Sony Quietly Adds PS2 Emulation To the PS4 (eurogamer.net)

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Sony Quietly Adds PS2 Emulation To the PS4 (eurogamer.net)

Posted by Soulskill on Friday November 20, 2015 @03:21AM from the this-should-be-the-standard dept.

An anonymous reader writes: The Digital Foundry blog reports that Sony has added functionality to the PlayStation 4 that allows it to act as an emulator for some PlayStation 2 games. Surprisingly, the company did not mention that this functionality is live; a new Star Wars game bundle just happened to include three titles that were released on the PS2. From the article: "How can we tell? First of all, a system prompt appears telling you that select and start buttons are mapped to the left and right sides of the Dual Shock 4's trackpad. Third party game developers cannot access the system OS in this manner. Secondly, just like the PS2 emulator on PlayStation 3, there's an emulation system in place for handling PS2 memory cards. Thirdly, the classic PlayStation 2 logo appears in all of its poorly upscaled glory when you boot each title." Sony has confirmed the games are being emulated, but declined to provide any further details.

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Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 03:30 · Score: 3, Insightful

If Sony made this official there would be and endless list of wingers and whiners here on Slashdot complaining about how game X didn't work properly, and then go ballistic when the support is removed.
1. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 03:34 · Score: 0
  
  If they didn't chase off so-called pirate emulators that actually worked there would be no contention
  But no, after all it is Sony's pool, with complimentary urine
2. Re:Because of the endless whiners by idontgno · 2015-11-20 03:39 · Score: 1, Troll
  
  But no, after all it is Sony's pool, with complimentary urine
  Also, that's not a Baby Ruth chocolate bar floating in the water.
  What I want to know is when are they adding "Other OS" back?
  
  --
  Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
3. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 03:44 · Score: 1
  
  endless list of wingers
  Now I have that stupid "Seventeen" song in my head. Thanks, jerkass.
4. Re:Because of the endless whiners by KatchooNJ · 2015-11-20 03:51 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  What I want to know is when are they adding "Other OS" back?
  Just so people don't get confused and think that "Other OS" was something that the PS4 previously had, it was a feature removed from the PS3.
  
  --
  "Never give up, for that is just the time and place when the tide will change." -Harriet Beecher Stowe ^_^
5. Re:Because of the endless whiners by DrXym · 2015-11-20 04:17 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  What I want to know is when are they adding "Other OS" back?
  What I want to know is how many people whining about Other OS being removed ever used it or realized the limitations to it in the first place. Or understood the implications for their console (saturation levels of piracy and a death spiral into shovelware) if it had allowed to remain in place.
6. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Wootery · 2015-11-20 04:28 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  the USERS removed it when they upgraded the firmware
  And I fixed a bunch of security issues when I ran Windows Update this morning. Except that no, it's not really me that did that.
  You're also conveniently failing to mention that firmware updates aren't exactly optional. Some PS3 software (games or apps) require the most recent firmware, giving you the choice between keeping OtherOS, or keeping your PS3 usable for other tasks.
  
  US army
  A minor point, but it was the USAF that built a PS3 cluster.
  
  many butthurt morons were butthurt because they thought, incorrectly, that this "other os" feature allowed for piracy
  Not that I've ever seen, no. It was about running Linux. It was tinkerers that used OtherOS, not pirates. Sony used the hypervisor to deliberately break GPU access, iirc, presumably to prevent gaming on OtherOS.
7. Re:Because of the endless whiners by tepples · 2015-11-20 04:29 · Score: 2
  
  Why hasn't the PC had a similar "death spiral into shovelware" despite being designed from the ground up for Other OS (with the exception of very few recent models with locked-down Secure Boot)? It has shovelware, as it is the first line platform for amateur productions, but why hasn't this caused "a death spiral"?
8. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous+Cow+Ward · 2015-11-20 04:31 · Score: 1
  
  Or "But why isn't my favorite PS2 game here? It only sold 10 copies but I really liked it!"
  
  --
  Examine even your most deeply held beliefs. Nobody is always right.
9. Re:Because of the endless whiners by ArhcAngel · 2015-11-20 04:42 · Score: 0
  
  Oh look a troll with a Facebook logon!
  
  If I paid for a product that did XYZ and then a few months after I purchased it the manufacturer said "If you want to keep using feature Z you must upgrade the firmware. Oh and by the way the new firmware removes feature X." I am well within my rights to be butthurt whether I use X or not. And I have never even attempted to mod my PS3.
  
  BTW it was the Air Force that built the cluster.
  
  --
  "A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
10. Re:Because of the endless whiners by spire3661 · 2015-11-20 04:49 · Score: 1
  
  I understood ALL of that. What you dont understand is that GeoHot was about to remove all those limits until Sony gave him a big check and told him to shut up or they will ruin him. I bought my Linux capable PS3 KNOWING that at some point we would get 'gpu' access. And we almost did, right up until Sony used the DMCA as a sledgehammer.
  
  --
  Good-bye
11. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 05:35 · Score: 0
  
  Not really because PCSX2 exists and does a far better job of enhancing visuals on PS2 games than this thing does.
12. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 05:59 · Score: 0
  
  Dude, hair metal is the BEST metal.
13. Re:Because of the endless whiners by maorb · 2015-11-20 06:38 · Score: 1
  
  Ah, good emulator, but it only runs on PC and has a fairly decent CPU requirement for a lot of good games.. That isn't a problem for the majority of people who frequent /. but it can be a problem for console gamers.
14. Re:Because of the endless whiners by hairyfeet · 2015-11-20 06:43 · Score: 1
  
  And the Linux fans will scream but removing OtherOS was a smart move and was frankly a stupid move in the first place!
  For those that do not know consoles work on a "razor and blades" model where the console is sold at a loss and they make their money on licenses and royalties. At the time of otherOS Sony was losing $300 USD per unit on the console and guess what? OtherOS users NEVER BOUGHT GAMES which meant every.single.OtherOS.user. was a loss of $300 per unit! And if that wasn't bad enough OtherOS wasn't being used by guys running 1 or 2, you had groups buying the console in the THOUSANDS to make cheap HPC clusters.
  So yeah getting rid of OtherOS was smart and if they would have kept it MSFT could have had the market to themselves as Sony would have bled to death. the only thing I would have done differently was offered an OtherOS PS3 for $1200, if they wanted OtherOS so bad? They could pay for it. Of course we all know they wouldn't have bought it if they would have had to pay what it actually cost, but at least then Sony could have killed the whining dead.
  
  --
  ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
15. Re:Because of the endless whiners by malditaenvidia · 2015-11-20 06:43 · Score: 2
  
  Oh wow, I thought the Sony Defense Force was just an internet meme,
16. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 07:16 · Score: 0
  
  Do you honestly know anyone who owns a console but not a computer?
  Even modern low-end computers can run PCSX2 without problems. The recommended system requirements are:
  Windows Vista / Windows 7 (32bit or 64bit) with the latest DirectX
  CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo @ 3.2 GHz or better OR i3/i5/i7 @ 2,8 GHz or better OR AMD Phenom II @ 3,2 GHz or better
  GPU: 8800gt or better (for Direct3D10 support)
  RAM: 1GB on Linux/Windows XP, 2GB or more on Vista / Windows 7
  A $250 PC has better specs than that these days.
17. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 07:24 · Score: 0
  
  "Because my heart belongs to youuuu.... but my dick is community propertyyyyy!"
18. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 07:25 · Score: 0
  
  Only pointing this out because you yourself seemed to feel a smug need to address it, but it was the US Navy. At the very least.
19. Re: Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 07:26 · Score: 0
  
  PC manufacturers don't sell at a loss.
20. Re:Because of the endless whiners by timmyf2371 · 2015-11-20 08:23 · Score: 1
  
  I suspect you might well be surprised at the hardware used by people who use Slashdot. With a few exceptions, I think the majority of people here seem quite intelligent and logical but have somewhat of an aversion to change and unnecessary innovations.
  Speaking purely for myself, I built my computer in 2011 with a i5 2500k and maxed out the RAM. Then I spent £60 on a low end graphics card because - why spend more when I have a console for gaming and a media player (WDTV at the time) for watching downloaded shows and movies?
  I might be in the minority, but I don't think it will be a tiny minority.
  
