I understand what you saying: You are not going to buy it. Ok, don´t buy it them, no one can force you to, it is your right. Just like I haven´t bought a WIIU yet, it  is my call.

However, if I buy a PS4, I will do it for PS4 games. I don´t care about my PS3 stuff, since I already have one. And, if it breaks, I don´t care either, life is too short and everything breaks, cars, bed, tvs, pcs, even people die...

So, a lot of people don´t care. It is a shame you will not buy the PS4, but, again, it is your choice.

In terms of businness, doing what you sugest would cripple SONY even further, the PS3 is a beast, to emulate it on the new console would be a gigantic waste of money, keep selling them for ten years and let the next gen gamers buy the PS4 for next gen experiences. That is it.

You know, if the next xbox doesn't play all my PSN titles, I deserve a refund from Sony. -___-
Tell you what.. Know what you're buying before you buy it. Sony doesn't owe you a refund NOW so why would they after you've bought another console from them???

You know, I bought a 750 Gigabyte HD for my PS3 a month ago, Did it to enjoy PSN PLUS a little more, 120GB was not even close to what I needed. The thing is, I do love my PS3, but I can´t wait t play stuff that the console can´t even DREAM of. I don´t even know what to expect, since XBOX360 and PS3 games look already amazing, but, man, I am excited.

2013 still have south park, last of us and beyond two souls, so, there will be a lot to do in my PS3, but I crave for the day the nnew beasts will arive, both from SONY and MS.

Doesn´t mean I will never play a PS3 game again, maybe someday I will try to finish SIREN or something like that.

However, I don´t think Sony owes me nothing, hey, they gave me a lot of fun times for 3 or 4 years with my PS3, and those guys are almost dying, I hope they do whatever it takes to stay alive for another gen, for another ten gens.

That would be cool, if the big three survive. I hope it happens.

The PC  is heavily dependent on some form of emulation to get them to play especially old games on  todays tech , the problem is Sony instead of using emulation and the fact they own the platform so it could work started incorporating  chip sets from the previous gen into the new  to have backwards compatibility  , that hit a roadblock when consumers reacted negatively to the Phat PS3's price point , then it became seen as a non core asset that could save money in a revision , this is something that may have happened sooner than later even if they had kept it , because at some point you have to answer the question how many gens can we continue to keep adding tech for backwards compatibilities before you have to give up and use other means like emulation , so in many ways the problem came about by the way Sony handled it's BC and once you give people something (looking at you Linux) and take it back for what ever reason it isn't going to be popular  ,even more so if you haven't got a fully viable alternative ready to quickly replace it .

Well. I'm pretty sure demos and stuff that was on the Xbox 1 wasn't available on the Xbox 360 over Xbox live!, because of the change in processor architecture.

However, the Wii and the Wii U both use PowerPC, so Nintendo has to do less fancy tricks to make backwards compatability actually work.

With that said it all comes down to how close to the metal Xbox Live! Games and Apps was made as to whether it will be on the next Xbox.

Wow...the sense of entitlement this topic exudes is just...wow. I'm sure that back in the day it was a GREAT big problem that if your brand spanking new Nintendo 64 wouldn't work with NES cartridges...you would have to...GASP...actually install the old console and play it once again. Can anyone here actually IMAGINE something like that?
Most of the games you BOUGHT on the PC a few years back will not run properly on your current architecture. I'm 100% confident that if I go and pull out my all time favorite game from my library, Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 2, and install it on my Windows XP PC, it won't run it -as it's already happened- and I would have to resort to internet hacks or tips. I cannot take that game to Valve and shove it under their noses and demand they give me an online copy that works with my current PC -or GoG, whoever's selling the thing now-. They would laugh at me. The developers or the publishers that put it out even more so.

It's a sad state of affairs that gamers have become so entitled that they believe they are owed something more than what is written in their EULA. You get what you pay for, the company has no way of predicting now how that software will be compatible with hardware 5 years later on. They have sold you an item for your Playstation 3. If you get tires for your Ford Fiesta and switch over to a Ford Focus later on, Ford would not be obligated to give you the same tires for your new Focus -it's a wide analogy, roll with it-.

At the same time, you have paid for content which you've consumed. It has fulfilled its intended purpose and you have received your money's worth. Restaurants will not give you money back for food you've put in your mouth and chewed. And so on.

I read some stuff on gaming sites that just make me start trusting the gamer stereotype of fat, sad men, locked away in a basement, completely cut off from reality, living in a warped and perverted bubble through which nothing resembling a real world can penetrate.

