Can MS & Sony just simply make next gen fully BC?

[Mr Puggsly]

Barozi said:

killeryoshis said:
You can make hardware completely Backwards compatible and not ask a single developer. When Nintendo made the Wii it was completely backward compatible with the Gamecube. You can play any Gamecube game on the Wii. Sony also did this with the PS2 as it was able to play PS1 games no problem. Developers can't legally stop the Xbox 4 and PS5 from being backward compatible like the Wii. However, Developers can pressure Sony and Microsoft to not do it by support means. Which means that they will treat the system with no backward compatibility with better support.

Honestly making a system backward compatible is a lot of work. You have to basically make two consoles in one. Which is why a lot of systems don't do it. Microsoft only has to ask developers to add a game to BC because digital rights are different from physical rights.

They have to ask because they need to make changes to the game code in oder to make the games run on X1. That requires permission.

I think its the digital aspect that's making this complicated.

Xbox 360 and PS3 (before it was eventually removed) both used software based 6th gen emulation. I don't think they were getting any permission to emulate those games.

X1 is handing this very different. Nothing is being emulated using the data on an actual disc and MS is trying to make everything available digitally. I think these two things are what requires permission. Hence, if the X1 had a simple emulator that only read discs, its likely no permission would be required to support games.