Flipping the disc over revealed the problem, as this disc was downright dirty. Need For Speed Hot Pursuit 2 didn’t work at all, throwing up an error any time I tried to play it. While I can’t claim prior knowledge, it’s one of those Xbox games where the 3D visuals have aged poorly, combined with some ultimately uninspired shooting action.Īnd I say that as someone who still thinks Halo is more than a little overrated, too. The bad news? It still pretty much sucks, even though this was the first time I’d played it. The good news? Mace Griffin Bounty Hunter worked. This past weekend, I realised I still hadn’t checked them, so I grabbed both, powered up the trusty old Xbox (which these days is mostly just a Battlefront II machine, if I’m honest), and set to playing.

I’m a sucker for a deal, so I picked them up, handed over the requisite dollar and then realised I was several hundred kilometres away from my actual Xbox, and I hadn’t actually bothered to check the condition of the discs within. My curiosity piqued, I enquired how much they wanted for them, because my own recent retro buying experiences have tended towards folks wanting, frankly, ridiculous sums for just about any retro game. Mace Griffin Bounty Hunter and Need For Speed Hot Pursuit 2, specifically, both sitting in a pile of audio CDs for some reason. That was when a pair of Xbox logos grabbed my attention, because I guess I spot that kind of thing.

You know the type a few farm goods, a few interesting bits of arts and crafts and a surprising quantity of mass-produced cheap Chinese toys that you’d undeniably find cheaper in a $2 store anyways. A couple of weeks ago, I was enjoying a brief sojourn on the far north coast of New South Wales, idling around a country market.

Clean xbox disc