Still Microsoft’s most successful console, the system’s massive library includes several titles we’re still looking to enjoy for the Xbox 360.
Initially released in November 2005 in North America, the Xbox 360 served as the long-awaited successor to Microsoft’s original Xbox, the sixth generation console released four years earlier that was best known for putting the Halo series on the map.
While the modern Xbox consoles have gone down a path of making the experience between playing on a console and a PC as close to indistinguishable as possible, Microsoft’s first two consoles served more as direct competitors to Sony and Nintendo than rather a complement to the PC gaming experience.
Growing up primarily as a Nintendo kid with a strong affinity for the Spyro and Crash Bandicoot games on the original Sony PlayStation, my exposure to the Xbox and its games were rather limited, mostly relying on playing at a friend’s house to get a feel for the system.
I eventually developed a strong interest in the Xbox 360 around two years after its release, coinciding with the October 2007 release of Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, which was released for multiple consoles offering slightly different experiences.
While I got the game for the PlayStation 2 when it came out, it was clear that the minor differences felt quite major to me as a kid, feeling disappointed that the PS2 version didn’t feature online play and didn’t include the availability of downloadable content that the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions did.
Rhythm games continued to drive my interest in the console for the next year, and I received my Xbox 360 as a Christmas gift in December 2008, getting Rock Band 2 alongside it.
Although many will likely think of Halo or Call of Duty games when reminiscing about the Xbox 360, I always look back at it as the console that is perhaps the best for sports games, while featuring an incredibly deep and impressive library that truly has something for everyone to enjoy.
As a collector, the Xbox 360 has also emerged as one of the more inexpensive and easier systems to collect for, with most physical games selling for a cheaper price than what they were sold for on their release date. With 63 Xbox 360 titles in our library, it remains the console we own the highest number of games for.
With that said, there are still quite a few notable omissions when it comes to Xbox 360 games in our collection, with several we’re still on the lookout for.
Here’s a peek at the three Xbox 360 games I’m searching for the most:
1. Guitar Hero Smash Hits
Perhaps the most forgotten Guitar Hero title released amid the rhythm game saturation of the late 2000’s and early 2010’s, Smash Hits stands out as a solid all-encompassing title to experience the series on.
Featuring an array of fan favorites from previous Guitar Hero games, Smash Hits brings the full-band setup that debuted in Guitar Hero: World Tour the previous year to older Guitar Hero tracks that were only playable on guitar in previous games.
While I’m on the lookout for this game, I’m also on the lookout for any and all Guitar Hero peripherals for the Xbox 360, as we currently only have Rock Band-compatible instruments for the console.
Although the instruments are unquestionably harder to find in 2026, especially for a decent price, the title itself remains the only Xbox 360 Guitar Hero I haven’t come across in retro stores, and I’ll still be prepared to pick it up whenever I do see it.
With a complete-in-box sale price of around $35, the game is still cheaper than it was at the time of its 2009 release, despite being no bargain for an Xbox 360 title.
2. NCAA Football 14
Long standing out as one of the most expensive games for the console, the revival of college football video games with the EA Sports College Football series has drastically changed the complexion of the genre – making this game much more affordable.
For over a decade, NCAA Football 14 was the most recent college football video game as the series came to a screeching halt after its release. This led to the game developing a large, dedicated fan community that continued to update and customize rosters as the years went on, treating the title like a brand new game with each college football season.
The unique novelty surrounding the game led for complete-in-box copies to be sold for well over $100 a piece, though the revival of college football video games has drastically decreased the value of this throwback – which finally makes it attainable for me to get.
Nowadays, complete-in-box copies don’t cost much more than $20 apiece, providing a perfect opportunity to tap into some nostalgia from the BCS era of college football without breaking the bank.
3. The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon
While the original Spyro trilogy is leaps and bounds beyond what The Legend of Spyro trilogy offered, my intrigue in the final game of the series persists, as it was the only one of the three to be released for both the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.
My personal experience with the series is rather limited. While I own all three games of the series on different consoles (A New Beginning on Xbox, The Eternal Night on PlayStation 2 and Dawn of the Dragon on Wii), I have only ever played a little bit of A New Beginning, with the Wii’s finnicky motion controls in third-party games keeping me from diving into this title on a different system.
That also isn’t to mention the graphical strengths that the Xbox 360 (and PS3 for that matter) possess over the Wii, providing much of the allure I have for this game – being the first true high definition look into the series that fans would be spoiled with a decade later with the release of Spyro Reignited Trilogy.
Picking up the game for the Xbox 360 would probably be the final bit of incentive I need to actually play through this series all the way through, as the true dork in me wants to have the most optimal console to play each game in our library.
For Xbox 360 standards, this is a bit of a pricier game, with complete-in-box copies selling for just under $50 – making the price only marginally cheaper than the $59.99 retail price most Xbox 360 games carried at the time of their release.
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