End of the highway: The Xbox 360 recreation market will shut down

The digital storefront for buying video games and different media on the Xbox 360 recreation console can be shut down subsequent summer time, only a bit shy of 20 years after the console’s debut.

A weblog submit announcement credited to Dave McCarthy, CVP of Xbox Player Services at Microsoft, acknowledged that purchases will not be potential beginning on July 29, 2024. The change impacts each the on-console retailer and the Xbox 360 Marketplace web site. Users will lose the power to buy video games, films and TV content material, and avatars and different profile customizations.

Users will nonetheless have the ability to obtain and play video games they’ve already bought for the foreseeable future after that date, and plenty of different community options will proceed to work, like communication with mates, cloud saves, and on-line play in multiplayer video games whose builders nonetheless assist it. Developers will nonetheless have the ability to problem patches and updates to Xbox 360 video games, too. Backward-compatible Xbox 360 video games will nonetheless be accessible for buy on the Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S shops, Microsoft says.

That stated, the identical will not be true for video content material customers have acquired. TV episodes and movies bought by way of Xbox’s on-line market will stay in customers’ libraries, however playback will not be potential on Xbox 360 consoles. Users must flip to different machines like Windows PCs or newer Xbox consoles just like the Xbox One or Xbox Series X to view the content material.

Although the Xbox 360’s on-line market was one of many first digital distribution platforms for recreation consoles, this is not the primary time a shutdown like this has been introduced. Nintendo infamously shut down the Wii U and 3DS eShops, which ended entry to quite a few indie titles. Sony introduced related plans for the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita, however canceled them after a buyer, media, and influencer backlash. It moved forward with closing the older PSP retailer, although.