xenia

Xenia is an experimental emulator for the Xbox 360, the gaming console Microsoft sold from 2005 to the mid-2010s. An emulator is software that mimics the hardware of one machine on a different machine, so that games or programs built for the original hardware can run on a regular computer instead. Xenia attempts to do that for Xbox 360 games on Windows and Linux.

The project describes itself as a research effort: its stated goal is to study how modern consoles and their operating systems work, using information gathered by reverse engineering legally purchased devices and publicly available documentation. The developers are explicit that the project is not intended to enable illegal activity, and discussions of illegal use are not permitted in their community channels.

Compatibility with actual games varies. The project maintains a public list where people can report which games run, which have problems, and which do not work at all. The README is direct about the current state: quite a few games run, and quite a few do not. Pre-built binaries for Windows are available as releases on GitHub for people who want to try it without compiling the code themselves.

The codebase is written in C++ and uses graphics APIs like Direct3D 12 and Vulkan to draw game visuals on modern hardware. The project is active and looking for contributors who know advanced C++, with several open areas of work including game compatibility fixes, log file size reduction, and Linux platform support.

Xenia is supported partly through Patreon contributions from people who want to back the core developers. A Discord server exists for discussion of emulation topics.