soon as I know more.  Take care and enjoy.

I am starting to get back in the groove of things. I want to write again and while it’s probably not where it was say a year ago at this time, but I’m trying to realize that writing only helps my mood. When I don’t write, my depression kicks into high gear and I’m really a bother to about everyone I care about. I know it seems silly, but it’s the absolute truth.

That aside, I should be doing a review for the remastered blu-ray set of Superman: The Animated Series soon. I reviewed the dvd set about 10 years ago and while some of my old comments will carry over, presentation and extras will need to be re-evaluated. Most people know I am way more of a Batman guy, but even I will admit that the Superman Animated Series was very well done. Furthermore, this will be my first introduction of the series to my son who loves just about anything that’s superhero related. So that alone will be the worth the effort I put into it.

Other news, I dropped Hulu recently (my son wasn’t happy but he has plenty to watch) due to the loss of the Food Network, ID, and other networks. I naturally subscribed to Discovery+ which became their own streaming service. It probably didn’t help that Hulu raised their prices as well. So far, so good on the service, it has a huge selection of material (I did not realize BBC and Animal Planet also have material on the service) and I’m only have a minor issue with some of the subtitling. But no longer am I subject to the random seasons that Hulu seemed to have of my favorite shows.

On to video games, and the last couple of months I’ve been going back and visiting older games that I never completed. We aren’t talking AAA titles here, but remasters like the Dig Dug series or Sega Vintage Collection: Golden Axe which I were able to complete after all of this time. I finally beat the heart on Slay the Spire with the Watcher which was the last class I had not done it with. (Was quite proud of that victory). I even went back to Ziggurat, had a successful run and knocked down three more achievements.

However, a couple of those games that I did go back and visits did not wield any success as I tried Crysis 3 again only to fully realize what my trouble was six years ago when I played it last. I basically suck at any first person shooter not named Doom and Wolfenstein but never seem to learn from my mistakes. I also went back and tried the remaster of Galaga and while I did net one more achievement, the challenge stages are much too difficult to 100% as they require a ton of repetitive button mashing (something I was never really good at). So back those two titles went to probably not be seen again for a few years (at least in the case of Galaga, Crysis 3 I am probably done with).

As to what I’m playing now? A combination of two games for the most part. I am playing a game I’m sure a lot of people recognize in Hades which is my current rogue-lite game of choice. I’m not sure if I would put it in the elite company of Slay the Spire and Ziggurat but it is a great deal of fun and I did finally beat it for the first time very recently. I am not consistently winning yet (in fact I still have only won once), but I am getting to Styx a lot even with weapons that I was having trouble with initially. While I am nowhere near the level of player that I have seen on Twitch doing these runs, I am having fun with it which is what’s important.

The second game I am getting through is a game I finally started earlier this year in Murdered: Soul Suspect. I mean the game is seven years old at this point but it does take a bit of dedication and persistence to find all of the collectibles which in my opinion is the game’s only major flaw. I have found 179 collectibles I believe and I just started the museum. I realize I am in the home stretch of the game and hope to complete it by Thanksgiving. A younger Michael would probably go back and play it again on 360 but I have way more things to play. The only game I really am double boxing at the moment is Scott Pilgrim which calls back to my River City Ransom roots.

Anyway, we’ll cut it there for today. Expect to see more of me as I ramp back up my writing/blogging and get out of my funk. It’s better for everyone involved. Enjoy.

It’s been two months since I last posted anything on this site. It came down to one very simple reason, and something I wasn’t sure I would be comfortable sharing on this site. It’s personal after all and while I do talk about some personal things on here, I should be sharing anecdotes about films, video games and music. While I have done all those things in the last two months, there is nothing I really feel like sharing about it, at least not yet.
Continue reading “Musings and Nonsense for October 6th, 2021” →

Part One can be found here.

Or you can simply look down the page.

Let’s see, I was pretty happy with myself that I just purchased a couch.  I know, but I have to be happy of something going good for once.  I should have known better.  I finally break down, I finally say hey I can make a purchase and then something needs to break.  Better yet, a couple of things just so slap you on the back of the head a bit.