  --
  
  Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic
21. Re:Because of the endless whiners by cfalcon · 2015-11-20 08:24 · Score: 1
  
  I think of the people chewing into the troll, yours is the best answer. If you bought a PS3 able to boot Linux (an advertised feature, and on the box) that is also able to play online games (same), you had to choose. If you choose the first option, you forever lost your ability to play online games (and many other games would later check for version- basically your box was now dead to everything from that point in time forward). If you chose the second option, you lost the Linux capability.
  It was real bad news.
22. Re:Because of the endless whiners by lgw · 2015-11-20 09:08 · Score: 1
  
  I suspect you might well be surprised at the hardware used by people who use Slashdot. With a few exceptions, I think the majority of people here seem quite intelligent and logical but have somewhat of an aversion to change and unnecessary innovations.
  Speaking purely for myself, I built my computer in 2011 with a i5 2500k and maxed out the RAM. Then I spent Â£60 on a low end graphics card because - why spend more when I have a console for gaming and a media player (WDTV at the time) for watching downloaded shows and movies?
  I might be in the minority, but I don't think it will be a tiny minority.
  What kind of geek builds a low-power PC? The only acceptable answer is "a broke geek"; otherwise turn in your geek card.
  When I built my computer in 2011, I built a tiny god. It had all the fast, and 12 cooling fans. This summer I dropped in a new graphics card and it's still in the top 10% of benchmarks (and has half as many fans, a single new card was faster than my old SLI setup). I'm thinking about liquid cooling for my next build, not because extreme overclocking is the best way to get a fast system, but because I'm a geek, dammit.
  
  --
  Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
23. Re:Because of the endless whiners by CronoCloud · 2015-11-20 09:21 · Score: 1
  
  Why hasn't the PC had a similar "death spiral into shovelware"
  Haven't you seen all the low budget mediocre indie shovelware out there?
  And it is something of a death spiral, because developers that want to make "real money" go cross platform in ways that they didn't do in the past.
24. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 09:40 · Score: 0
  
  You must be getting pretty old. You have to die eventually. Then your trolling ends.
25. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 09:44 · Score: 0
  
  I installed Yellow-dog linux on my fat ps3 back in the day. The thing was damned near unusable for anything worthwhile for me. I had considered some sort of HTPC setup with assorted emulators. Turns out that even the SNES emulator (forget which) would be stupidly slow thanks to the hypervisor taking over half the resources on the ps3.
  Instead, thanks to geohot and custom firmware, I can actually play SNES and Genesis games on my ps3 with ease (at the expense of many newer games)
26. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Wootery · 2015-11-20 10:11 · Score: 1
  
  No, it was the US Air Force, like I said.
  What is At the very least meant to mean anyway?
27. Re:Because of the endless whiners by LT218 · 2015-11-20 10:12 · Score: 1
  
  Meaning less than 15% of the idiots complaining about a removed feature they never used were full of crap because their console indeed never actually supported this feature.
  Nice statistic. It's a shame you chose one completely out of context with the issue at hand. Cherry picking statistics out of context hurts your argument more than it helps it.
  At the specific point in time Sony released the update that removed support for Other OS, the percentage of PS3s on the market that did have that functionality was much higher than 15% so your point is invalid. Even if your statistic was accurate, what would it matter? If even 1% of the PS3 owners bought a PS3 for the advertised Other OS functionality, the complaint about something they paid for being removed after the sale is still valid.
  
  Beyond that, they didn't actually remove it from the ps3s that shipped with that support, the USERS removed it when they upgraded the firmware, something Sony gave advanced warning about. No excuses.
  Again, you're cherry picking facts and using them out of context. Sure, the users upgraded their firmware but they only did so because Sony intentionally made a multiple other features on the PS3 stop working if they did not update to the latest firmware. In other words, Sony forced PS3 owners to choose which of the original, advertised functionality they would give up.
  
  Unless you are the US army building a cluster, you had no use for this feature at all. But.... many butthurt morons were butthurt because they thought, incorrectly, that this "other os" feature allowed for piracy.
  Wait, let me get this straight. You are reading and posting on a site known for it's Linux advocacy/fanaticism and you essentially just said you don't see any other uses for the ability to run Linux on hardware that was purpose built for media playback other than military cluster computing and game piracy? Either you are being intentionally obtuse with the intention of trolling or you are incredibly unimaginative and just plain ignorant of the potential the PS3 had as a HTPC running Linux.
  Car analogy time. What Sony did to the orignal PS3s would be like you buying a car specifically because the manufacturer advertised electronically selectable driving modes (i.e. normal, sport, track, etc.) as a feature on it. 6 months later, you take the car in for the manufacturer's recommended maintenance. The service department tells you that the manufacturer doesn't like how owners have been driving their cars in sport and track modes, so they have to install an update to the vehicle's control module that disables the selectable driving modes. If you don't install that update, your radio, power windows and locks, and sunroof will stop working after a certain date. You still have a drivable car but it is most definitely not the same car you originally purchased from a functionality standpoint, regardless of which option you chose. I suspect you would be fairly unhappy with the manufacturer at that point.
28. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Z80a · 2015-11-20 11:29 · Score: 1
  
  The compatibility of this emulator must be quite bad, given the fact they must be using all sorts of speedhacks and multithreaded insanity that leads to innacuate timing to make the quite weak jaguar cores handle emulation in realtime and probably the emulator must require per game tweaking as happens with the nintendo 64 emulation on the Wii virtual console.
29. Re:Because of the endless whiners by thegarbz · 2015-11-20 22:57 · Score: 1
  
  I wonder if you're both right. Heck our University had a PS3 cluster, but we didn't have a Wikipedia page. It was quite a cost-effective solution at the time. It wouldn't surprise me if several government departments did this.
30. Re:Because of the endless whiners by DrXym · 2015-11-21 01:30 · Score: 1
  
  Because the PC isn't a console. It isn't a closed platform. It isn't loss leading with profits expected to come from the sale of games. A console is. The likes of Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft sink billions into developing consoles with the expectation of a return over their lifetime.
  It should be quite obvious to anyone why Sony disabled Other OS. It wasn't because of the handful of people who actually used it (and I was one of those unlike the vast % of people complaining) or even those running MAME or SNES emulators. It was the imminent threat of a perfected hypervisor crack that people could download, burn, run and crack their PS3 via Other OS.
  The decision to remove the attack vector was hardly a difficult one.
31. Re:Because of the endless whiners by CronoCloud · 2015-11-21 06:17 · Score: 1
  
  The ps3 slims removed that feature from the box description.
  
