Some patents filed in Japan suggest that the next PlayStation 5 will be backwards compatible with all titles released in the past for the console
Good news for Sony and its PlayStation loyalists, from the very first PSX version onwards: the PlayStation 5, which should see the light by the end of this year, perhaps will be backwards compatible with all previous models of this very successful console.
The patent, filed by PlayStation 4 father Mark Cerny at the Japan Patent Office, deals with several possible ways to run old PSX, PS2, PS3 and PS4 games on the PS5. One such method is to use the new CPU no longer to emulate the old hardware but to "play the role" of the older CPUs on Sony's older consoles. Another method to run old PlayStation games on the PS5, mentioned in the patent, is to include in the new console some chips that mimic those of the previous versions. This second method would be a sort of spare wheel, in case the previous method doesn't prove effective.
The PS5 will also be a retrogaming console
But what's really important, and what hardened gamers are interested in, is the hope of being able to play without problems the titles that made history on PSX and later versions. Today, Sony allows you to do that on the PS4 via its PlayStation Now service, but it takes a subscription and a robust Internet connection. The competition, on the other hand, is certainly not standing idly by: with the Xbox One it is possible to play hundreds of titles for Xbox 360 and original Xbox, and Microsoft has made backward compatibility a winning weapon for its console, showing on its site a very long list of old compatible titles.
In October 2018, rumors had circulated of a possible backward compatibility of the PS5 based on a patent, this time registered by Sony in the USA, which provided for the emulation of graphics and sound. Later, however, the enthusiasm was extinguished by the deepening of the news: the patent does not have to do with gaming consoles but with video compression. Moreover, the first text of this patent even dates back to 2016, that is, to even before Sony started working on the design of the PS5. That's why the news of the new patent, the one registered in Japan, should still be taken with due caution: this technology might not be implemented on the PlayStation 5.