No Natal Compatibility for Older Xbox 360 Titles

The biggest future project Microsoft is developing for the Xbox 360 home gaming console is the Natal motion tracking system, put on display at the E3 trade show and at the recent Tokyo Game Show. The system already has the support of big game publishers, like Electronic Arts, Activision Blizzard and Ubisoft, and the Redmond-based company is teasing a release date in late 2010. But one crucial point about Natal that has not been clarified is whether players will be able to enjoy games they already have with the new motion tracking capabilities or not.

Kudo Tsunoda, who is working for the Microsoft Games studio, told Destructoid at the TGS that there would probably be no option to allow publishers to get older games working with Project Natal. So, no chance of getting out that old Halo 2 or first Gears of War and shooting a few aliens by pointing at the screen while sprinting from cover to cover.

The statement might seem like a bit of a surprise, given the fact that the software giant itself has already released videogames to demo Natal. At E3, Burnout Paradise was used to show off the new motion tracking system, while at TGS, Microsoft employed Space Invader Extreme and Beautiful Katamari.

Tsunoda explained that in order for all these titles to work with Natal, the company was forced to actually rewrite a significant amount of code. He seems to believe that publishers will need to rework the whole title and re-release the game in order to make it Natal compatible.

Even if Project Natal should arrive in 2010, there are no titles yet set to use the motion tracking it can deliver. Sony plans to offer its wand-based system even earlier during next year but, again, no titles are known to use the system yet.