  NO PS3 boxes mention OtherOS or Linux, I don't know why some people think they did. And yes, I have checked. (CECHE model PS3) Did some shops in the UK/EU slap Tux stickers on PS3's or something?
32. Re:Because of the endless whiners by CronoCloud · 2015-11-21 06:24 · Score: 1
  
  If you bought a PS3 able to boot Linux (an advertised feature,
  I wouldn't exactly call OtherOS an "advertised feature". Sure a few Sony people talked about it in interviews with sites like Ars, but that's not really advertisement but promotion. They're two different things. Use the right word for the job. OtherOS was "promoted" and "documented" (In the PS3's larger manual), but not "advertised". Hell, Sony's "OpenPlatform" website wasn't actually indexed by search engines back when the PS3 launched.
  [quote] and on the box)[/quote]
  OtherOS/Linux was never mentioned on the box, go check, I'll wait.
33. Re:Because of the endless whiners by CronoCloud · 2015-11-21 06:37 · Score: 1
  
  you essentially just said you don't see any other uses for the ability to run Linux on hardware that was purpose built for media playback other than military cluster computing and game piracy? Either you are being intentionally obtuse with the intention of trolling or you are incredibly unimaginative and just plain ignorant of the potential the PS3 had as a HTPC running Linux.
  Indeed. I had YDL on mine. It could handle plenty of basic computing tasks. For example, Firefox on the PS3 was a much better browser than the silly Netfront based browser the PS3 had at first. (The browser the PS3 currently has is by the same company but is webkit now, it's "some" better)
  It was great for music playback, more functionality than what is built into the PS3. Video not so much, unless 720p or lower.
  It had OO, GIMP. and most of the usual applications LInux distros have. There was even IBM's Java for PPC. YDL even had LaTeX.
  I know some people who had YDL installs only installed it to run emulators. Some people even had Win95 running under QEMU.on it.
34. Re:Because of the endless whiners by CronoCloud · 2015-11-21 06:53 · Score: 1
  
  Turns out that even the SNES emulator (forget which) would be stupidly slow thanks to the hypervisor taking over half the resources on the ps3.
  What? SNES emulation ran fairly well for me when I tested it. Did you have VRAM swap enabled? And which Desktop environment were you running? It matters, for some reason the default E17 caused a performance hit. You were better off running Gnome2 or XFCE
Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 03:33 · Score: 1

As someone who has never had a console, do I understand correctly that people normally have to re-buy games when they upgrade their consoles? i.e. not like a PC where something 20 years old can, sometimes with a bit of hacking, still be played on your current machine.
That's... ugh... do you just stack all your consoles in your living room so you can select the appropriate one for the games you have? Are you people made of space and money?
1. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 03:49 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  Yes, people have multiple consoles across the generations and use them to play older games where they're not able to play them on the newer systems.
2. Re:Let me get this right. by KatchooNJ · 2015-11-20 03:53 · Score: 1
  
  As someone who has never had a console, do I understand correctly that people normally have to re-buy games when they upgrade their consoles? i.e. not like a PC where something 20 years old can, sometimes with a bit of hacking, still be played on your current machine.
  That's... ugh... do you just stack all your consoles in your living room so you can select the appropriate one for the games you have? Are you people made of space and money?
  Indeed! This has been going on for nearly 40 years. Welcome to today.
  
  --
  "Never give up, for that is just the time and place when the tide will change." -Harriet Beecher Stowe ^_^
3. Re:Let me get this right. by Junta · 2015-11-20 03:59 · Score: 2
  
  This is precisely why I'm shying away from console games now. It wasn't too bad when the PC would gain emulation for the console titles over time (e.g. I can play nes, snes, n64, gameboy, playstation, playstation 2, gamecube, psp, nintendo ds, and wii titles fine on PC now), but as of PS3/Xbox360, things have gotten to the point where the chances of workable emulation are limited for the forseeable future.
  
  --
  XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
4. Re:Let me get this right. by phishybongwaters · 2015-11-20 04:06 · Score: 1
  
  Yes and no, some games do get re-released in an updated format and some users will pay for that. The rest of us tend to keep the old consoles and the few games we truely love, in a box somewhere that gets dusted off and used once every leap year. The upside to this is there's no "hacking" to get something working. And if we're talking 20 year old PC titles, well, we're into the territory that you have to ensure your sound card (yes, they did exist as their own card) and video card are actually supported for the game. If the game is for my console, my console supports it. Period. I've got my wii, 1 modded ps2, 1 unmodded ps2, and two ps3s that are being usurped once I unbox the ps4. Not much space or money wasted there considering each console upgrade cost LESS than the video card upgrade required to keep my pc running current titles are good quality. The ps4 is the first to come CLOSE to how much I have to dish out every 2 years for a video card, and only because I grabbed one of the special console bundles to get a larger drive. It was still less than the video card upgrade but not by much. As for stacks of games? Ignoring the modded ps2 with a HD loaded with games, I typically keep 3 or 4 disc based games for the console. So as a pc gamer, what do you upgrade and on why cycle, what's the cost, how do you store all the piles of hard drives, ram sticks and video cards you have to continually upgrade to stay current?
5. Re:Let me get this right. by gohmifune · 2015-11-20 04:15 · Score: 1
  
  Yes and no. Backward compatibility is more common than people mention, but because the actual architecture and media of consoles change from generation to generation, consoles as a whole aren't backwards compatible.
6. Re:Let me get this right. by gstoddart · 2015-11-20 04:16 · Score: 1
  
  As someone who has never had a console, do I understand correctly that people normally have to re-buy games when they upgrade their consoles?
  Most things with CD tried to be backwards compatibility, most things with cartridges not so much.
  
  That's... ugh... do you just stack all your consoles in your living room so you can select the appropriate one for the games you have?
  I'm pretty sure I know people who have several game consoles spanning a very long time .. like back to their Super Nintento.
  
  Are you people made of space and money?
  No, but once you've bought it, if it still works and there are games you still like .. why just throw it away? You've already bought them.
  And some times, what you really want to do is play that ancient version of Duck Hunt or whatever floats your boat.
  
  --
  Lost at C:>. Found at C.
7. Re:Let me get this right. by petermgreen · 2015-11-20 04:18 · Score: 1
  
  It varies.
  In the old day each new console was a very different system that was basically totally incompatible with it's predecessors, if you wanted to keep playing your old games you had to keep your old consoles around. Sometimes a game would be re-released for a newer console but this was the exception not the rule. If a game was re-released and you wanted to play it on your new console then yes you did have to re-buy it. Often such games were packaged together into compilations for the re-release.
  The playstation 2 broke this trend being able to play games for the original playstation (from their original disks, no need to re-buy) with no obvious issues. The playstation 3 was supposed to continue this but the support hardware for this feature was removed in later PS3 models (some intermediate models removed some of the support hardware and replaced it with crappy emulation, later models removed PS2 support completely) to cut costs. I have no idea about the playstation 4.
  Original wii models had support for gamecube games to be played off their original disks but this was removed in later models. The wii-u similarly supports wii games (but not gamecube games) off their original disks. With the wii ninitendo also introduced something called the virtual console which allows playing many of the games for older consoles (both nintendo and otherwise) but you have to re-buy them.
  On the MS side the xbox 360 could play some games for the original xbox. You could use the original disks (didn't have to re-buy) but you did have to have a hard drive and internet connection.
  I belive sony and MS are doing something similar to the virtual console but I haven't investigated the details. I'm also not sure what is going on with the PS4 and XBONE as I lost interest in consoles before they came out.
  And yes many people do build shelving around their TV to support their collection of games consoles.
  
  --
  note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
8. Re:Let me get this right. by sims+2 · 2015-11-20 04:22 · Score: 2
  
  Yes none of this generations systems has any significant backwards compatibility.
  Yes see;
  http://www.techeblog.com/index...
  and
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
  No but Sony and Microsoft seem to think we are.
  
  --
  Minimum threshold fixed. Thanks!
9. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 04:25 · Score: 1
  
  PC Gamer here.
  I bought a new video card recently for 200. The previous one lasted around 5 years and it was purchased for about 250. It kept up with most games rather nicely and only started showing its age with newer titles about a year ago. Ram and processor are good for a while yet. 8GB DDR3, Phenom 2 1090t
  Stacks of hard drives? Really? No need. 3tb drive holds it all nicely. Games I am currently playing get moved to the ssd.
  I also do not have 6 consoles plugged into my TV, with their various controllers, accessories, game discs, rats nest of cords cluttering up my living room.
10. Re:Let me get this right. by tepples · 2015-11-20 04:27 · Score: 1
  
  Most things with CD tried to be backwards compatibility, most things with cartridges not so much.
  Except anything in the Game Boy or Nintendo DS line, which support at least one generation of back-compat: GBA and GBA SP can run Game Boy and GBC games, DS and DS Lite can run GBA games, and 3DS, 2DS, and New Nintendo 3DS can run DS games.
  
