PlayStation 5 Could Emulate All Previous Generations of PS Consoles

Megalith

24-bit/48kHz
Staff member
Joined
Aug 20, 2006
Messages
13,000
Sony dropped the ball with backwards compatibility this generation, but they may be making up for that with their next console: the company has filed a patent for a new method designed by PlayStation 4 engineer Mark Cerny, which leverages the power of multiple CPUs for emulating PSone, PS2, PS3, and PS4 titles. “When an old game is booted up, the PS5 ‘tricks’ the software into thinking that it's running on its original device.” One writer at Digital Foundry insists BC is a done deal for the next PlayStation, although it may be a different, lesser implementation.

We've been saying for a while now that we think the PS5 has to be backwards compatible -- at least with PS4 games -- and honestly, we reckon that it's on the cards. It makes sense for your library of titles to carry forward from here on in, especially with the likes of Sony pushing for a digital future. You're already a part of that ecosystem if you own a PS4, after all. As always, though, this is another case of waiting to see what happens. Keep your eyes peeled for most stories like this one throughout 2019, as it's about to get wild.
 
i doubt sony greed will let them include this. they know they can make money on "reMasters" of thie games they own. 4k remasters of god of war series, uncartered series, last of us, ico, sotc, last guardian, spiderman and wipeout will bring in the money. they will prolly do a 8k and beyond remasters of these games.
 
i doubt sony greed will let them include this. they know they can make money on "reMasters" of thie games they own. 4k remasters of god of war series, uncartered series, last of us, ico, sotc, last guardian, spiderman and wipeout will bring in the money. they will prolly do a 8k and beyond remasters of these games.

I'm sure remasters won't be going anywhere, especially since taking older games and making them pretty at 4k seems like an easy sell.

With that said, I'm sure they'll support B/C even if it's very vanilla. I wouldn't be surprised if it only goes as far back as PS4 titles, though. I bet if MS picks up steam and goodwill with their B/C implementation, I bet we'll see this feature more fleshed out on PS5.

As for the older titles (PSX - PS3), my pipe dream would be if Sony utilizes that AI-enhancing tech that's been used with the original DooM, FF VII, etc. Those screens looked amazing and breathes new life into those titles.
 
And lose all that subscription money from PlayStation now?

Nah
I think even Sony realizes that cloud gaming is a dead end.

i doubt sony greed will let them include this. they know they can make money on "reMasters" of thie games they own. 4k remasters of god of war series, uncartered series, last of us, ico, sotc, last guardian, spiderman and wipeout will bring in the money. they will prolly do a 8k and beyond remasters of these games.
Those remasters are what caused the PS4 and XBone to have slow sales at first cause they were just PS3/360 games with better textures. You don't want that with the next console generation, you want new games.
 
Playstation now game streaming probably. I would fall over shocked if they allowed physical BC aka by using old game discs.... which is what the BC purists really want.

I think even Sony realizes that cloud gaming is a dead end.

And give up their cloud gaming gold mine? ROFL ok :)
 
I find Sony's position on emulation amusing. I hear they are against it because of piracy, yet the Playstation Classic, which is an official Sony licensed product runs emulation (PSXrearmed).

Anyways, if the PS5 did emulate all other PS consoles, that would finally give me a reason to buy one of their new consoles other than using it for a glorified Blu Ray player.
 
I find Sony's position on emulation amusing. I hear they are against it because of piracy, yet the Playstation Classic, which is an official Sony licensed product runs emulation (PSXrearmed).
Reminds me of that one time that Nintendo sold a pirated ROM off the internet back to consumers. Anything in the pursuit of the almighty dollar.

 
That technology sounds like bull....

The PC can already emulate anything but the PS4, which means the PS5 can do it also. Except the PS5 should be able to play PS4 titles natively since its based on the "same" AMD architechture.
 
This isn't so all those discs you have in the closet will still work.

This is so developers can put in minimum effort to re-sell you all of those as retro-throwback-nostalgia sales.
 
Well they kind of have to now. While not a lot of people play BC games, it is something the competition gets to hang over their heads, and since Microsoft has all but said they are sticking with the same OS and 64bit x86 processors and Direct X graphics their BC solutions will just continue to work as will the current gen games, so if Sony doesn't follow suit it will look bad if they want to continue to call themselves the gamers' choice.
 
And give up their cloud gaming gold mine? ROFL ok :)
If nobody wants it then how profitable will it be? Gotta also remember that PC gamers have been emulating the PS1/PS2/PS3 for some time now, so if your backwards compatibility is through the cloud with a delay plus a monthly fee then who's going to pay for it? Better off buying the game used for $1 and ripping it to your PC and playing it on a Ryzen 2200G.
 
