Xbox emulators
| |
| Xbox console with the "Xbox controller" | |
| Developer | Microsoft |
|---|---|
| Manufacturer | Flextronics |
| Type | Home video game console |
| Generation | Sixth |
| Release date | NA: November 15, 2001 JP: February 22, 2002 PAL: March 14, 2002 |
| Discontinued | JP: 2005 WW: 2006 |
| Successor | Xbox 360 |
| Emulated | ✓ |
- For emulators that run on the original Xbox, see Emulators on Xbox.
The Xbox is a sixth-generation console released by Microsoft on November 15, 2001. Known as the DirectXbox during development, it is notable for the specs having similarities to a PC due to using familiar components around the x86 architecture. It had a custom Pentium III CPU at 733 MHz with 64 MBs of RAM, and a custom Nvidia GPU codenamed NV2A at 233 MHz. The Xbox was often said to be the most powerful console from the sixth generation, and Sega later designed the Chihiro arcade system with the same components.
The Xbox was a modest seller and helped create a brand for Microsoft that would give its successor a stronger market share in the west. Despite Microsoft's best efforts, the original Xbox and succeeding consoles from the company never gained a foothold in Japan for various reasons.[1] It had a number of advantages over other sixth-gen consoles at the time; it was the only console to include a hard disk,[2] meaning it was the first to be able to rip CDs, and it was the first and only console of the lineup to include a unified online service called Xbox Live,[3] prompting Sony to create the PlayStation Network the next generation.
Early in its lifespan, the Xbox had an unusually active modding scene compared to the other consoles (often vindicated by the incredibly short warranty). Upon the first jailbreak by Andrew Huang, the scene ultimately delivered no comprehensive emulation until the mid-2010s,[4] as Xbox homebrew typically relied on stolen XDKs rather than true reverse-engineering work. Although developers have continued to have issues because, alongside the poorly documented hardware and repeated uses of the simpler but largely failed HLE approach, there has been little motivation to develop an emulator because many of the Xbox's games either came from Windows or were then released for Windows afterward (though it does retain a few exclusives). However, the Xbox emulation scene has been resurging with two emulators at the forefront since mid-2017. Their developers continue to say there's no competition between them, as they're both open-source and have different goals and methods.[5][6]
The controller ports use a proprietary USB interface, so it may be possible to hook-up or connect other USB devices by modifying the console.
Emulators
edit
- ↑ Playable state in the xemu compatibility list purposely doesn't include performance metrics due to varying PC build possibilities (see #Comparisons section) and minor graphical, audio, or FMV issues. While the compatibility list categorizes majority games as playable, some users may encounter issues that impact their individual experience and consider them unplayable.
- ↑ Xeon runs only one commercial game and it is Halo NTSC version, it plays very roughly, the images are too slow to get in game.
- ↑ If you remove the game whitelist it will allow more Xbox Classic games to be played on the Xbox 360 than are officially supported.
Comparisons
edit- XQEMU
- A low-level emulator based on QEMU. It can emulate the BIOS and many games at very slow speeds but is sometimes faster than Cxbx with acceptable graphics. Audio has not been tested but is assumed to be emulated, just not forwarded to the audio hardware for some reason.
- xemu
- A low-level emulator by Matt Borgerson continuing much of the work done on XQEMU. Focuses on stability, performance, and ease of use. xemu also supports various enhancements and some system features and peripherals. While some titles require powerful hardware for full-speed emulation (see the Computer specifications#xemu page), CPU performance, particularly single-threaded performance, is often the bottleneck. Additionally, using demanding graphical enhancements may also require a strong GPU.
- Cxbx
- One of the first Xbox emulators. It started as an ahead-of-time compiler for Xbox executables.
- Dxbx
- A port of Cxbx to Delphi, expanded with a redesigned symbol detection engine, many rendering improvements, a new pixel shader converter, etc. It ended its development at a similar stage as Cxbx.
