Delisted Xbox 360 video games briefly reappear on the Xbox Store — Microsoft prepares backward compatibility revival

Several delisted Xbox 360 video games briefly reappeared on the Xbox Store this week earlier than being pulled once more, in accordance with the Better xCloud datamining account, which screens Microsoft’s cloud gaming backend for adjustments. This follows Xbox Vice President Jason Ronald’s dedication at GDC 2026 in March to revive the corporate’s backward compatibility program as a part of Xbox’s twenty fifth anniversary later this 12 months.

The titles noticed embrace Aegis Wing, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, and Mars: War Logs, all of which had been faraway from the shop beforehand. The Prince of Persia title resurfaced with its unique launch date, together with an obvious placeholder worth of $100, and the 2003 shooter Armed and Dangerous additionally reappeared and vanished shortly earlier than the newest batch. Mars: War Logs was delisted across the similar time.

One or two unintended relists may imply nothing, however the sample throughout 4 titles in fast succession has understandably caught consideration. The Better xCloud account, run by the developer behind the browser plugin of the identical title, first flagged Armed and Dangerous as a doable mistake earlier than noting that subsequent appearances seemed intentional.

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At GDC 2026 in San Francisco, Ronald told attendees that the game preservation team would be “rolling out new ways to play some of the most iconic games from our past” as part of Xbox’s 25th anniversary celebrations. Microsoft discontinued its backward compatibility program in 2021, citing licensing issues and technical limitations that prevented further titles from being added to the catalog.

The program originally launched in 2015 and brought hundreds of original Xbox and Xbox 360 titles to Xbox One and later Xbox Series X|S. At its peak, the catalog included over 600 titles spanning two console generations. Since the hiatus, fan demand for its return has remained high, with the community-run Xbox Game Preservation website tracking which Original Xbox titles players most want to see come back. Top-requested games on the site include Jet Set Radio Future, Sonic Heroes, and The Simpsons: Hit & Run.

All this raises questions on how backward compatibility will work on Project Helix, Microsoft’s next-generation console powered by a customized AMD SoC. Microsoft has confirmed that Helix will play each Xbox console and PC video games, and Ronald described the machine as delivering an “order of magnitude” leap in ray tracing efficiency on the similar GDC presentation.

Speculation has centered on the likelihood that Microsoft’s preservation staff is working to convey Xbox 360 emulation to Windows PCs, which might maintain older titles accessible on each Helix and commonplace Windows 11 machines, however Microsoft hasn’t confirmed that.

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