  I'm pretty sure I know people who have several game consoles spanning a very long time .. like back to their Super Nintento.
  That and there are still third-party games coming out for the original Nintendo Entertainment System, three decades after the console's launch.
  
  if it still works and there are games you still like .. why just throw it away?
  Presumably to save recurring rent/property tax money by moving to a smaller home.
11. Re:Let me get this right. by Wootery · 2015-11-20 04:30 · Score: 1
  
  This is all true, but it's slightly offset by the recent trend to re-release (and modernise) some of the more popular previous-gen games.
12. Re:Let me get this right. by AdamHaun · 2015-11-20 04:41 · Score: 1
  
  As someone who has never had a console, do I understand correctly that people normally have to re-buy games when they upgrade their consoles? i.e. not like a PC where something 20 years old can, sometimes with a bit of hacking, still be played on your current machine. That's... ugh... do you just stack all your consoles in your living room so you can select the appropriate one for the games you have? Are you people made of space and money?
  
  We just keep the old consoles. They're not that big -- maybe a foot across. And (until they got internet connectivity) they were mostly guaranteed to work forever without user intervention.
  Backwards compatibility on PCs was not trivial before DOSBox, and I understand that running Windows 3.1 games is still pretty difficult. Keep in mind that consoles don't have a single standard architecture. Different consoles in the same generation are not compatible, and the hardware on consoles changes much more from generation to generation. The NES and SNES used 6502 derivatives, and the PlayStations used custom Sony processors built around a MIPS or PowerPC core. The jump from one generation to the next typically isn't enough for software emulation. (The PS2 had a PS1 built into it, and the early model PS3s had a PS2 processor on the motherboard.) Aside from the CPUs, there are also special graphics and sound chips. The SNES even allowed for coprocessors on the game cartridges themselves! (That's why you need a multi-GHz CPU to properly emulate a ~21 MHz SNES.) The exception to all this is later model PS3s having software emulation for the PS2. I suspect this was possible because of the weird Cell processor, but I don't know for sure.
  The Xboxes' hardware has always been closer to PCs, so I don't know what the Xbone's excuse is.
  
  --
  Visit the
13. Re:Let me get this right. by Quirkz · 2015-11-20 04:55 · Score: 1
  
  Well, kinda, but not entirely that simple. I've probably re-bought more computer games than console games, really.
  I play my Atari and Nintendo (original NES, and SuperNintendo) games on my PC in emulation.
  My original computer games were for the Mac OS 6 through 9, none of which are compatible with my curent MacBook running OS X, so I either don't get to play them anymore, or I re-purchased them for PC. GOG.com makes this relatively inexpensive, and honestly it's easier and cheaper (in terms of time) to re-buy rather than try to do the hacks.
  I do still have a PS2 (maybe 15 years old) with a few games that I only play every few years, and my "new" console is a PS3 that's about 7. Even that doesn't get much use as a gaming box since the first kid was born 4 years ago. I don't have any duplicates here, but I do have a few that run in a series across consoles. For instance, Dynasty Warriors 4 for the PS2, and Dynasty Warriors 6 for the PS3.
  
  --
  The Quirkz Handbook of Self-Improvement for People Who Are Already Pretty Okay
14. Re:Let me get this right. by twistedsymphony · 2015-11-20 04:58 · Score: 1
  
  Most things with CD tried to be backwards compatibility, most things with cartridges not so much.
  That's not really accurate. Sure the Playstation line was Backwards compatible up until half way through the PS3's life span but none of the Sega Disc based consoles were BC. However Sega's Genesis could play Master system games with the appropriate adapter. (the adapter was really only there for the slot to accept the cartridges). Also the Atari 5200 and 7800 could play 2600 games. The gameboy's were almost all backwards compatible through that entire lineage and now the DSs are are almost all backward compatible through their lineage. And those are all cart based. The Wii could play GC games but the WiiU could play Wii games but NOT GC games. All of Microsoft's consoles were only semi-backwards compatible since it's really just emulation and support was added on a game by game basis. Then you have other weird stuff like the Super Nintendo could play Game Boy games and the GameCube could play GameBoy Advanced games.
  
  My point being that there's no general rule when it comes to this stuff, the compatibility from generation to generation is inconsistent since support just comes down to a cost-benefit analysis for whoever made the console.
  
  --
  Collector's Edition
15. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 05:01 · Score: 0
  
  "(That's why you need a multi-GHz CPU to properly emulate [wikipedia.org] a ~21 MHz SNES.)"
  I haven't had any problems emulating an SNES with add-on stuff like SuperFX and Mode 7 graphics since, oh.. 450MHz PII-based Celeron using ZSNES.
  And everything pretty much works exactly as it did on the original system.
  And that was back in like 1998, well before Higan/Bsnes.
  Perhaps if the developer chose x86 ASM instead of C++, he wouldn't need a multi-GHz CPU to properly emulate things.
16. Re:Let me get this right. by tepples · 2015-11-20 05:20 · Score: 2
  
  I haven't had any problems emulating an SNES with add-on stuff like SuperFX and Mode 7 graphics since, oh.. 450MHz PII-based Celeron using ZSNES.
  ZSNES is fine if it runs the particular game you are trying to play. But it's not so fine for more obscure uses, such as compatibility with controller logs for console-verifiable speedruns, development of game mods and original games that work on the original console, and even a few games. From ZSNES Readme:
  
  The following features are missing: Pseudo 512 SNES horizontal resolution (no games are known to use this)
  Jurassic Park and Kirby's Dream Land 3 use this feature for tinted transparency.
  
  Perhaps if the developer chose x86 ASM instead of C++
  Then it would require megabytes upon megabytes of :i386 libraries to run on an x86-64 operating system, and the emulator would itself have to be run in an emulator on ARM or any other non-x86 platform.
17. Re:Let me get this right. by keith_nt4 · 2015-11-20 05:25 · Score: 1
  
  I don't think keeping a PC constantly up to date is really necessary to enjoy a majority of games. Sure some people spend hundreds of dollars on multiple video cards, high end processors and fancy monitors from Korea but it's not necessary. Mostly because so many PC games are optimized for console hardware released 10 years ago. If your monitor only goes to 1080p you can usually max out the specs anyway. You can run a 4 year old video card and still enjoy most PC games. Because as I said unless you want some 4k magic, 1080p is pretty easy (haven't tried FO4, probably just as true).
  I was kind of excited by the possibility of PS2 backwards compatibility for a second though but now not so much (maybe that will change again in December). I haven't modded with my PS2-with-HDD yet (or my original xbox) but I will eventually. Although at this point extremely small form factor PCs are powerful and cheap enough it may not even be necessary as said PC will emulated all the old consoles anyway. I would probably keep a old wii for wii/gamecube stuff and emulate everything pre-360 on a dedicated PC (or my gaming PC via the steam link).
  Oh, and I store my HDDs is piles. Lots and lots of piles. Also, an unnecessary 32 gigs of RAM is really cheap.
  
  --
  "UNIX is very simple, it just needs a genius to understand its simplicity." -Dennis Ritchie
18. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 05:42 · Score: 0
  
  What are you talking about? Backward compatibility is where the x86 PC really shines and why it's by far the most popular platform in the world. Most DOS or Windows programs could be run directly until the 64-bit versions of Windows.
  To this day, I could install MS-DOS on my Core i7 and run Ancient Art of War.
19. Re:Let me get this right. by AdamHaun · 2015-11-20 05:58 · Score: 1
  
  Most DOS or Windows programs could be run directly until the 64-bit versions of Windows.
  Lots of games worked, but many didn't. Good luck getting sound from a game that expects an ISA Sound Blaster or Adlib card. Some games used software delays to control the execution speed, which became unusably fast on newer CPUs. Regardless, having to install an old operating system is not what I'd call backwards compatibility.
  The thing I miss most in 64-bit Win7 is the ability to enter 80x25 text mode. It really brought back the feeling of playing old Infocom games for the first time.
  
