This rumor has been circulation for quite a few months now, but it really got into gear this past weekend when an article was published on comicbook.com (yes, a comic book website… what they are doing covering games is beyond me) saying that, based on speculation from some guy called “HipHopGamer” (someone I’ve never heard of) saying that between a previous patent “suggesting” backwards compatibility and another system to add trophies to PlayStation and PlayStation 2 games that the PlayStation 5 will probably “play every PlayStation game.”
Everyone is reading into this all as “the PlayStation 5 will play PS1, PS2, PS3, and PS4 games!” and getting excited about the possibility of full backwards compatibility with the PlayStation 5 and the entire 25 years worth of PlayStation platform games.
The problem is, there’s no evidence to support that this will be the case as people think it will be — that you can just shove in a game and play it, all re-rendered in 4K (ignoring how muddy textures and any basic images will be) all seamlessly.
Here’s the problem — a big one that no one is thinking about because, honestly, people who fall into the hype game tend to never think critically about anything:
Where is the financial incentive for Sony to do this?
Seriously, think about it for a minute — what money would Sony actually make from the effort it would take to create proper emulation engines for each system that can handle every game ever produced for a PlayStation series console without issue?
Your first thought is “oh, they will sell more systems that way!” No, they really won’t.
Contrary to what many will think, being able to play old games on a system isn’t as big a deal to most people who buy new systems — they buy them for the new games, after all. If people cared as much about the past as some in the gaming community think, then stores like GameStop and GameXChange would have no inventory as people would keep everything.
No, people are fine with letting go of the past — if it isn’t the flavor of the week game most don’t care. Sure, there are plenty who do, but they are somewhat of a minority and if they already have that much old PlayStation software to play, guess what? They probably were already going to buy a PS5 anyway.
That’s not to ignore the fact that you don’t make money selling consoles — you make money selling the software for the console. Most game systems are sold at a loss for many years before finally becoming profitable on their own — the money lost selling the system is made up over the purchaser then buying several games for it, eventually balancing out and then finally being profitable after a certain point of software sales.
This leads directly to point two:
Sony won’t make a dime from used game sales.
You naturally think then that “Well, someone could just go buy some used PS1 or PS2 games and enjoy them!” which yes, they could, but where does Sony see a single cent in this? They aren’t selling these games new (Square-Enix actually does still sell some new PlayStation and PlayStation 2 games, sure, but that’s an oddity to say the least.) These systems are dead, relegated to the hoarding piles of every retrobro on YouTube and all the game stores that carry the hot new consoles of yesteryear. Neither Sony, nor the creators of those games see any money from their secondhand sales. That’s just how it goes, so no, there’s no financial incentive to do this on for the sake of the used market.
Then comes the part that everyone, and I mean everyone should have thought about, but of course, haven’t.
This would cut into the PlayStation Store sales of old games.
I’m amazed how seemingly no one brought up the fact that Sony has had a successful market for the past decade plus of selling digital versions of many games for the PlayStation and PlayStation 2, starting back in the PSP and PS3 days. While yes, the PS3 originally did play PS1 and PS2 software from disc, it was cut back to just run PS1 software a few years after the launch of the console.
Still, on the digital front Sony kept a selection of games available for purchase and download, and indeed expanded upon it as time went on, giving the PlayStation 3 a somewhat mature library of games you can purchase and play digitally (no need for an original disc.) Currently, with the PlayStation 4, you have options of select Emulated PS2 games, and some PS3 games can be “streamed” via the PlayStation Now service. Limited, but it’s something.
Something you still have to pay for, however, and that’s the key point: Sony makes money when you buy these games from their online store! Why would they give up the chance to earn money from a user base that’s already grown used to re-buying these games?
The simple answer is, they wouldn’t. They have invested too much already into this “re-purchase what you already own, or sell a remake to you” ecosystem to go back now.
Again, I’m absolutely certain that Sony is not going to let you just stick discs in and play games — there’s just no sensible way without them doing something insane. I don’t believe they would go through the effort and devote the resources necessary to create full, complete emulation systems for these games, as well as some kind of trophy system for older games, to not use it as a way to sell you the games again.
Hell, how would the trophy system even work for those old games? You would need a version of the game which was “aware” of these points and could tell that system that the trigger point for the trophy has been reached! This alone tells you that you aren’t just going to be running the game without some kind of change — a patch, a custom version.. something. Why would Sony not just sell you this updated version and let that be that? They’ve already been doing it for years now, why stop?
So what do I actually think is going on here?
Simple — Sony is working to enhance the capabilities of the emulation layers they may have in development for the system for games to be made available on the PlayStation Store, and that’s it. They are probably going to push the store more than ever (especially in the “retro” (wrong use of the word) wave we’re going through right now) Sony is going to try to capitalize on this by creating a probable base on the PS5 for you to play pretty much whatever they make available, so long as you pay for the game on the PlayStation Store. That’s as far as this will go. I’m highly doubting anything like what Microsoft has done with the Xbox One, and even if they did, it would probably still be just as limited — you would only be able to play select games, as opposed to literally all of them, primarily due to licensing restrictions.
This all fits within the realm of the two rumors – a trophy system for PS1 and PS2 games, and a method system calls for (presumably) emulation purposes — the two things which keep spawning this rumor.
I could still be wrong, of course — Sony could make the system just play everything from disc. However, that would be an extreme effort for little gain, and if you have any respect for Sony, or the PlayStation team in general I would think you would think of them as smarter than to waste resources with such.
Mark my words though – I will be coming back to this once we have clarification. If I’m right, expect me to stress it non-stop. If I’m wrong, I’ll admit such.
We’ll see what happens.
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