Confirmed: PS3 fully backwards compatible

June 14th, 2005, 20:52 Posted By: wraggster

Sony has put to rest any fears surrounding PlayStation 3 backwards compatibility by confirming that the next-gen console will play both PS2 and PSone games, via a combination of hardware and software emulation.

"Developers sometimes do things that are unexpected," explained Sony Computer Entertainment boss Ken Kutaragi. "Their games run but are written in ways that make us say, 'What is this code?'

"We need to support backwards compatibility for these games too, so using software alone for compatibility is difficult."

In contrast, Microsoft has cautiously stated that its next-gen machine will just be capable of playing 'top' titles for the original Xbox.

As Xbox 360 won't run Xbox games off embedded hardware, there is the risk that some games could catch out the emulator - and hence wouldn't work.

"The current Xbox will become antiquated once Xbox 360 launches in November," reckons Kutaragi. "When that happens, the original Xbox will be killing itself.

"The only way to avoid that is to allow 100% compatibility from launch but Microsoft won't be able to guarantee that. It's technically very difficult."

There are 2 comments - Join In and Discuss Here