  --
  Visit the
20. Re:Let me get this right. by AdamHaun · 2015-11-20 06:06 · Score: 2
  
  I haven't had any problems emulating an SNES with add-on stuff like SuperFX and Mode 7 graphics since, oh.. 450MHz PII-based Celeron using ZSNES. And everything pretty much works exactly as it did on the original system.
  Sure. But the difference between "pretty much" and "indistinguishable from the original hardware" is not always a small one, and some people care about it more than others.
  
  --
  Visit the
21. Re:Let me get this right. by JazzLad · 2015-11-20 06:12 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  FO4 junkie here, it's no exception. My (bought used for $180 a year ago) GTX 680 works great in 4k (by great, I mean with anti-aliasing basically off - at 24" 4k doesn't really need it). Yeah, I spent a stack of cash on my monitor (mainly for Photoshop), but otherwise, I have a 6 year old (bought 5 years ago for about $100) AMD quad core processor & 8GB RAM (and a small SDD + large HDD) - it doesn't take much to get a better experience than consoles.
  
  --
  "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever
22. Re:Let me get this right. by jmac_the_man · 2015-11-20 06:28 · Score: 2
  
  There's backwards compatibility on the XBox One now, although it was only added within the past few weeks. If you own the original on Xbox 360, you can download the Xbox One version of the title without paying extra.
23. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 06:43 · Score: 0
  
  That's not backward compatibility, the game are ported.
24. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 07:07 · Score: 1
  
  The fact that I can install any old PC OS on my current PC is proof that they are backward compatible. Operating systems are just software.
  Sound Blaster and Adlib support aren't part of backward compatibility because they were add-on cards, but nice try at moving the goalposts. Oh and Ancient Art of War uses PC speaker sounds anyway and those still work fine.
25. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 07:33 · Score: 1
  
  To be more specific, the BC capability on XOne is enabled by a virtualized Xbox 360 environment. If you own the disc, it uses that for license verification and then downloads the whole VM image with the game embedded. If you bought the game digitally on 360, it will show up as ready to install in your Games and Apps, which is really just the same virtual image, but with licensing verified by the MS Store purchase. You are correct though in that a "Xbox One version of a 360 game" is just a port.
26. Re:Let me get this right. by Junta · 2015-11-20 08:11 · Score: 2
  
  Note that a lot of games I revisit are not on the popular list.
  I do however wonder if finally getting into the x86 architecture means they will have more x86 sensibility with respect to backwards compatibility moving forward.... On the other hand they may recognize the cash cow for now work that is rereleasing...
  
  --
  XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
27. Re:Let me get this right. by cfalcon · 2015-11-20 08:28 · Score: 2
  
  Most actually vintage titles get GoG releases. Many can also be emulated in DosBox just straight up.
  Basically, if you don't want to keep your old PC hardware around (as you obviously do your old console hardware), then you have to take steps in software to play the games. With consoles, you don't have the second option at all- though the first option is a bit easier.
28. Re:Let me get this right. by cfalcon · 2015-11-20 08:33 · Score: 1
  
  > Perhaps if the developer chose x86 ASM instead of C++, he wouldn't need a multi-GHz CPU to properly emulate things.
  And he'd have a bunch of limitations as to where he could run it, then.
  The "right" way to right an emulator is probably with several tuned hardware specific pieces of code for the parts that are the most resource intensive, cobbled together with a high level language- but you have to maintain each separately. If you expect a random emulator to have the same sort of support as the Windows or Linux kernels, maybe you should be on that team.
29. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 08:38 · Score: 0
  
  Presumably to save recurring rent/property tax money by moving to a smaller home.
  Because you can totally save a lot of money by getting a house that has a floorplan 5 square feet less.
30. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 09:01 · Score: 0
  
  And he'd have a bunch of limitations as to where he could run it, then.
  Like what? Higan already requires an x86 CPU.
31. Re:Let me get this right. by lgw · 2015-11-20 09:52 · Score: 1
  
  Regardless, having to install an old operating system is not what I'd call backwards compatibility.
  Whatever the game is, Good Old Games will have it eventually. They have lots of very early games with goofy requirements, that run effortlessly in my 64-bit Win7 gaming machine.
  Games written for 10-years-ago Windows tend to run fine with the emulation built into Win7. Games that actually followed the MS rules to ensure compatibility (rare, but they exist) from last millennium work. Starcraft released 17 years ago and still works. I'm not sure if I can drop in my Diablo CD from 19 years ago (haven't tried it), but the download I bought from Blizzard works fine. I think I've run Warcraft 1, from 21 years ago, straight from the CD on my current PC, but I could be thinking of the previous one.
  That all sounds like amazing backwards compatibility to me.
  
  --
  Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
32. Re:Let me get this right. by Wootery · 2015-11-20 10:13 · Score: 1
  
  getting into the x86 architecture means they will have more x86 sensibility with respect to backwards compatibility moving forward
  True, but if the games are using low-level graphics APIs, you're only half-way there.
33. Re:Let me get this right. by tepples · 2015-11-20 10:30 · Score: 1
  
  The idea was that when you reduce the area of your home by 30 percent, old consoles are among the first to go.
34. Re: Let me get this right. by LocalH · 2015-11-20 13:31 · Score: 1
  
  Not as much of a trend as you think. Atari 7800 was compatible with 2600 games. Sega broke that trend as well. Mega Drive was backcompat with Master System, and 32x was also backcompat with Mega Drive by way of being an addon (as you could put your MD cats on top of the 32x and they would generally work).
  Also Nintend broke that trend in handheld - all GBA systems but the GB Micro could play original B&W GB games. Each successive handheld has at least supported one previous generation of consoles.
  
  --
  FC Closer
35. Re:Let me get this right. by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 18:35 · Score: 0
  
  you can get vmac or basilisk. Just get a mac rom. You can download system 7.5 free.
36. Re:Let me get this right. by Rastignac · 2015-11-21 22:48 · Score: 1
  
  5200 was not 2600 compatible. People were really angry!
  This was a major error from Atari; that and the 5200 joysticks.
  
  --
  -- Rastignac was here.
Sony vs. Terrorism by bill_mcgonigle · 2015-11-20 03:34 · Score: 2, Funny

The Belgium Foreign Minister confirmed this morning that ISIS has ported Telegram to the PS2. He implored good citizens to switch exclusively to USB peripherals and await the banning of cash and TLS, technologies known to enable human trafficking.

--
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Viol8 · 2015-11-20 03:35 · Score: 4, Interesting

I'm sure a PS2 emulator has novelty value but I'm not sure many people will really be that interested. Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense given a lot of PS4 owners may still have a PS3 to play PS3 games and might prefer one console to do both? Or is the PS4 simply not powerful enough to do it?
1. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by gstoddart · 2015-11-20 03:51 · Score: 2
  
  There's probably a lot of old titles people would still play if they could, and which can probably make some additional revenue from.
  I can't remember if it was PS->PS2, or PS2->PS3 ... but essentially they achieved backwards compatibility by making the CPU for the previous generation the front-end processor for the new generation. The theory was backwards compatible was essentially free.
  It's entirely plausible the PS4 can't emulate a PS3 fast enough ... but I bet there's a lot of side scrollers and other classic PS2 games people would still love to play.
  
  --
  Lost at C:>. Found at C.
2. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Junta · 2015-11-20 03:53 · Score: 2
  
  PS2 is easier. Note this is probably like the PS1 emulation in PSP, good enough to work almost all the time, but limited by Sony to make sure a given title works and/or is tweaked to work under the emulator before blessing it.
  Also, porting from PS3 might be more in reach for companies than PS2 back catalog, simply because being newer means they are more likely to still have the assets to build the title.
  
