PlayStation 5

You said backwards compatibility wasn’t feasible due to different architectures, but that isn’t accurate because the PS5 will be more than fast enough to emulate the PS3. The reason why they aren’t working towards real backwards compatibility is very simple, they like money.

Microsoft put in the initial effort and continues to devote substantial work to emulate the X360 on Xbone for a reason; they lost to PS4, so free backwards compatibility is a competitive advantage. Remember back in the X360 days when they won that generation, MS wasn’t quite as warm and cuddly as today. When you’re on top you don’t want things like cross-platform compatibility; treating consumers well doesn’t matter because what’re they gonna do, buy a PS3 and play inferior versions of all those games?

Backwards compatibility didn’t help the Xbox One a lot since it was a later arrival. If it had been available from the start of the generation, it could have really changed how people viewed those consoles.

I think Sony don’t want to take the risk, and will have a solid local PS2/3 story to tell this time around. No point in gambling the whole generation away to get a handful of PS Now subscribers. (Just a handful, since very few people actually want to play those old games. They just think they do, just like they think they might want to read some classics or whatever.)

Regarding the tweet that was shared; It strongly hints that people will use their existing discs to play games. I stated my belief that due to the old architecture they would stream,as it would be easier and presumably more reliable - I didn’t mean to speak to the feasibility of emulation. I am aware of emulation, I don’t believe that’s an easy solution to implement based on what I know of emulation however, though I am not an expert. I don’t believe it’s a catch-all-games solution. What they imply here is every game will work. That’s only a rumor, obviously, but it’s what I was replying to and all I’m talking about. To me that’s them streaming and using the disc as a verification, which is what I stated and where I stand.

Whelp I still have my PS1 discs… guess that might matter.

Yes I think that’s likely, but they’ll still charge a monthly fee for the PSnow service.

Which I also agree with.

I don’t know about most people, I only know about me. And I love playing my old Xbox games on my Xbone, and I would love to have a single PS console that could play any gen PS game. I’m open to streaming, provided it’s done well. I’m very curious to see what shakes out here.

The PS4 actually has a number of PS2 games available, no streaming required. They get enhanced graphics and trophy support. You have to rebuy the games, though, and the effort petered out pretty quickly, presumably due to low sales and publishers preferring to do more thorough remasters for a higher price tag on their most valuable legacy games.

Absolutely. Would even pay extra for a PS5 that had that feature.

That’s an interesting thought. A version of the console that actually has extra hardware inside and costs more. Of course that’s precisely what the launch PS3 was by the time I bought one, when I could have gotten a cheaper PS3 instead that didn’t have PS2 hardware inside.

Of course in the end that didn’t work out well for me, since the console only lasted 3 years before yellow lighting to death.

I don’t care. I cannot possibly imagine wanting to play a 15 year old game that hasn’t been updated when there are so many cool things to play from this generation. There is no possible way for me to play all the things I want to play just from the last few years. I can’t imagine why I would play something with terrible graphics, etc. from so long ago.

For me that game is Demon’s Souls. I really, really want to finish it. I tried playing my copy of the game on a PS3 emulator recently, and I can’t even get 1 frame a second on it, since my CPU is from 2009. The emulator is really CPU intensive. If a PS5 can let me play Demon’s Souls, it will be a huge bonus. I really want to finish at least my first play through of it.

There’s likely a remaster coming for the PS5.

Oh. Well, in that case, I guess I’d rather buy that than spend extra money on a backward compatible PS5.

I miss Top Shop, a lot.

Top Spin…any freaking good tennis game.

Not directly related, but topical.

Consequently, Sony also confirmed former president WWS, Shuhei Yoshida, will leave his position to head up a “newly formed initiative that will focus on nurturing external independent creators”.

The only way i get a PS5 is if it’s entirely backwards compatible. My backlog of physical and digital games demands it.

I don’t expect this to happen - I don’t think it lines up with Sony’s business model of selling updated versions of older games - but as I’ve said before I will get a PS5 day one if it’s compatible with previous generations.

I don’t even need 100% backward compatibility, if they’d just try to line up with what MS is doing and get the biggest games working I’d be onboard.

They’ve said it’s likely to be BC and are working on it. The issue with previous generations is that the consoles had radically different architecture. The reason the early PS3s were BC and later ones weren’t is the early PS3s basically had a PS2 in them. The PS4 wasn’t as the PS3 ran on Cell which was completely different. With PS4 and 5 it’s much closer to PC architecture so shouldn’t be as much of an issue. Plus they are powerful enough now to run older stuff in emulation.