- Cxbx-Reloaded
- A fork of Cxbx that has been having good development momentum since mid-2016. It is built for x86_64 machines and includes a ton of improvements to its HLE kernel, some from code originating in Dxbx and other related forks. While it has HLE support for the GPU and other parts (e.g., audio) to make many games run fast, XQEMU's LLE implementation was introduced in April 2018 and is expected to help even further. Beyond this, Cxbx-Reloaded supports various enhancements and some system features and peripherals. Roadmap for more information about CXBX-Reloaded emulator.
- StrikeBox
- Beginning low-level emulator that just initializes an x86 system and runs whatever is in the ROM. Few works for this. It was uploaded to GitHub on Dec 5, 2017, by mborgerson, a well-known XQEMU contributor.
- Xeon
- Can emulate Halo: Combat Evolved to the point where the first stage is semi-playable. The walls and ground are pitch black, and the game crashes after you complete the first stage or right after you select the difficulty on modern versions of Windows. It was noteworthy for being the first emulator to run Halo as well as for predating the PC port of Halo.
- MAME
- Existing x86 emulation in MAME has given way to an Xbox driver. However, it has been marked as not working and sound as unimplemented (graphics are OK, though). On some firmware versions it displays an error message with no error code at most.
Consoles
edit- Xenon Fusion (XeFu)
- The internal name for backward compatibility on the Xbox 360. It supports a specific list of games that, while some work right off the bat, may need additional patches to play properly. It also requires your console to have system storage. Some games still have issues with graphical glitches and slowdowns to errors that can make standard gameplay basically impossible. If you remove the game whitelist; it allows for more Xbox Classic games to be played on the Xbox 360 than are officially supported. Some games not officially supported play almost perfectly, however, some have various issues. [7]
- Fission
- The internal name for backward compatibility on the Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S. Supporting much fewer games likely due to licensing: developers and publishers going defunct, movie and toy tie-in, brands, vehicles, music Licenses expiring. However, it has better loading times and allows the ones that do work to run at twice the Xbox's standard resolution (480p) on both Xbox One (S) and Xbox Series S consoles (up to 960p), and more than quadruple on Xbox One X and Xbox Series X consoles (up to 2160p).
- Unfortunately, with November 2021 update Microsoft ends the program and said: "This latest and final addition of titles to the backwards compatibility program was only possible through the passion and feedback from the community," Microsoft said. "Your constant requests for specific titles and enhancements encouraged the Backwards Compatibility team to partner with the original creators to preserve thousands of games from over four generations of Xbox. While we continue to stay focused on preserving and enhancing the art form of games, we've reached the limit of our ability to bring new games to the catalog from the past due to licensing, legal and technical constraints. Thank you for being part of this journey with us."[8] Microsoft added support for Windows 11 on Fission starting from July 2026.[9]
Enhancements
edit| Name | xemu | Cxbx-Reloaded | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Controls | Disguise peripheral support through passthrough Tricking the software into think that the original controller was connected even those identify themselves with different device IDs. When a game tries to identify a connected 'nearly the same internally' controller, emulator will tell it that the equivalent original controller is connected instead, allowing it to work. |
? | ? |
| Input lag mitigating | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Mouse injector | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Real peripheral support (passthrough) Ability to passthrough USB HID devices or Bluetooth adapter for emulated system. |
WIP | ~ | |
| Turbo button | ? | ? | |
| Graphics | Better texture filtering Enhancement option for providing better texture filtering methods comparing the original hardware had. |
WIP | ? |
| Pre-rendering anti-aliasing (MSAA, SSAA) |
✗ | ✗ | |
| Ray tracing (DXR, VRT and MRT) |
