The Xbox Series S is certainly an attractive, cheaper proposition for the next generation, though naturally there’s a few comprimises to ensure the smaller price. One of these that has come up over the weekend is that the machine won’t offer Xbox One X Enhancements for backwards compatible games.
Part of this is due to the specifications of the console—as we found out upon the reveal last week, the Xbox Series S won’t output a full 4K resolution, instead running at 1440p with only 10GB of RAM. Tech site Digital Foundry speculated that the smaller memory size than the previous gen console Xbox One X (with its 12GB of RAM) would mean that games with Xbox One X Enhanced features such as running Xbox 360 games at a 4K resolution wouldn’t be able to utilise these features.
This speculation was later confirmed in a statement from Xbox to Video Games Chronicle, in which they said that “To deliver the highest quality backwards compatible experience consistent with the developer’s original intent, the Xbox Series S runs the Xbox One S version of backward compatible games.”
However, it’s not all bad news, as Xbox also confirmed in the same statement that backwards compatible games on the new hardware will still get the benefit of some enhancements, including “improved texture filtering, higher and more consistent frame rates, faster load times and Auto HDR.”
To try and break it down as (hopefully) as simply as possible then; as far as backwards compatiblity goes Xbox One X Enhancements will be on Xbox Series X and not on Xbox Series S, but both consoles still see a benefit over running the same games on an Xbox One or Xbox One S.
Xbox Series S and Xbox Series X are set to launch on November 10 at £249 GBP ($299 USD) and £449 GBP ($499 USD) respectively.
