Summary

• PlayStation may soon offer native PS3 backwards compatibility, similar to Xbox, likely sold to players for .
• Sony avoided full backwards compatibility for PS3 on PS4 and PS5 due to the difficult PS3 system architecture, but this may now be changing.
• Despite PS+ Classics emulation, a market exists for native backwards compatibility for full game library access.

A new PlayStation, PS2, and PSP generations, as well as streamable PS3 titles.

This could be changing soon, however, as Nick "Shpeshal Nick" Baker has claimed on the latest XboxEra podcast via an anonymous source that Sony is working on "select PS3 backwards compatibility." Baker asked his source for more detail about what this meant, addressing the rumor's vagueness and whether this will be as part of PlayStation Plus like the PS, PS2, and PSP "Classics" that would allow players to them now instead of relying on streaming, and got a response that Sony would "sell them," which suggests a similar approach to Microsoft that would allow the chosen PS3 titles to be played natively on the PlayStation 5.

Unfortunately, Baker pointed out that he received "no more details" regarding FPS boosts or other features often seen through emulation on modern hardware.

The PS3's System Architecture Is Often Used As A Reason Its Games Aren't As Backwards Compatible

Developers Were Critical Of This At The Time

One reason PS3 titles weren't playable on the PS4 or the PS5 natively was due to the console's infamous system architecture. In the PS3 and Xbox 360 era, several developers had been vocal about the PS3 system, with Valve President Gabe Newell stating that it was a "waste of everybody's time" in an interview with Game Informer magazine (via GamesRadar+) initially before partnering with Sony to release Portal 2 on the platform. Therefore, in order to PS+ as having titles from every system, Sony made PS3 emulation streamable, but this was controversial due to needing a high-speed, stable internet connection and the fact it had a cut-off limit to free up the servers, which would make some PS3 exclusive titles such as the cutscene-heavy Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots - which was on the new PS+ tiers' streaming predecessor, PS Now - unplayable.

It will be interesting to see just how Sony manages to achieve this rumored native backwards compatibility considering how the company has seemingly avoided such a task for two console generations so far. Sony used to be on-board with native backwards compatibility in the earlier PlayStation generations, with the original PS library being playable by simply inserting those disks into the PS2, and the original, first edition PS3s could play PS2 and PlayStation titles through a similar process, while Sony dropped this for PS2 titles later on. If Sony could successfully implement backwards compatibility from the PS3, which is its most notoriously challenging hardware, it could bode well for the other, earlier generations as well.

The PS+ Classics collection is a nice way to emulate select titles and introduces features modern gaming audiences would expect, such as upgraded graphics, quick save feature, and trophies, along with the ability to rewind and custom video filters. However, it does still offer a limited number of titles, and as Nick Baker pointed out, there's a number of people who don't want to keep the old hardware, but do want to just play their full libraries on the PlayStation 5, meaning there's certainly a market for native backwards compatibility should Sony opt to invest more heavily into it.

Sources: XboxEra/YouTube, GamesRadar+