  --
  XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
3. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 03:53 · Score: 0
  
  They already had the PS2 emulator from the PS3, and a PS3 emulator would require emulating the Cell processor, which I imagine would be quite an effort.
4. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by tepples · 2015-11-20 03:56 · Score: 2
  
  I'm sure a PS2 emulator has novelty value but I'm not sure many people will really be that interested.
  It's the same logic as the Virtual Console section of Nintendo's Wii Shop Channel. Only a PlayStation 2 emulator can play PlayStation 2 exclusive games. A heck of a lot of those were produced for a console that clearly outsold the contemporary Xbox and GameCube consoles. Emulating the PlayStation 2 allows SCE and participating game publishers to produce revenue from these games.
  
  Or is the PS4 simply not powerful enough to do it?
  I suspect that to be the case. PlayStation 4's processor (a 64-bit Jaguar, DO THE MATH) is reportedly clocked lower than PlayStation 3's Cell Broadband Engine.
5. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by tepples · 2015-11-20 04:09 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  I can't remember if it was PS->PS2, or PS2->PS3 ... but essentially they achieved backwards compatibility by making the CPU for the previous generation the front-end processor for the new generation.
  There have been several consoles like that. Sega Genesis included the Sega Master System CPU as a coprocessor mostly used for audio and a VDP that can fall back to Master System video modes. PlayStation 2 included the original PlayStation's CPU as the I/O coprocessor. Nintendo DS included the GBA's ARM7 as the I/O coprocessor.
  There are a few other approaches to backward compatibility. One is to overclock the same CPU (Game Boy Color, Wii), possibly with more identical cores (Wii U). Another is to disable the previous CPU entirely when running new games (Game Boy Advance, PlayStation 3 with SACD logo).
6. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by phishybongwaters · 2015-11-20 04:09 · Score: 1
  
  Keep in mind the ps3 (cell) had a totally different architecture where the ps4 is off the shelf (mostly) pc components. They are offering a paid streaming service for some (all?) ps3 titles. That's why just giving us an emulator will never happen. Why spend time and money developing this to give it for free when you can make me buy those games again, or better yet sucker me into a subscription. Fact is, much like the xbox1 supporting a big list of xbox games, no one gives a crap because no one buys a 500$ console to play games from 7 years ago.
7. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by UnknownSoldier · 2015-11-20 04:16 · Score: 1
  
  As someone who has shipped a few PS2 games and did PS3 dev support, emulating the 3.2 GHz PowerPC along with the 6 SPUs on an 8-core x86 would have been a **huge** performance hit.
  Why?
  Remember the PS4 is only running at a pathetic 1.6 GHz.
  In contradistinction the PS2's CPU, the EEE, only runs ~ 300 Mhz. Likewise the other processors, the VU0, VU1, GS, SPU run at ~ 150 MHz. (The SPU runs only at 8 MHz.) FAR easier to emulate -- you basically just throw hardware at the problem. :-) At that is even accounting for the wicked fast PS2's GS VRAM transfer speed.
8. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by gohmifune · 2015-11-20 04:19 · Score: 1
  
  My PS2 sits underneath my PS4. I still have a crazy backlog of games I own and games I've yet to buy. As a system, it has yet to be beat. Unless one is too young for it, I don't imagine people would ignore how amazing the games were. It's pretty much the last significant console.
9. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by DrXym · 2015-11-20 04:23 · Score: 1
  
  I have about 8 or so PS2 titles in my cupboard which would be nice to play. But I doubt Sony have any intention of opening up the emulation so I can run them on a PS4. They make too much money selling "remastered" titles, and from packaging up titles to sell on PSN, or via their cloud service. At least they recoup their investment from testing games and making their money in that way. Just opening up emulation on the console doesn't earn them a thing unless they intend to charge people a few coins to "unlock" a supported game. Otherwise the money isn't there for them to open up the emulator. I'd be happily surprised if they did of course but I don't see it happening.
10. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Wootery · 2015-11-20 04:36 · Score: 1
  
  Indeed, emulating a Cell with usable performance is a huge task. There's also the GPU. I imagine emulating the PS3's nVidia GPU would be quite a task. PS3 games use a low-level API to access the PS3's GPU, so it wouldn't be easy to map things across to the PS4's (totally different) GPU. (The PS4's GPU is by AMD, and of course GPU architectures have changed quite radically over the years anyway.)
11. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Wootery · 2015-11-20 04:41 · Score: 1
  
  Who cares about clock speeds? Even if the PS4 had a current-day top-of-the-line CPU, emulating a Cell processor with usable performance would be an enormous -- probably impossible -- task.
  The Cell is quite exotic: it's radically different from most CPUs. I imagine it would be a nightmare for software emulation.
  On top of that, you'd have to emulate the GPU, which would another enormous (maybe impossible) task.
  A more practical alternative would be to set our sights lower, and for Sony to create tooling to simplify porting PS3 games onto the PS4.
12. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 05:17 · Score: 0
  
  Sell old games online for small change, free money.
13. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 06:00 · Score: 0
  
  and this of course is why it's more straightforward for MS to do this with XboxOne and Xbox360... the ATI graphics team made sure that the old 360 test suite ran on the new graphics core, as part of a design requirement.
14. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 06:55 · Score: 0
  
  It's a business decision for sure. You can still buy a PS3, so Sony would rather you buy a PS3 and games than they spend their money making the games work in a PS4.
  The PS2 is basically EOL, you can't really get new consoles and the games market is entirely second hand. If they create PS2 Emulation they can re-sell you the emulated versions of games. Real, pop-the-disk-in-and-go backwards compatibility doesn't create that market since there won't be new PS2 games to sell you and unless they charge significantly for the BC feature somehow, it's a feature created at a loss. So they do the PS2 Emulation, and if you want to play one of your PS2 games again you can buy it on the PSN store.
15. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 07:38 · Score: 0
  
  I would love a system that could do all 4 play stations; while my hardware collection is quite nice, for practical reasons having a single console that plays all my PS1/2/3/4 games would be awesome! I don't even care if I have to pay extra for such a critter for literally having to shove all 4 versions of hardware into a single box. But in the real world I'm sure that would be quite the engineering feat especially if the box size is to remain reasonable plus I don't know how much of demand there would be besides me.
16. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by malditaenvidia · 2015-11-20 07:50 · Score: 1
  
  They already had the PS2 emulator from the PS3.
  Which did not work very well, had some horrible issues and was eventually phased out completely. Keep in mind that launch PS3s had a couple of configurations, one of which contained an entire PS2 emotion engine inside for purposes of backwards compatibility, and also cost more ($599 USD). The ones with software backwards compatibility struggled to run most games.
17. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by malditaenvidia · 2015-11-20 07:57 · Score: 1
  
  Yet it's not horribly different to that of the Xbox 360's as they both have PowerPC processors at their core. Microsoft is somehow managing this with a (negligibly) weaker system and offering backwards compatibility with 360 titles on the xbox one.
18. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 08:06 · Score: 0
  
  Microsoft seems to be doing it by recompiling the games, though, not CPU emulation.
19. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by cfalcon · 2015-11-20 08:36 · Score: 1
  
  The PS3 was going to have this problem from the start- the cell architecture was just too exotic. The only way we would have PS3 emulation on the PS4 is if the PS4 kept to that exact design concept- and that's just punting the problem to whenever it's no longer wise to keep down that design path.
20. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by xombo · 2015-11-20 09:17 · Score: 1
  
  I have so few games that "struggle to run" under software backwards compatibility under a PS3. The list on Wikipedia is quite short when you compare it to the thousands of available titles. The only titles that tend to cause me trouble were music games where the timing and sync of audio and video was tantamount to player success.
21. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by xombo · 2015-11-20 09:19 · Score: 1
  
  This is the same strategy they took with backwards compatibility on the 360. Essentially, you put in your old XBox disc and it downloads a recompiled binary for the new architecture off Xbox live.
22. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Wootery · 2015-11-20 10:16 · Score: 1
  
  Citation needed. Interesting if true though.
23. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 11:38 · Score: 0
  
