Delisted XBLA titles will still be available for purchase

Last week, Grim told you about Microsoft’s plan to delist underperforming titles from XBLA. Since then, there’s been some confusion over what exactly delisting really means here. Aaron Greenberg, Director of Product Management for Xbox 360 and Live, went on Major Nelson’s Podcast yesterday and clarified what exactly Microsoft is doing.

First up, whatever games that are going to be delisted based on all three of Microsoft’s requirements (older than six months, less than 65% on Metacritic and less than a 6% conversion rate), will still be available on XBLA. So, if you already own a title and it gets deleted from your hard drive for whatever reason, you’ll still be able to re-download the game. Furthermore, you can purchase a delisted game through the Tell A Friend option. 

Basically, they’re moving the underperforming titles away from the main store to the “back room”, as Aaron put it in the interview. Full Live support, such as multiplayer and leaderboards, will still work just as normal for the delisted titles. 

Now then, I bet you’re curious as to what games fall under Microsoft’s requirements. Hit the jump to see the list of XBLA titles that might be getting pushed to the side.  

First off, thanks to driph for coming up with this list of possible delisted XBLA titles. Now before reading this list, remember, this is mostly based on two of the three requirements by Microsoft for delisting. Most of these games came out more than six months ago and all these games have less than 65% on Metacritic. Some of these games did come out this year, but they all got less than 65% on Metacritic.

The 6% conversaion rate, which is the percentage of people that download the trial version of a game and then convert to purchasing the game, is only known by Microsoft. This list just gives us a basic idea of what might be leaving the front of the XBLA store:   

Aegis Wing 58
Arkadian Warriors 59
Asteroids / Asteroids Deluxe 55
Bankshot Billiards 2 65
Battlestar Galactica 55
Battlezone 52
Bliss Island 42
Boogie Bunnies 54
Brain Challenge 54
Centipede & Millipede 55
Contra 63
Crystal Quest 64
Cyberball 2072 41
Defender 58
Dig Dug 65
Discs of Tron 44
Double Dragon 57
Ecco the Dolphin 53
Fatal Fury Special 63
Feeding Frenzy 65
Frogger 62
Gauntlet 65
Geon: Emotions 59
Gyruss 56
Hardwood Backgammon 62
Hardwood Hearts 64
Hardwood Spades 62
Mad Tracks 62
Marathon: Durandal 63
Missile Command 63
Mr. Driller Online 48
Ms. Pac-Man 65
New Rally-X 43
Novadrome 50
Pac-Man 62
Robotron: 2084 65
Rocketmen: Axis of Evil 57
Rocky and Bullwinkle 37
Root Beer Tapper 61
Rush’n Attack 58
Scramble 47
Screwjumper! 40
Shrek-N-Roll 49
Soltrio Solitaire 59
Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe 64
SpongeBob … Slam! 55
Spyglass Board Games 54
Street Trace: NYC 45
Super Contra 61
Tempest 47
Tetris Splash 53
Texas Hold ‘em 63
Time Pilot 63
TiQal 58
TotemBall 44
Track & Field 63
Triggerheart Exelica 63
Tron 43
Wing Commander Arena 51
Word Puzzle 44
Xevious 56
Yaris 17
Yie Ar Kung-Fu 51

See any titles that surprise you here? Honestly, I’m more surprised that there are so many reviews of re-released classics such as Contra on Metacritic. Easy money, I suppose.  

[Awesomeshop by Fronz]