Anyway, Sunday comes, Grandma leaves back for the homestead.  My wife goes upstairs and comes down and asks “Hey it’s awfully cold up there, what do you have it set on?”  I’m thinking, 72 like every other part of this house.  I like every other man go upstairs and check it out for myself, and yeah it’s pretty freaking cold.  It’s actually 67, but set at 72.  Downstairs, it still says 72 but nothing appears to be running in the middle of summer.  This ain’t good.  So I inevitably do the man thing of play with the thermostats which did no good and then see if something was wrong with the fuse box, and still nothing.

On Monday, I call around and then get someone who can come on Tuesday.  My family decides to sleep upstairs on Monday night, air mattress and all while I take the bed.  I know I should offer, but at 46, I honestly can’t do air mattresses anymore (like someone would have to roll me down the stairs in this case).  Anyway,  Tuesday comes and the guy arrives at the house.  I show him to the attic (mind the old TV boxes and Christmas stuff), and let him poke around the unit.  After about 15 or 20 minutes, he comes back and says that the dampers were bad.  Dampers basically control air flow and in this case the downstairs one was constantly closed and the upstairs one was constantly open.  Hence why it felt like my house was at two sides of the world.  Furthermore, I could benefit from replacing the dump (which also helps with air flow) to something a little more modern.  For now, he just banged on it and that caused the downstairs to open.  Those are technical terms.

Anyway, the next couple of nights were okay but upstairs was still pretty frigid (it had calmed down to about 69) right up until they replaced the dampers and dump on Thursday afternoon.  They did do a great job, it’s been noticeably cooler and the AC hasn’t needed to kick on as much since then.  Of course, my finances are now in pain.  And the pain did not stop there either.  Later that night, the vacuum cleaner decided to break.  We have a quite old Hoover that has lasted about twelve years.  I remember sitting on the floor of my old house picking out cat hairs from this thing (back when I still had a cat), that’s how old it is.  So I guess it was time.  Thankfully I had a couple of Amazon gift cards I was saving for a rainy day (birthday/Christmas) that helped to soften the blow but it was still frustrating to say the least.

So, my wife tends to sell things that my son no longer needs on Facebook marketplace.  Most of these items are $10, $25, maybe a little more, and I really had not paid it any attention.  A couple of weeks ago, my wife asked if I wanted to sell my television which I was no longer using (not as old as the vacuum cleaner, but it was a few years old) on Facebook.  I said sure, why not.  I think I might have been better off selling it along the side of the road.  Okay it wasn’t that bad.  But the topper was we believed we had a buyer at one point early on and they wanted to meet somewhere in the middle.  Well that middle was as they decided, the Waffle House.  If that wasn’t bad enough, they didn’t believe our pictures of it working online was doing it justice so they wanted to bring along an extension cord and hook it up in the Waffle House so they could see it in action.  Right.  This was going bad to worse and I asked my wife very nicely to stop dealing with the person.

Sadly the person decided to keep harassing my wife and said that because we pulled out it somehow ruined a family outing.  Eventually it subsided and we kept trying to sell it to other interested folks.  Finally, we did find another buyer and even sent them an additional picture of it in action to make sure we didn’t have any more “Waffle House” suggestions.  We met at a Costco, exchanged money and TV and that was that.  The morale of the story?  Facebook marketplace is only slightly better than a garage sale (which I will never do again).  At least the second person was on the ball, and it was very appreciated.

Well, I’m going to actually end the column there, I know I forgot to talk about Prince’s newish album, but I probably want to give it another listen before I give a formal review.

Enjoy.

Okay, a little better with my writing, but I still need to improve.  It’s been about two weeks since I last wrote and at the thought of writing again, it certainly brought a smile to my face that writing this column was serving some purpose.  Which sounds odd I’m sure but considering past situations, it was almost a chore to do this six months ago.  So what has happened lately?

Well, the last couple of weeks were very difficult.  After five years of my kid picking apart the middle part of the couch, we decided the time was right to finally get a new couch.  Grandma was in town, and my wife and myself took the opportunity to go to three different furniture places in the span of two hours.  The first stop was Rooms to Go which my wife always loved since it basically made all the decisions for her which would not only include a couch in this situation but also an easy chair, end tables, lamps, rugs and anything else Rooms to Go could throw into the space.  Unfortunately, in classic Rooms to Go fashion, the couches we were really interested in weren’t available until October.  I’m not a fan of waiting of waiting 2-3 months and we left.  No couch, no end table, no lamp.  My wife did not seem pleased.