Implementing ray tracing in an emulator is unfortunately quite challenging and unlikely to be possible soon. However, you can try "Screen-Space Ray Traced Global Illumination" shader using ReShade. Demonstration | ||
| Resizable internal resolution | ✓ | ✓ | |
| RTX Remix | Implementing RTX Remix technology in an emulator is unfortunately quite challenging and unlikely to be possible soon. You can use ReShade for post-processing. | ||
| Super-resolution techniques (DLSS, XeSS and FSR 2+) |
Requires access to the depth buffer and temporal data like motion-vectors, so it is quite challenging and unlikely to be possible soon. Besides any GPU that can use DLSS can run these emulators at higher resolution than native anyway. | ||
| Texture replacement | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Widescreen hack | ✓ | ✓ | |
| Performance | Frame generation technologies (LSFG, DLSS-FG and SM, XeSS-FG, AFMF and FSR FG) |
Implementing frame generation technology in an emulator is unfortunately quite challenging and unlikely to be possible soon however post-processing techniques such as motion interpolation is quite possible. Input latency will be a crucial factor, but its impact likely varies depending on the specific technique used, it is recommended to use after applying the "Internal Framerate Hack". While AFMF or LSFG can be used with xemu or CXBX-Reloaded, please be aware that some visual glitches and artifacts may occur at this time. | |
| Internal frame rate hack | ✓ | ✓ | |
| Overclock | ~ | ✗ | |
| Preload optical disc image to RAM For users with sluggish multi-platter HDDs or plagued by horrible seek times, this enhancement might offer smoother experience, potentially reduced power consumption; it also shines when disc images reside on a network drive. Although keep in mind that preloading image would take some time, and it will require additional amount of RAM capacity. |
✗ | ✗ | |
| Rendering latency reduction technologies (LatencyFleX, Reflex,  Xe-LL and Anti-Lag+)
|
While most emulators offer frame pacing or framebuffer latency control options, implementing rendering latency reduction technologies isn't currently feasible. This is likely doesn't offer enough benefits to justify the development effort. | ||
| Post-processing | AI-powered filter (Freestyle) |
? | ? |
| Filters | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Inverse tone mapping compatible | ? | ? | |
| Post-rendering anti-aliasing (FXAA, TXAA and MLAA/SMAA) |
✗ | ? | |
| Post-rendering scaling (Sharp bilinear, Lanczos and FSR 1) |
✗ | ? | |
| Shader chain | ✗ You can use reshade for this job, issues with injection fixed. |
✗ | |
| Quality of life | Automatic emulated controller connect/disconnect Automatically connects or disconnects emulated controllers when a new or current controller is connected or disconnected. |
✗ | ✗ |
| Automatic region switching | ✗ | ? | |
| Automatic updater | ? | ? | |
| Big Picture Mode | ~ | ✗ | |
| Built-in cheat manager | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Built-in custom resolution/CRTSwitchRes For using this on Windows, you need CRT Emudriver. Another option is using EDID editor tool such as "Custom Resolution Utility". |
✗ | ✗ | |
| Built-in mod editor and manager | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Built-in patch manager | wip | ✗ | |
| Built-in save manager | ✗ It is possible to use Xbox Memory Unit emulation or HDD emulation (via disk image) but it is not capable of managing the game saves within them via GUI. You need to use MS Dash emulation capability of the emulator or third-party application for that job such as using FTP solutions. |
✗ | |
| Command-line options | ✓ | ? | |
| Index/Compatibility databases Many modern emulators incorporate database-driven per-game overrides to apply targeted fixes or tweaks for quality-of-life (QoL) improvement without requiring users to manually edit global config files for each title. This approach allows quick, centralized application of workarounds for specific games, such as graphics fixes, timing adjustments, or compatibility flags, while keeping the emulator's default settings intact. This auto fix feature shouldn't be confused with "Per-game profiles" enhancement feature. |
✗ | ✗ | |
| Pause/Resume emulation | ✓ | ? | |
| Per-game profiles | ? | ? | |
