It was more like the console was too costly and to save a few bucks a feature that was hardly used was easily sacrificed to save a couple bucks. Same with Linux dual boot, not worth supporting since it was a loss leading feature. People buying it for Linux only, don't buy games. Since the console was sold at a loss, not a good business strategy. The whole ps3 hack was a good excuse to cover for the removal of Linux.

PS3 emulation might be possible, but it's another cost vs benefit scenario. It will take a lot of man hours to produce a stable enough emulator and many more man hours to test games and make sure saves transfer over. Nvm a lot have already been 'retired' servers switched off. So the choice is, spend a lot of money that won't really bring in more customers, definitely not enough to cover the effort. Or, remaster/remake some of the best ones and resell them like Sony has been doing.

I wonder, would there be a market for an PS complete edition. A bigger box with ps3 and ps2 hardware added inside (ps2 already played ps1?) for full BC. No emulation, simply using the original hardware, with the benefit of the ps5 OS on top and installing/loading from SSD. As well as all the legacy outputs and HDMI output with a good upscaler. I guess the market would be too small for designing such a $1000 box.

You weren't the mod so you wouldn't really now, but if that was a reason then you, Azz and Ludicrous would have been perma from PS threads long ago.

Mods said to not go off topic. But i guess you just had to get that little quip in there haha 

All except 10 games are fully BC (may have some errors in some of them), if available physically you can just put the disc and use, or you can also download patches to improve it if you want. That is what I got from all the news.

I think Sony could make a buck from a PS full version capable of playing all 5 gen titles, just not sure how much they would need to mod the APU of PS5 to match that. Perhaps use the regular APU plus a simplified Cell processor on it with the PS2 and PS1 SW emulated that they had available on PS3.

They wouldn't have to make to many, just enough for the collector enthusiasts.  It would cost more, but people like me wouldn't care.  I would snag one up quick. Call it the special 25th anniversary edition.

The more I think about it, the clearer it is that Sony doing Backwards Compatibility for the PS4 but not for anything earlier makes sense. I mean, from a consumer standpoint it'd be great for folks to keep earlier stuff on the docket, but let's be real here. Sony and every other gaming company have to consider a bunch of factors when incorporating features into their console, and everything is a balancing act of investment vs payout. That's how business works.

With backwards compatibility, the further you go back the less likely it will be that people will still have their games and get any use out of them. Everyone still has a PS4, and a lot of people are still working on PS4 backlog and it's likely very similar in archetecture and programming to the PS5 so it's financially smart to incorporate it. PS3 is likely more complicated and has less of an impact on sales and customer appreciation. PS1 and PS2 by now are hilariously outdated (they're still good, but I highly doubt anyone who still has PS1 and PS2 discs are the type who DON'T also have PS1s or PS2s.) It just wouldn't be a good investment.

I am a collector, and I have a fully functioning PS2 and PS3, so I can play the first three generations with ease. But I don't. I could, but I don't even remember the last time I went back to play a PS1, PS2, or PS3 game, and I specifically set up a room in my house to do that. I play my SNES more.

I'm not trying to move the goalposts here, but I genuinely do think that the best option for PS5 and Xbox Series X backwards compatibility is to focus on the PS4 and Xbox One libraries. That makes the most business sense and will get the most functionality out of most users. It'd be nice if they could go back further but I really don't see how that would be worth it except for a stunningly small percentage of their fanbase. IT'd be nice to have as an option but let's be real, almost nobody would use it, thus making it not worth thier time and resources to implement.

I'm curious, does anyone know how many Xbox One games are coming forward to the Series X? I tried googling it but can't find anything so I just assumed all the 2500+ games would be coming forth.

Well I would say the fewer they produce the costlier it would be because most of the cost would be on the R&D to make such a near 100% BC PS5. But I think that could sell up to 1M units so it could be justified. And let's say it sell fast Sony could certainly make second batch on a different color. The parts itself would probably be like only 100USD or even less of additional cost, but cost to develop and produce low quantities would be the bigger issue.

And Sony is not really willing to lose the money they get from remasters and remakes... the PS4 BC will be regular BC with maybe some improvements, but they have kept open to each dev (including themselves) to charge for a patch for improved (so yes remastered) version. Sure several (newer) games will offer free update because they can still sell full price or near that on a good amount, but for a 5 year old game the odds of a lot of full price sales is slim, so they are more likely to charge for the update.

https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2020/10/13/xbox-series-x-and-xbox-series-s-backward-compatibility-update/

No exact number yet..."thousands" + "all the games you love and remember". So if a game doesn't run, we obviously don't love it enough.

I expect almost all XBO games + these older games: https://www.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-one/backward-compatibility/available-games