This thread sounds a few years old really. 2007, 2011, I don't really know exactly which, but somewhere around there. If it's made in a "trolling" fashion...then it's a sad excuse. If it's serious...it's even sadder in a myriad of ways.

I'm calling it now: gaming will never pass this adolescent time. It will never mature, never attain a degree of respectability akin to books or even films. It will always be close, just in reach, but never able to fully extend to those lengths because it won't be allowed to by those that are to support it fully. It's maybe sad...but this is who our brethren are and there's fair little we can do about it.

Long rant, perhaps better said by someone else already, but I had to say at least this. This sort of thinking as demonstrated is what has put me off of blogging on games that I enjoy.

Actually. It depends on the game whether it will work or not.

Grab StarCraft, released in 1998, Runs on Windows XP/7/8 just fine.
Master of Orion 2, released in 1995, runs on XP/7/8 just fine.

In-fact there is a gaming store known as "Good Old Games" which grabs games that are a decade or two old and sells them and they all work fine on Windows XP/7/8. - Seriously, hit it up. gog.com, they even patch the games if they have issues and for a couple of bucks for some DRM free retro gaming, who can complain? :)

Another option is to use a Virtual machine and install Windows 98 or Windows NT and go from there, unlike the consoles and other platforms you actually have options of playing your old games just fine, regardless of it's age.

Or, you know, you could build a "Retro" gaming machine for next to nothing, I built one a couple of years ago with an Athlon XP 3000+, 1gb of ram, 2x 3dfx Voodoo 2's in SLI and a Radeon 9200 for 2D all running Windows 98SE.
You forget how awesome it was running glide games back from "way back then". :)

My main desktop though, every game I've wanted to play from the last few decades has run fine without any dramas (I can list them if you so wish.), so please don't spread such FUD.

Black and White - does NOT run just fine on windows XP / 7;

Unreal 2 , Unreal Tournament - do NOT run just fine on windows XP / 7;

Deus Ex - does NOT run just fine on current PCs;

The list can continue.

And if you paid a bit of attention, you would have seen the point. I did mention Good old Games - GoG - there and I am more than aware that you can get any of the old games running today...with some effort and community support. Fact remains that almost no publisher has ever future proofed their game against tech that at the time of the release wasn't even heard of. As you said, gog will patch the game...for a fee. It's not the original publisher or developer that's doing that, it's a third party that's now carrying that game.

Thing of the matter is that even on the PC, which is the freest of all the main platforms, you cannot be sure now that a game will run as well on a new configuration a few years down the line, which was the point I was trying to convey. And nobody will assure you of that, nobody will give you money back if your STAR BLAZE MEGA PC with WinLux 12 is incapable of running a game that was assured to work on Windows 7 and 8.

You even went on my point by saying that if all else fails, you can get a Retro Machine for your gaming needs for next to nothing. A PS3, at the time of the PS4, will cost next to nothing eventually and you can always get one of them to play what's not supported on your current gen console.

Please read more carefully next time. We're not all dunces you know :).

Black and White, works fine on my system.
I just set the games compatibility mode to Windows 2000 and done, took 2 seconds.
Everyone should know how to do the above after all these years.

Unreal 2 and Unreal Tournament and even the original Unreal Gold works fine via Steam in Windows 7 for me too.

And I never did like Deus Ex, so can't verify.

For the very sake of arguments I've pulled out Soul Reaver 2 from my collection and installed it off the disk just now, on my laptop running Windows 7. As previously stated, the game won't run out of the box. Patching it did not help so I had to search for solutions online. Easy enough to find and apply, took 5 minutes tops.
After this I did the same thing with my dusty PS2 copy. Just plugged in the console, stuck the disk in and...well, the dialogue is still fantastic.
Regarding Unreal 2 and Unreal Tournament, my original copies would not run on 4 different PCs -two desktops and two laptops to be fair- without some coaxing with community patches, processor settings and some other baloney. The original versions, not the Steam version, not the GoG version, the disc versions that I have bought will not run on their own except after I work a bit on them.

At this point I'm beginning to wonder why I am answering.
Defending my point? I've just installed a game on a clean version of Windows 7 with everything up to date and it did not run out of the box as I first bought it. I'd say my point defends itself.
I made no specifications that old games will not run PERIOD on current PCs. There are solutions, of course, but they are at times not even official -like Gothic 3's complete revamp that has nothing to do with Piranha Bites or JoWood- or poorly supported.

If it isn't clear now, I am sorry, but it would be a waste of my time to answer once more.