| Portable and stealth Useful enhancement feature for non-personal computer use or plug-and-play scenarios. However, the software may still require the necessary prerequisites and dependencies for your operating system if it is not statically linked. |
✓ | ✓ | |
| SDL backend support Provides controller plug-and-play and automatic input mapping through SDL GameController database. |
✓ | ✓ | |
| Streamable compression format | WIP | ✗ | |
| Variable refresh rate compatible | ✓ | ? | |
| Built-in Eeprom editor | wip | ✓ | |
| TAS features | Fast forward/Turbo speed | ✗ | ✗ |
| Frame step (forwards and backwards) |
? | ? | |
| Macros/Scripts/Lua | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Movie recording/playback | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Rewind | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Save states/snapshots | ✓ | ✗ | |
| Misc. | Ambient sounds simulation Simulation of audio from original hardware and environments, such as mechanical hard drive, floppy diskette, and optical drive noises (e.g., head seeks, spin-up/down, tray loading, disc spinning, and clicking), variable CRT flyback transformer whine (the classic high-pitched "coil whine" that dynamically changes pitch based on screen brightness and content), arcade cabinet effects (e.g., fan hum or button rattles), and other background ambient noises. |
✗ | ✗ |
| Audio filters and presets Simulation of characteristic playback limitations and coloration of vintage consumer audio hardware, such as CRT television speakers, arcade cabinets, handheld consoles, early PC sound outputs, and low-fidelity integrated speakers. These filters are not intended to be perfectly accurate recreations, but rather to evoke the tonal qualities, distortion, bandwidth limits, resonance, and compression associated with 8-bit and 16-bit era devices. Examples include mono or narrow stereo output, reduced frequency response, speaker cone distortion, mild saturation, aliasing, and preset lo-fi profiles inspired by classic TVs, portable game systems, radios, and retro multimedia hardware. |
Exclusive to libretro cores at the moment. | ||
| Debug features | ✓ | ✓ | |
| EmuVR support | Exclusive to libretro cores. So there is no support at the moment. | ||
| File browser Lets the user look at the ROM's internal files. |
✗ | ✗ | |
| Free Look Free Look is an enhancement feature that allows manipulation of the in-game camera. |
While freecam would be technically possible, it will require per-game patches. Said patches would require a significant amount of time to reverse the game's engine, which means that only someone talented with enough dedication to a single game could do it. See feature request for this. | ||
| RetroAchievements | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Rich Presence (RPC) Allows the emulator to share real-time game session details (e.g., current game title, level, boss, playtime, or custom status) with external applications. This enables features such as displaying what you're playing on your profile, inviting friends to spectate, or triggering join-in-progress functionality where supported. |
? | ? | |
| Screen translator Using optical character recognition (OCR) and other techniques, this feature can provide live translation of in-game text, text-to-speech for visually impaired users, and more — either on demand or automatically. |
You can use RetroArch's AI Service or the standalone offline bquenin's Interpreter. | ||
Hardware features and peripherals
edit| Name | xemu[n 1] | Cxbx-Reloaded | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hardware features | Alternative display modes | ✓ | ? | |
| Connectivity | Ethernet | ✓ | ✓ | |
| Xbox Live | ✓ | ? | ||
| Controller | Pressure-sensitive buttons | ~[n 2] | ~[n 2] | |
| Vibration | ? | ? | ||
| DTS Surround (DVD-Video only) Dolby Surround Dolby Digital Live 5.1 |
~ Surround is not currently supported, trying to set it will cause xemu to crash (on windows anyway) -medievil (xemu tester) |
? | ||
| DVD Drive | ✗ | ✗ | ||
| MS Dash | ✓ | ✓ | ||
| Xbox Live Arcade | ✓ | ✓ | ||
| Peripherals | Audio | Xbox Karaoke | ✗ | ✗ |
| Xbox Live Communicator | ✓[n 3] | ✗ | ||
| Controllers | Arcade stick Third-party peripherals like Gamester Reflex Arcade Stick with Dual Force. |
~ | ✓ | |
| Dance Dance Revolution Dance Mat | ✗ | ✗ | ||
| Gametrak | ✗ | ✗ | ||
| Light guns | ~ Still wip, but you can use xemu-sinden-lightgun fork in the meantime. |
✓ | ||
| Racing wheels | ✗ | ✗ | ||
| Steel Battalion Controller | ~[n 4] | ✓ | ||