If they allowed me to use my old disks, then I would have a reason to buy a PS5.

If they expect me to buy virtual copies of each game, then no, I'll spend my money somewhere else.
 
And here I am waiting for the digital remastering AI to become part of emulators so that old 480p games will look good at 1080p.
 
Post process enhancement is where it is at these days to be honest. It's a long been a easy means to bump up and improve old content from games to video's and is continually evolving and improving. I'm kind of waiting on a company to release a actual console type piece of hardware purposely dedicated to just that. That's actually something Intel could consider for it's initial entry into discrete graphics since they build FPGA's the algorithms could be tweaked and improved and adapted on the fly depending the effect as well they could do a bang up job at this sort of thing. Simply process a input signal and output in near real time like mCable except more ambitious and adaptive.
 
Emulating the PS4 on PS5 should be dead easy, considering they're both x86 ISA. If Microsoft can emulate the Xbox 360 on the One, Sony should be able to emulate the PS3 on the PS5.
 
PS5 BC with PS4 seems like a no brainier since PS5 is going to just be a souped up version of the PS4. But it would be really cool of Sony could ship with PS1-2-3 BC as well.
 
Emulating the PS4 on PS5 should be dead easy, considering they're both x86 ISA. If Microsoft can emulate the Xbox 360 on the One, Sony should be able to emulate the PS3 on the PS5.
The 360 had a 3c6t xenon cpu, the ps3 had a 1+6 core cpu (close enough pedantics have at it).
Good luck emulating that with an underclocked amd?
 
My bet is that Sony and MS will have their entire console history backwards compatible on their new consoles, but mostly so they can sell you digital versions of games that you don't physically own.
 
Reminds me of that one time that Nintendo sold a pirated ROM off the internet back to consumers. Anything in the pursuit of the almighty dollar.
How is that wrong, they own the rights to all of those roms, right? They just used someone else's "work" to save themselves some time.

(by "work" I mean the community does this for fun, not for profit, or at least that's always the hope)
 
My bet is that Sony and MS will have their entire console history backwards compatible on their new consoles, but mostly so they can sell you digital versions of games that you don't physically own.
and I'd be totally happy with this, because I'm not much of a console gamer and haven't bought the last two generations of these consoles but have a few games from each that I still wanna play at some point.
 
It's almost certain that the PS5 will be based on the x86 architecture just like the PS4 which will mean backwards comparability will be possible on the hardware side as long as the software allows it. The PS3 was backwards compatible with the PS2 and PS1 because the PS3 had the PS2 emotion engine CPU and it was powerful enough to emulate the PS1. This is why it cost so much at launch because the emotion engine CPU wasn't exactly cheap being the previous generation CPU.

I'm sure they would build an emotion engine and cell processor for little to no cost and emulate the PS1 processor like they've done in the past. Even then, they should have the power to emulate the PS2 emotion engine and the PS3 cell processor. Since the PS4 is x86, they wouldn't need to emulate anything.
 
We've already seen the specs of the PS5: x86 AMD chip. The emulation that is possible on these chips we all know would allow for backwards emulation of everything from a PSP:go to a PS3. Sony just has to allow it....
 
i doubt sony greed will let them include this. they know they can make money on "reMasters" of thie games they own. 4k remasters of god of war series, uncartered series, last of us, ico, sotc, last guardian, spiderman and wipeout will bring in the money. they will prolly do a 8k and beyond remasters of these games.

Remastering games is a risk - they spend a lot of money developing the game and have to sell enough copies to recoup their costs.

It'd actually be more profitable if they release the PS5 and re-release old games. Put them in PS5 packaging and create a new label, like the "Throwback series." All they'd have to pay for is the manufacturing of the discs and any publishing costs (including licensing fees, copyright, TM, etc.) and a bit of manpower getting them compatible with the PS5. It'd be far cheaper than a complete remaster.
 
Or just bragging rights of taking the crown of releasing a new system with the largest available library of games at launch.
 
I'm never buying a console since Gamestop won't even be open and they wouldn't even buy my PS4 that they sold me.
 
It'd be far cheaper than a complete remaster.
Especially nowadays where people don't really care to have "4k" texture packs... the original PS3 & PS4 assets are fine, just play test the game on the newer system to double check everything works and re-release the thing... I'd buy that and wouldn't mind paying full price
 
Back
Top