  They've openly talked about why it cannot be done. The architecture is vastly different to the point where emulation is impossible without having the ps3 components built in to the system, which they obviously have not done. They are doing this to compete with xbone who have announced 360 compatibility coming soon.
24. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by malditaenvidia · 2015-11-20 12:31 · Score: 1
  
  Timing and sync of audio and video is sort of important, if you're considering a game playable.
25. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 17:08 · Score: 0
  
  The PC Engine SuperGrafx was backward compatible with the PC Engine and the Super Famicom is backward compatible with Famicom games with a cartridge adapter.
26. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 20:31 · Score: 0
  
  All recent Intel CPUs are Cell-architecture like, only way faster.
  PPE = x86/64 core
  SPE = HD Graphics EU
  EIB = intel ring bus
27. Re:Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-29 10:15 · Score: 0
  
  Is this horseshit still being spread around. The PS3 is a PPC with a bunch of simple DSP like co-processors. It wasn't even that fast, as Sony realised when they eventually had to shoehorn in a GPU.
  You do know what Sony stopped advertising it years ago and moved onto the PS4. You can stop fanboying.
  It's not, and never was, a supercomputer.
  Most emulators have moved onto binary translation these days. They don't interpret binaries. They compile them.
  Now stop wanking over 13 year old tech.
Gran Turismo PS2 games? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 03:40 · Score: 0

Supported or not?
1. Re:Gran Turismo PS2 games? by phishybongwaters · 2015-11-20 04:11 · Score: 0
  
  You did read the article where it stated only the star wars bundle is taking advantage and Sony refuses to comment further. Oh wait, of course you didn't read it.
2. Re:Gran Turismo PS2 games? by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 04:27 · Score: 0
  
  "The PlayStation 2 was one of Sony’s most popular gaming platforms and had thousands of games released for it worldwide, including many classics like the original God of War, Gran Turismo 3, and Final Fantasy X among others. If Sony can get these games running on an emulator on PS4, it can sell them all over again and boost the PS4’s library significantly."
Well This Is Just TERRIBLE News by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 03:49 · Score: 0

How dare Sony do this! This is a bad thing, right?
I don't know what's worse, Kari Wuhrer on Sliders, or boob job/remove boob job, or Roger Daltrey on Sliders, and his boob job/remove boob job.
Catphca was sliders so all on topic.
And isn't a roger a gay joke for you Brits?
Short version by Rik+Sweeney · 2015-11-20 03:49 · Score: 5, Insightful

Sony: We're not going to add emulation to the PS4, there's just no interest in it.
Microsoft: We've added emulation to the XBoxOne!
Sony: Shit. Guys, get coding...
Competition = good.

--
Summation 2
1. Re:Short version by gohmifune · 2015-11-20 04:20 · Score: 1
  
  They probably just didn't want to overpromise. Considering that emulation would have been required anyways for their streaming model to work, I don't see how this wasn't inevitable.
2. Re:Short version by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 05:31 · Score: 0
  
  Sony: Shit. Guys, get coding...
  To add to that, they did not want to make a big deal out of PS2 emulation while Microsoft gets to tout Xbox 360 emulation, which means that Sony needs to emulate the PS3 to be the same thing.
  I suspect that emulating the Cell processor is going to be much harder for Sony (or anyone) to do since they do not have a Hyper V equivalent sitting around for the rest of the OS to use. Not to mention, it was known to be hard to program against without emulation, so emulating is likely to be difficult too.
3. Re:Short version by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 05:37 · Score: 0
  
  Before you go assuming competition made them do what they're doing, I'd recommend we wait to see what they plan on doing with this emulation.
  I suspect it's just being done to make it easier and faster for them to add almost-good-but-probably-buggy PS2 games to the PSN store. IE: The backwards compatibility isn't for the consumer with a load of PS2 discs. It's just to make it cheaper for them to resell you less than perfect copies for 10-15 dollars digitally.
  Wake me when it's shown you can pop in a PS2 disc and have it work, but I doubt anyone will be waking me up soon. It wouldn't make sense for them to keep it hush hush if it was real backwards compatibility in the traditional sense.
4. Re:Short version by xombo · 2015-11-20 09:22 · Score: 1
  
  Sony is notorious for over-promising and under-delivering on Playstation hardware and software capabilities. This would fly in the face of much of their history. I suspect it was simply cheaper to pull off an attempt at emulation to try and make this bundle of Star Wars games work, vs trying to build it again, as a quick cash grab.
5. Re:Short version by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 11:10 · Score: 0
  
  Except with Microsoft they've added Xbox 360 emulation while with Sony they added PS2 emulation. If it were on par with Microsoft it would be PS3 emulation they were adding not PS2. There is a open source PS2 emulator ( https://github.com/PCSX2/pcsx2 ) I honestly wouldn't be surprised if Sony used their work to speed up their "feature". There is a open source PS3 emulator ( https://github.com/DHrpcs3/rpcs3/ ) but it only supports homebrew games at this point and no commercial games unlike the PS2 OSS.
6. Re:Short version by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 11:42 · Score: 0
  
  No. Architecture is too different to feasibly add ps3 emulation.
Games from discs by RogueyWon · 2015-11-20 03:54 · Score: 2, Interesting

The big unanswered question is whether Sony will allow users to play PS2 games from their original discs. On the basis of what we've seen so far, there would appear to be no reason why this isn't feasible.
The worry, however, is that Sony wants restrict the system to online purchases made via a PS4, so that people who want to play PS2 games on a PS4 need to purchase the titles again, even if they own the original discs (and with probably only a tiny portion of the PS2's library being available for purchase).
1. Re:Games from discs by Junta · 2015-11-20 04:02 · Score: 1
  
  I suspect more it's a carry over of the capability from PS3. Not the original hardware capability to play the discs, but the later capability they had to help developers massage PS2 games to work on PS3 through their online store. It wasn't able to flat out run an existing game unmodified, but mitigated the amount of stuff a developer had to do to get it to run on a PS3 by emulating a lot of the stuff that was within reach.
  
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2. Re:Games from discs by phil.swansborough · 2015-11-20 04:04 · Score: 1
  
  I'm sure they'd never do a thing like that...
3. Re:Games from discs by tommeke100 · 2015-11-20 04:09 · Score: 2
  
  A non-trivial amount of PS2 games came out on CD-ROM (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_PlayStation_2_CD-ROM_games) and not DVD. PS4 can't read plain old CD-ROM.
4. Re:Games from discs by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 04:36 · Score: 1
  
  I thought the PS4 had a Blu-ray drive, all of which read DVD and CD. If the PS4 can't read CD-ROM, that's a software issue, not a hardware one.
5. Re:Games from discs by PRMan · 2015-11-20 04:48 · Score: 1
  
  Easily fixed.
  
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6. Re:Games from discs by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 04:54 · Score: 0
  
  Even watching Blu-ray movie seems to be a problem on PS4, so no wonder it cannot read CD-ROMs.
7. Re:Games from discs by tommeke100 · 2015-11-20 05:04 · Score: 1
  
  I don't know. My sources are a google search on the internet :-) The official PS4 website didn't list CD as a supported format and I saw a forum post of a guy saying he couldn't play his audio CD on it. But again, that's what the interwebz told me, could be wrong.
8. Re:Games from discs by Gibgezr · 2015-11-20 06:23 · Score: 1
  
  I think the PS4 can *read* cds technically, but it had no media player app that can play audio cds.
9. Re:Games from discs by Sowelu · 2015-11-20 07:03 · Score: 1
  
  Frustrated now. I was about to buy a refurbed PS2 off ebay or something (interior components of the controller ports on my last model literally crumbled apart, which is apparently not uncommon) to get my Katamari and DDR on again, but now I'm not sure if I want to wait and get a modern console instead.
10. Re:Games from discs by cfalcon · 2015-11-20 08:40 · Score: 1
  