| Xbox Controller S | ✓ | ? | ||
| Infrared remotes | Windows Media Center Extender | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Xbox DVD Movie Playback Kit | ~ | ✗ | ||
| USB Keyboard | ? | ? | ||
| Xbox Cam | ✗ | ✗ | ||
| Xbox Memory Unit | ✓ | ✓ | ||
| Misc. | Development kits | ~ | ~ | |
| Disc scratch Similarly to cartridge tilting on cartridge-based systems, people intentionally scratch their discs to make a particular glitch work more reliably. |
No emulator currently includes built-in disc scratch simulation, as it would require low-level emulation of optical drive error correction, which is not implemented. As a workaround, you can try the external Real-Time Corruptor (RTCV) tool. It is a real-time memory/data corruption tool for inducing glitches during emulation, which might mimic some effects of a scratched disc (e.g., visual/audio artifacts or crashes). However, it is not a true "disc scratch" simulator, as it works on live memory rather than simulating physical disc read errors. | |||
| Power light | ✗ | ✗ | ||
- ↑ Feature Request: Adding missing peripherals for xemu
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Xbox controller is supported by USB passthrough technology for xemu and Cxbx-Reloaded. Other controllers with pressure-sensitive buttons like DualShock 2, DualShock 3 or Steam Deck touchpads aren't supported, but developers plan to implement their support via SDL library. You have to build it from source with libusb enabled. On linux you would do this: .\build.sh --enable-libusb , on Windows you would just modify the docker command to add --enable-libusb right after .\build.sh in the docker command.
- ↑ https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu/pull/1188
https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu/pull/1873 - ↑ https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu/pull/1478
https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu/pull/1803
System Link
editOffline multiplayer gaming on the Xbox home console over a LAN (local area network) multiplayer games, just like LAN tunneling for PlayStation systems. Over time, most private servers have been shut. However, computer programs such as XBSlink, SVDL and XLink Kai allow users to play multiplayer for LAN supported games by using a network configuration that simulates a worldwide LAN.
- xemu and CXBX-Reloaded supports System Link, see Xemu - XLink Kai Setup.
- Fusion supports System Link, see Xbox 360 - XLink Kai Setup
- Fission supports System Link, see Xbox One - XLink Kai Setup
Peripherals
editXbox DVD Movie Playback Kit
editIf you do not mod your console and use XBMC4Xbox, you need this dongle which contains a ROM with an XBE which provides some functions for the DVD-Video playback. You'll also need to match the console region, the dongle region and the DVD disc region. Region is set in the "eeprom", and can be set to any other zone using Xblast or "XboxEepromEditor" tool. The regions are:
Region 1 - U.S.A, U.S. territories and Canada (Part Number X08-25387) Region 2 - Europe, Japan, the Middle East, Egypt, South Africa and Greenland (Part Number X08-25402) Region 3 - Taiwan, Korea, the Philippines, Indonesia and Hong Kong (Part Number X08-96288-XXX)In this example, XXX is the specific part number of the DVD dongle/receiver. Region 4 - Colombia, Mexico, South & Central America, Australia, New Zealand, Pacific Islands and Caribbean (Part Number X08-25597) Region 5 - Russia, Eastern Europe, India, Africa excluding South Africa, North Korea and Mongolia (No DVD Movie Playback Kits Sold) Region 6 - China (No DVD Movie Playback Kits Sold)
- xemu has no Xbox DVD Movie Playback Kit emulation at the moment, so there is no DVD-Video support. Good news is, there is a feature request and pull request for implementing this, but you need to dump the ROM of your Xbox DVD Movie Playback Kit dongle. Another option is, if you have this peripheral physically, it is possible to play DVD-Video discs using xemu and manually attaching the DVD kit via USB.
- Xbox 360/Fusion has no Xbox DVD Movie Playback Kit support; however, no emulation process needed to handle DVD-Video for Xbox 360 anyway. DVD-Video is already supported out-of-the-box.
- Xbox One and Xbox Series consoles (Fission) can play DVD-Video. To watch DVD-Video on those consoles, you first need to install the Blu-ray Player software app which is not only play DVD-Video but also play Blu-ray Video discs.