We had passed by a Bel Furniture on the way to Rooms to Go and saw they were having some sort of Black Friday in July sale and decided that was our next destination.  Getting there seemed easy, but in the midst of a circle drive (these should be outlawed) and turning down a side street which look reserved for giant trucks that would crush my now seemingly undersized SUV didn’t seem like a good use of time.  But eventually we got there and parked in what barely resembled a parking spot.  We went inside, and it looked like a clearing house of sorts where everything was marked really low (which was great for me) because quite frankly no one in their right mind would want 75-80% of these items.  I should have turned around at this point.  But in classic Durr fashion, I pressed forward.

We eventually found a couch that interested me with a price that was even more inticing.  I gave it the usual sit test and then looked at my beautiful wife of nearly seven years and asked so, 1-10 what do you think?  She looked back at me and responded “ehhh, 5…6”.  What about that one that we would have waited until October for at Rooms to Go?  She shrugged, “A 6?” What about the couch we have at home before our son got a hold of it?   “6, maybe a 7.”  We walked out of Bel Furniture and left a couch and a really nice easy chair (or at least I thought).  I am sure the heck not buying something that’s not at least a 7 on my wife’s very tough scale.

I won’t lie, things were not going well.  My mother in law had given us a good opportunity to shop for something that would have ended terribly had we brought along our six year old.  We would have purchased something that was either a 6 and/or waited until October to get it.  But we were arguably wasting time and things were going to close in about 90 minutes.  So I did what any reasonable person would do in this situation.  Take my wife to get frozen yogurt.  After indulging in some much needed frozen refreshment, we re-analyzed the situation and went to the place we should have went in the first place, Texas Furniture Hut.

Texas Furniture Hut was the place several years ago where I bought four book cases to replace my old I just got you from Walmart and Target mix and matches.  We also purchased our dining table from there and to this day all those pieces of furniture are holding up like prize fighting champions of the world.  I’d buy 20 more of those bookcases if I had the space or the money to do so.  They are that good.  It also happened to be a stone’s throw from the yogurt place and was still open.  We go in and immediately my wife finds the couch she wanted, theater seating.  Down girl.

After I had a small heart attack on the price (it was an 8 by the way and no I don’t have any idea what a 10 resembled but I was pretty sure the Royal Family was not willing to part with any of their heirlooms on an installment plan), we moved on to look at more reasonably priced pieces of furniture.  We actually liked quite a few of the pieces.  After about 20 or so minutes, we did end up finding one that I not only liked for its comfort (and support for my back) but didn’t break the bank.  It was also a 7 on the wife rating which meant I could move forward.

As with most purchases that are costly (which for me is always anything that’s $500 or higher), we walk around the item about 5-10 times before inevitably someone from the place comes up and asks if we need any help.  Which happened here, and even though we weren’t at a car dealership, I decided to spin the conversation into “Can you do any better on the price here?”  We were also interested in the easy chair that went along with the couch but it’s hard justifying the chair when its only a few hundred less than the giant couch.

Oddly enough, it did lead to a 15% discount (which she said they were having a sale but since there weren’t any obvious signs around I just labelled it as trying to help out my non-decisive self) and they still had one in the warehouse.  Only $100 to deliver and assemble it was pretty awesome as well.  I ended up getting it last Friday and it has lived up to the billing so far.  Trust me, if I need a piece of furniture from here on out, I will start there rather than spend time at random other places.  However, the yogurt was excellent.

So that’s part one of my last couple of weeks.  I have more to tell from a broken AC to a broken vacuum cleaner to Facebook TV Selling to Prince’s “NEW” album.  But I need to take a break.  More later.  Enjoy.

It’s funny.  You reach a point where you let yourself think for one second, okay maybe we can start returning to a normal life, I can start writing blog posts with regular frequency because I have plenty of stuff to talk about.  That would mean I’m happy or at least not absolutely miserable about the state of the world.  Mind you I do have a lovely wife and a fantastic son but it’s very hard for me to be truly positive when it comes to what’s surrounding me.  So much that it has affected my writing, more than I like to think about for the simple fact that I might be rationalizing not having this site anymore.

