Has a console firmware update ever broken a retail game?

[Ninjadom]

As far as I'm aware, console firmware updates started with the Xbox 360 back in 2005. The Wii an PS3 came a year later and all were capable of being able to have firmware updates.

Now with smartphones I've had it where a firmware update has stopped many games from working. The most recent being iOS 11 which stopped all Cave Co Ltd's Games from working.

I'm a Switch only gamer right now (no PS4 or Xbox) and the Switch hasn't been out a year but has had many firmware updates. v4.0.1 came out today. But is there a chance that any of these firmware updates down the line, maybe years down the line, will stop my March 2017 Zelda BOTW cartridge from ever working? Has that ever happened before with other consoles and retail games? Or broken certain aspects of a retail game?

 

[Figments]

Certainly in preview, but those are treated as issues to be ironed out prior to release. I don't honestly remember a time when a public release broke games.

 

[Monado Blade]

Wait, I didn't realize ios 11 broke Cave's games. Aw that sucks. I really liked DDP Max.

 

[Deleted member 543]

One of the PS3 updates broke backwards compatability with PAL copies of Tomb Raider and Tomb Raider 2. Was never fixed afaik.

 

[Alvis]

I think the 360 update that enabled 1080p output broke vsync on some games but that's it

 

[TI92]

Android like 6.0 broke one of my favorite mobile games ever, dungeon raid. It's so awful now and the dev already removed all ads and said he's not working on it anymore.

All games like it now are free to play trash.

 

[Skeeter49]

I believe one of the PS3'S fucked up TLOU.

 

[Ninjadom]

Wait, I didn't realize ios 11 broke Cave's games. Aw that sucks. I really liked DDP Max.

Click to shrink...

Yeah. iOS 11 is 64-bit only. Cave's games are all still compiled in 32-bit. Even though Apple warned all devs up to 3 years ago that apps must be compiled at 64-bit, Cave never updated their apps. So as of now, they all don't work on iOS 11.

 

[Garou]

It's not only Cave games, for example some Chunsoft and SNK-games are also not updated.

It's a good test to see which developers care about their customers. I think next week with the launch of the iPhone X there will be another big wave of app-updates.

 

[Plasma]

One of the PS3 updates stopped my blu ray drive from reading discs so I couldn't play my games.

 

[pigswill]

every 3ds update ruins every older title slightly more. smt4, for example, runs notably worse than it did on release. same with x&y

 

[Stop It]

I think the last PS4 firmware beta had some unexpected side effects for a couple of games, but if course was beta for that reason.

 

[Cranster]

One of the preview builds for an Xbox One dashboard update might have killed Backwards Compatibility, though I could be mistaken it for a general Xbox Live outage.

 

[Monado Blade]

Yeah. iOS 11 is 64-bit only. Cave's games are all still compiled in 32-bit. Even though Apple warned all devs up to 3 years ago that apps must be compiled at 64-bit, Cave never updated their apps. So as of now, they all don't work on iOS 11.

Click to shrink...

Ugh. And knowing Cave, they'll never fix them.

 

[TheSporkWithin]

PC operating systems have broken compatibility countless times. Windows 95 broke 3.1 apps, XP broke 95 apps, 7 broke XP apps, etc. etc. On the Mac things are mostly better aside from the elimination of PowerPC support in... OSX 10.4? I forget. This issue is what GoG.com originally launched on.

Consoles are an entirely different beast, as they get a reset button every 5 years or so when the next system is released rather than being shackled to supporting the same standards which were in place when the platform was originally launched. The console analogue is lack of backwards compatibility, which is complained about by some people and swept aside as a total nonissue by others. If you want to play old games, keep your old system. The same response holds here: if you want to play old games, keep your old phone. The only difference is that seemingly an enormous number of people have never dealt with this sort of operating system paradigm shift before.

 

[TemplaerDude]

Every time my PS3 updated, Skyrim would run shittier.

Either that or just playing Skyrim made Skyrim run shittier. You could never tell.

 

[Daggoth]

I'd have to go digging for the details, but one of the PS3 updates (3.2something?) broke Dragon Age Origins. It'd hard lock not long after you were properly in-game.

Fixed with a patch, but still.

 

[Deleted member 4359]

Ridge Racer was broken on 1.1.0 on 3DS, fixed with the next firmware.

 

[Clowns]

Every time my PS3 updated, Skyrim would run shittier.

Either that or just playing Skyrim made Skyrim run shittier. You could never tell.

Click to shrink...

Pretty sure it was the latter. Because the game would just save the location of every object or something so if you did anything it would save it and it just kept eating more and more memory.

then poof zero fps.

 

[Brandon]

I think a PS4 firmware update messed with Final Fantasy XIV not long ago.

 

[LemonLime]

To my knowledge, what caused many games to break on iOS 11 was due to 32 bit support being dropped. Consoles never had revisions upgrading from 32 bit to 64 bit so something similar happening on consoles is highly unlikely.

 

[julian]

It's not only Cave games, for example some Chunsoft and SNK-games are also not updated.

It's a good test to see which developers care about their customers. I think next week with the launch of the iPhone X there will be another big wave of app-updates.

Click to shrink...

I will never understand this. A developer should be able to make software. Test it thoroughly. Release it. And forget it. The notion that if a developer doesn't constantly update their software to keep up with OS updates means they don't care about their customers or that the responsibility is on the developers just doesn't track for me. This only makes sense if you as a platform holder are insisting that all games be some sort of GaaS - which I guess is fine, but I don't really think it's how phones were pitched to consumers.

If the platform holder breaks compatibility with something you purchased, that's the platform holder's fault. I don't care how much notice they gave. Developers should be able to move onto other projects and not assume that once they release a perfectly functional piece of software on your device they now are forever responsible for making sure it keeps up with whatever breaking changes you make to your platform. Hell, sometimes they just don't have the resources or went defunct.

I can't think of an instance where an OS update broke a console game for good.

 

[OtakuCoder]

PS4 Pro's Boost Mode initially broke Soma, though it could be gotten around by simply not using it and it seems the devs have fixed it since...