One of the biggest selling points of the Xbox Series X is its ability to play hundreds of legacy titles, which include classics such as the original Red Dead Redemption and the Fable RPG trilogy. Microsoft fortified that perk in a new blog post today, confirming that select backward-compatible titles would be enhanced on its next-generation console in various ways. These include higher resolutions of up to 4K, anisotropic filtering, HDR support (which can be done with “zero impact” to performance), and increased frame rates of up to 120 FPS. They’ll even support the all-new Quick Resume feature, allowing players to resume their games instantaneously.
“In partnership with the Xbox Advanced Technology Group, Xbox Series X delivers a new, innovative HDR reconstruction technique which enables the platform to automatically add HDR support to games,” wrote Jason Ronald, Director of Program Management for Xbox Series X. “As this technique is handled by the platform itself, it allows us to enable HDR with zero impact to the game’s performance and we can also apply it to Xbox 360 and original Xbox titles developed almost 20 years ago, well before the existence of HDR.”
“The compatibility team has invented brand new techniques that enable even more titles to run at higher resolutions and image quality while still respecting the artistic intent and vision of the original creators,” Ronald added. “We are also creating whole new classes of innovations including the ability to double the frame rate of a select set of titles from 30 fps to 60 fps or 60 fps to 120 fps.”
Microsoft hasn’t decided on a release date or price for the Xbox Series X yet, but the company insists that it’ll launch its next-generation console this holiday.