  It seems unlikely that this will be released as a generic thing on the PS4. If you have space in your house for a working PS2, and a desire to play those games, then you should get the hardware.
11. Re:Games from discs by xombo · 2015-11-20 09:22 · Score: 1
  
  I'm still not sure how to play Blu-rays on my PS4. I gave up after about 10 minutes and just popped it in the PS3. Worked immediately.
12. Re:Games from discs by xombo · 2015-11-20 09:23 · Score: 1
  
  DDR games are generally emulated really poorly due to the need to have really good timing sync between the audio and video signals. You're better off sticking with the PS2 if you don't want to fail every dance.
13. Re:Games from discs by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 11:13 · Score: 0
  
  Well with the modern console, you never know if or when Sony will force a update that removes the support for this "feature" much like they've done in the past.
14. Re:Games from discs by Voyager529 · 2015-11-20 13:53 · Score: 1
  
  I can't speak for Katamari, but assuming you have a PS2 dance pad...
  http://www.stepmania.com/downl..., plus
  http://stepmaniaonline.net/ind..., plus
  http://www.amazon.com/gp/produ..., equals
  A near-equivalent, if not superior, DDR experience on your computer.
15. Re:Games from discs by captjc · 2015-11-20 13:53 · Score: 1
  
  Really? I just tried it for the lulz and it was pop in disc, and select the disc from the main menu. Aliens was playing in all of 10 seconds.
  
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16. Re:Games from discs by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 17:24 · Score: 0
  
  It doesn't need a media player app, the optical drive itself is capable of playing CDs as it is just raw PCM audio. Sony purposefully went out of their way to prevent CDs from being played on the PS4.
17. Re:Games from discs by CronoCloud · 2015-11-21 07:03 · Score: 1
  
  You put in a disc, a "Blu-ray disc" tile will show up in the UI. select it with the controller.
Playstation NOW is Sony's answer by KatchooNJ · 2015-11-20 04:04 · Score: 1

I'm sure a PS2 emulator has novelty value but I'm not sure many people will really be that interested. Wouldn't a PS3 emulator make more sense given a lot of PS4 owners may still have a PS3 to play PS3 games and might prefer one console to do both? Or is the PS4 simply not powerful enough to do it?
Sony's solution is Playstation NOW. It is a streaming service to let you play PS4 games on your PS4 using a streaming "rental" model. The plan is to include PS3 games at some point.

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1. Re:Playstation NOW is Sony's answer by gohmifune · 2015-11-20 04:17 · Score: 1
  
  NOW is for PS3 games, and possibly PS2 at some point.
2. Re:Playstation NOW is Sony's answer by KatchooNJ · 2015-11-20 04:31 · Score: 1
  
  PS3 now and PS4 emulation later. I got the order mixed up.
  
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  "Never give up, for that is just the time and place when the tide will change." -Harriet Beecher Stowe ^_^
3. Re:Playstation NOW is Sony's answer by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 04:44 · Score: 0
  
  No one cares what Sony's answer is. Because the question isn't about what Sony want, it's about what the consumer desires. The price model of Now is wrong, it's still-born beyond the novelty factor. When it costs more to rent some old shit in that's $5 in the bargain bin, you know it'll fail. Furthermore, the Now titles are old or shitty shovelware from Unity 3D or Gamemaker, i.e. phone/table games. Yeah, fuck that.
Urm by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 04:13 · Score: 0

What PS2 emulation on the PS3? Mine doesn't have PS2 emulation.
That said, PSP emulation would be nice...
1. Re:Urm by Rik+Sweeney · 2015-11-20 04:28 · Score: 1
  
  The first editions of the PS3 have PS2 hardware in them, allowing you to simply stick a PS2 game in and play.
  
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  Summation 2
2. Re:Urm by SScorpio · 2015-11-20 05:02 · Score: 1
  
  The first editions of the PS3 had a CPU/GPU hardware, changed to a GPU hardware/Software PS2 compatibility, and finally removed all together.
  Sony later started releasing "PS2 Classics" on their store. These are fully software based emulation and could be ran on any PS3 including the ones that had PS2 compatibility removed.
It's not "disc emulation" by iONiUM · 2015-11-20 04:48 · Score: 1

When the Wii began offering SNES games, nobody called it a "SNES emulator." This is exactly what PS4 is doing, they're adding PS2 games onto the marketplace for PS4 (which may or may not be using an emulator, who knows/cares). But you cannot insert PS2 discs and expect it to work.
This is how you... by cloud.pt · 2015-11-20 05:32 · Score: 1

Recipe: How to add a full fledged, previously tested feature to a new platform without creating false expectation like guaranteeing support for all cases of such feature.
Seems pretty fair to me. Microsoft just dumps features and markets them without the least relevant release notes, such as supported titles, and then we need to resort to the ends of the internet for seeing what we should rush snipe on eBay that will most likely Not Work (tm).
GPL by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 05:41 · Score: 0

Crack that sucker open and start looking for GPL violations. Wouldn't surprise me if they're just shipping a f/oss ps2 emulator.
1. Re: GPL by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 09:06 · Score: 0
  
  They own the source code for the original. They don't need to rely on a reverse engineered clone.
The emulator is not fully supported by subanark · 2015-11-20 06:08 · Score: 1

They haven't tested it for all games. So, they only support using it for this special case. Also, they probably don't want to encourage game makers to use it, but rather recompile (and retarget) their game for better support.
It is like running World of Warcraft on linux. The company has a linux build of the game. They don't release it. They don't support running WoW using Wine. They won't ban you for playing WoW using Wine. Their anti-cheat program will detect you using Wine to run their game, and will appropriately adjust.
In short, they don't want to deal with the customer support issue or any negative PR about a not fully functional emulator.
1. Re:The emulator is not fully supported by cfalcon · 2015-11-20 08:42 · Score: 1
  
  The are absolutely not recompiling the games for better support. They are emulating the games.
  They might have to recompile the emulator to support more games later.
  WINE, as I will point out twice, Is Not an Emulator.
2. Re: The emulator is not fully supported by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 09:09 · Score: 0
  
  I run WoW and a WoW server. With the wotlk version of WoW. The server and game client don't tax 4 year old hardware a bit. I even occasional have another player connecting to my server on the LAN.
3. Re:The emulator is not fully supported by subanark · 2015-11-20 10:04 · Score: 1
  
  Sony would prefer games to be optimized for their latest hardware, but if a company pressures them enough to simply use an emulator to save development costs they will allow it.
  Yes, they might fix up the emulator in the future to support more games, which is why it is not for general purpose right now.
  Sorry, if my last line was confusing, I was referring to Sony, not Blizzard in reference to an emulator.
It will only work for a small selection of games by Anonymous Coward · 2015-11-20 10:07 · Score: 0

I don't expect 90% of the games to be released this way, simply because on that hardware it is impossible to emulate the gpu of the ps2. Yes, there are games that did not take advantage of the exotic features, they were programmed conventionally, but the vast majority did. (source: pcsx2 dev here)
Meanwhile... by kuzb · 2015-11-20 10:23 · Score: 1

...most people continue to silently not really care, because the PS2 is so far removed from the last generation that only a small subset of people will actually be interested in this.
They really should have focused their efforts on the PS3.

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Super 8 famiclone by tepples · 2015-11-21 03:17 · Score: 1

the Super Famicom is backward compatible with Famicom games with a cartridge adapter.
Are you referring to something like the Super 8 famiclone? That's no more "backward compatibility" than a ColecoVision Expansion Module No. 1, Super Game Boy, or Game Boy Player accessory because all the NES processing hardware is in the Super 8 adapter. It just uses the Super NES for power and controllers. It's not like the Power Base Converter, which just mapped Master System cartridge pinout to Genesis. Or was there another adapter I'm missing?
Then why no IBM PS/3? by tepples · 2015-11-22 01:29 · Score: 1

Then why didn't IBM start selling Personal System 3 computers in order to provide an alternative that fulfilled the original intended purpose of Other OS, namely training developers for its Cell architecture?