Xbox Fans Should Prepare For A Dark Day On July 29, But There Is A Silver Lining

With past console generations falling to the wayside as the industry progresses, there's sad news for longtime Xbox supporters coming on July 29, albeit with a silver lining. With the current console generation heading into its fourth year (or, in the case of the Switch, its seventh), support for past consoles, devices, and services is beginning to dwindle as companies shift their focus towards newer releases. Unfortunately, this means that some functions of older consoles are inevitably facing discontinued service, rendering players no longer able to use online services on those consoles.

Typically, when consoles move onto new generations, support for devices from the previous generation will continue for some time, before eventually being discontinued. Usually, this occurs somewhere around two generations later — while the old console may still receive some minor updates, most of the focus from companies, developers, and consumers naturally shifts towards the newest release. Some exceptions exist, like crowdfunded games releasing on old consoles that they were initially promised for, or franchises like continuing to release on obsolete hardware, but for the most part, old consoles don't receive anything new once newer generations are out.

The Xbox community should prepare for May 30, as the company has sent out a notification regarding the removal of a major feature from its devices.

As has been announced on the Xbox website, theXbox 360's online store will close on July 29, meaning that players won't be able to purchase games digitally on the console after that date. In exchange, however, many games on the platform will be receiving heavy discounts (as high as 90% off) before the online store ceases operations. A full list can be found on the announcement post, but the discounted games include major releases like,, and, with more to come on June 18 and July 16. Some of the more significant discounts include the following:

Xbox 360 Game

Discount

75%

80%

80%