PlayStation 4 will not natively support PlayStation 3 games, including downloadable PlayStation Network games, said Shuhei Yoshida, president of Sony Worldwide Studios during a roundtable interview today. The absence of native compatibility means Sony will need to explore other alternatives for playing current-gen software.

"Unless, somehow, some games work on emulation," Yoshida acknowledged. "The easiest thing, technically, would be to make PS1 games work on PS4 with emulation, but we are not talking about our emulation plans as yet." PS1 games currently run through emulation on the PlayStation 3 as well as the PlayStation Vita while PlayStation 2 software has no such emulation available.

"So there are two ways, emulation or cloud services. But native support, no. Sorry," Yoshida said. "No backwards compatibility. You can quote me on that," he said, acknowledging the headline-worthiness of the quote.

When asked if the aforementioned "cloud services" could work with your existing PSN library, recognizing your previous purchases and making those experiences available on the otherwise-incompatible PS4, Yoshida said, "We could do so if we choose to. We know who purchased what as a record. But we are working on service plans and we haven't decided."

Retail PS3 games won't run natively on PS4, said Gaikai CEO David Perry during yesterday's unveiling of the new console, when he introduced its cloud gaming capabilities.

This is likely due to the significant differences in the design of the hardware between PS3 and PS4. The former featured a custom-built Cell processor with unique hardware architecture that was reportedly difficult for developers to grasp; the latter will include an x86 processor that is expected to bear a closer resemblance to current PC hardware, said lead architect Mark Cerny.

Perry did say that Sony wants to eventually make the PS4 backward-compatible with PS1, PS2 and PS3 games through Gaikai-based streaming, but implied that that functionality will not be available anytime soon.

Link

Lame

oh boy, if they don't do it now, they're going to look like real assholes.

depends.  if their online service is a subscription based like netflix where you pay for all or nothing than no.  if their online services is a pay per title then yes, so very much yes.  what i read in that comment is they haven't decided all of the business details of their service capabilities yet.  so we'll see.

That's true. What I mean is, I hope they don't just say 'screw it'.

sony are they guys that game me a free copy of playstation all stars for my vita.   sony are the guys that gave me free access to nearly all my LBP dlc in LBPvita. sony is really pushing this cross buy system and i really believe they will do right by me with the ps4/ps3/gaikai situation.

They will do it, all your digitally purchased PSN/PS3 games, that should be free.

Actually from the sounds of it, it will be a mixture of both. For this you have to look at their history which doesn't make things look good, but it could change ever since Kaz became CEO they have been trying some new things for the company.

History - PSP Go, first was the pay per title "digitalization service" then no you have to buy them.

PSP Vita changed it up a bit, feature dicisions that spaned what they did with the PSP Go but now have the multi-buy and other things.

So them saying we could do that if we want to isn't very reassuring.

at this time if they say PS4 can do everything PS3 does, who is gonna buy PS3 from now till PS4 release date??

I called this:

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=5147195