I don’t like that at all, especially from the time I was 18 until I got the site in 2013, so roughly 20 years, I had wanted one and knew exactly which domain I wanted.  Heck, I still check Kedrix.com as well every six months or so…oh would you look at that?  Kedrix.com is available for $5,195.  HugeDomains.com, you can suck it, seriously.  (I would probably consider it for 1 to 2k)  I’m not a fan of squatters.  I consider myself lucky that I got Kedrix.net when I did.

Going back to writing, keep in mind that I haven’t even done a book review (above assigning a rating) in months.  My reviews have been limited and most blu-rays and dvds I get these days are from the bargain bin.  I’m more likely to get a new cd release than a new movie for the most part.  Heck, I got the new St Vincent cd upon release back in May (not bad though I preferred Masseduction and her self titled cd).  I will probably pick up the new release from Prince’s vault when it drops in a couple of weeks.  I also plan to get Jungle’s new cd when it drops in August.  Maybe I should start doing cd reviews, lol.

Or perhaps I should start talking wrestling again.  WWE finally has live crowds back and Money in the Bank was last night (don’t read the next part if you are trying to avoid spoilers).

…

Spoilers ahead.  Feel free to visit my Black Cauldron review from June instead.

…

The best match was Rhea Ripley and Charlotte Flair in my opinion.  They had the most chemistry and the finish of Charlotte finally outwitting Rhea made complete sense.  This would probably be followed by the Men MITB match which saw a very deserved win for Big E.  Disappointments of the night?  Well Kofi and Lashley would be an obvious favorite.  I know, let’s make Lashley strong but they made Kofi look up to the level of someone who had a tryout match for NXT against Karrion Kross.  Heck Kross sells more moves than Lashley.  I think they had Goldberg next in mind for Lashley from what I’ve read, but why?  But I guess Summerslam is just about selling as many tickets as they can even if Goldberg really isn’t a draw anymore.

The Women’s Money in the Bank was also disappointing.  I like Nikki Cross, really I do.  But this Almost a Super Hero gimmick isn’t winning anyone over.  It’s just sadly all creative has for her at the moment.  I also guess if I listened to the Internet trolls, I mean the Internet Wrestling Community, I would have believed that every one was going to take a crap on Alexa Bliss (who has always been one of my favorites).  That was FAR from the truth.  She was getting some solid fan reaction in the form of loud cheers anytime she was close to winning and a solid boo when she was buried by the other seven superstars with ladders.  I read Twitter this morning and a few idiots were still trying to convince others that they were booing her or there was no reaction at all.  You know who had no reaction at all?  Natalya and Tamina.  Bless their heart, they work their butts off, but still no one seems to care.

Which is certainly what they did with John Cena challenging Roman Reigns at the end of the PPV.  We could believe that John Cena will finally get his 17th World Title which would also lead the way to Big E going over John Cena (because Cena has always been willing to put some one over) via his MITB shot.  Big E proved he could be a main eventer with his IC reign, so I’m certainly willing to make the leap on the Universal Championship.  Or perhaps Roman is just going to be World Champ until Wrestlemania when they would arguably bring back Lesnar.  So they can have a World Title match where I completely fall asleep.  This is why I watch NXT with more regularity.

7/20 – Update: Looks like Nikki ASH won the Woman’s title on Raw from Charlotte after Rhea left her laying.  They love giving Charlotte the short reigns as they try to convince everyone that she is every bit Ric’s daughter.  This will most likely lead to a triple threat at Summerslam where Nikki will probably still go over in some fashion.  Does this probably just lead the way for Becky to come back and fued with Nikki over the title, hrmmm that doesn’t sound quite right.   I will have to think about that a little more.

Anyway, I think this qualifies as a solid blog post for today.  I’m not really playing any video games worth mentioning, but if I do play some really good indie game or an AAA title that just got released, I’ll bring it up for sure.  Have a great day, I’m going to try and do this a couple of times a week, even if I’m just rambling about random subjects like I did here.  Anything is better than just watching grass grow.  Enjoy.