- MVG: Secrets of the Original Xbox DVD Playback Kit
- See #DVD Drive section for Audio CD compatibility or this dedicated page for more information about home media playback with emulation software.
- MVG:
Windows Media Center Extender
editThanks to this peripheral/add-on which is comes with DVD and remote controller: it's possible to media streaming (music, photos and videos) with PC using Windows XP MCE. This peripheral/add-on shouldn't be confused with other standalone Windows Media Center Extender devices or Xbox 360's built-in version 2 Media Center Extender functionality and app.
Chihiro
editThe Chihiro arcade system was produced by Sega in 2003. It consists of an Xbox motherboard (with double the RAM as with devkits) with additional boards for handling arcade I/O (Sega JVS standard). As the inner workings of the Xbox are better understood, Chihiro emulation support and accuracy will improve. Cxbx-Reloaded[10] and especially xemu can also run a handful of Chihiro arcade games.[11] See feature request for improving Chihiro emulation on xemu and pull request: chihiro stuff. Chihiro emulation also supported with TeknoParrot as well.
Game-specific features
edit| Name | xemu | Cxbx-Reloaded | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Card reader types | IC card reader Used in Ghost Squad, Quest of D, Sangokushi Taisen, OutRun 2, OutRun 2 SP, Sega Golf Club, Sega Golf Club: Network Pro Tour. |
✗ | ✗ | |
| Magnetic card reader/writer | None of the emulators have built-in support. But, YaCardEmu project support emulating the various magnetic cards for arcade cabinets. | |||
| Force feedback | ✗ | ✗ | ||
| GD-ROM | ✗ | ✗ | ||
| Input | Touchscreen Used in Sega Golf Club, Sega Golf Club: Network Pro Tour and Quest of D. |
✗ | ✗ | |
| Networking | Ethernet | Link E.g. Ollie King, OutRun 2, OutRun 2 SP support up to 4 cabinets, Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune 2 supports at least 2. |
✗ | ✗ |
| Online Supported by Sega Net Mahjong MJ2, Sega Net Mahjong MJ3, Sega Net Mahjong MJ3 Evolution. Sega Golf Club and Sega Golf Club: Network Pro Tour allow you to send your play data, other players will play against your "ghost". Quest of D has D.Net integration. Sangokushi Taisen is also playable online. |
✗ | ✗ | ||
| Satellite terminal | ✗ | ✗ | ||
| RC-232C | ✗ | ✗ | ||
| Output | Lamps and LED lights | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Upgradable RAM E.g. OutRun 2 uses 512MB instead of standard 64MB. |
✗ | ✗ | ||
See also
editReferences
edit- ↑ Why The Xbox Failed In Japan
- ↑ The PlayStation 2 also had a hard disk accessory, but the Xbox had it built-in on all models. Consoles in the seventh generation and onward began to include internal storage in varying forms.
- ↑ The Dreamcast had SegaNet in North America and Dreamarena in Europe, but Xbox Live was the same for all regions.
- ↑ The Xbox would have been too difficult to emulate at the time anyway, as its specs often rivaled that of consumer PCs. It was alleged that many developers received legal threats from Microsoft to dissuade them from trying.
- ↑ JayFoxRox's statement (representing XQEMU). Reddit (2018-07-14).
- ↑ SoullessSentinel's statement (representing Cxbx-Reloaded). Reddit (2017-07-13).
- ↑ FrameRater's 360's Xbox Emulator EXPANDED!, Unlocking MORE Xbox Originals on 360 videos about this hack.
- ↑ https://www.gamespot.com/articles/xbox-backwards-compatibility-adds-70-more-games-today-as-microsoft-ends-the-program/1100-6498021/
- ↑ https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2026/07/22/xbox-backward-compatibility-on-pc/
- ↑ MrThunderwing's video: Outrun 2 - Chihiro Beta
- ↑ Emu Gamer: Chihiro emulation YouTube videos Batocera TV: Sega Chihiro Emulation Just Took a HUGE Step
