When I got the XSX recently, it was so I can play Starfield when it comes out. That was basically the only reason. I did not realize the extensive backwards compatibility that this thing has. But since getting it, I’ve been playing FF13 trilogy, Fable games, Dragon Age series, Lost Odyssey, etc. Basically all games of note going all the way back to the OG Xbox will play on the latest console. Either with the original disc, or you can even purchase them online.
The point of my post is I think it’s a real travesty that PlayStation doesn’t do this. I don’t understand it. First of all, you cannot buy most PS1-PS3 games on the digital store. You can’t use the discs. The main way to get access to these games is through the top tier of PS+. But the selection is quite limited, and PS3 games in particular are streaming only.
With the selection, I want to point out that you can’t even play most of the Killzone series on PS+. This is a first party title. There is absolutely no reason that Killzone shouldn’t be available. Killzone 1 isn’t even on there. A PS2 title that is not graphically demanding.
As for the streaming of PS3 games, maybe this was justifiable back on the PS4 because the PS3 has a unique architecture that can be difficult to emulate without performance drops. But with the capabilities of the PS5, it’s not credible to claim that it can’t emulate a PS3. It certainly could, if Sony wanted to assign resources to make an emulator.
I am not a fanboy of one or the other, and I probably still play more on the PS5 than my Xbox, but I think Microsoft should market their backwards compatibility superiority a lot more than they currently do.
Lots of weird incorrect answers in the comments. MS 100% has changed CPU architectures and needs to emulate old games. The 360 was basically a PowerMac.
My guess - the Xbox One’s launch catalog was trash, and MS doubled down on emulation to build it out. Then they never stopped. They kept plugging away at it, and now they have a giant asset for GamePass.
MS got a head start because they were desperate for good games in the early days on the One.f
This is the answer.
If Sony was losing the console wars, they’d be doing BC, and not MS.
Sony changed their CPU architecture every time until PS4/5. The only reason some PS3s could play PS2 games is because they had also had PS2 hardware in them. Xbox has been x86 the whole time.
The 360 is IBM power pc based.
The simple answer is that microsoft is a far more advanced company in terms of programming an OS, the gap shows when you compare console securities, where virtually every nintendo or sony device had software vulnerabilities, while microsoft consoles tended to need to be hardmodded
As other noted, this is not true. The early 360 development kits were literally PowerMac towers purchased from Apple.
360 games require emulation, and MS has been slowing plugging away at expanding its emulation library for years. None of this was easy.
This interview has some details about how it was done on Xbox: https://hanselminutes.com/632/eric-heutchy-on-backward-compatibility-xbox-one-x-enhanced-games-and-the-heutchy-method
lol, I’d rather have the first party modern bangers Sony’s pumping out then…checks notes…literally no good first party games on my xsx since I bought it. Backwards compatibility is great, but I don’t spend $600+ on a console to play old games. I can keep my old consoles around for that or emulate.
Depends on your tastes doesn’t it. I’ll take a hundred smaller projects like Pentiment, Hi-Fi Rush or Psychonauts over another generic open world adventure or sad dad simulator.
I have all there of those on my PC/Steam Deck. They’re not really XBox exclusives.
The hardware architecture on the PS2 and PS3 was so radically different, it effectively makes emulation impossible.
The change made in the PS4 and PS5 makes the transfer of those games relatively trivial, but attempting the replicate the now abandoned Core processor of the PS3 is the hold up there, as is the PS2 Emotion Engine.
The reason the PS3 was so expensive was including PS2 hardware to handle the backwards compatibility. They weren’t going to repeat that mistake with the 4 and 5.
Meanwhile, on the Xbox side, Microsoft never had that problem.
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