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

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.

3 of 151 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Because of the endless whiners by KatchooNJ · · 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 ^_^
  2. Re:Because of the endless whiners by Wootery · · 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.