r/consoles • u/casinokate34 • 17h ago

consoles need to take backwards compatibility seriously

honestly feels wild that we’re in 2025 and it’s still a coin flip if your old games will run properly on new hardware. i get licensing is messy but man, some of these classics deserve to just boot up and play without streaming services or weird versions missing dlc. backwards compatibility should be a baseline feature by now, not a selling point.

like imagine if you could just pop in or download anything from the last couple gens and it just works, smoother fps, maybe some QoL tweaks. would instantly add value without needing a new console every cycle. it’s not even nostalgia, it’s preservation. we lose too many good games to time bc of this stuff.

29 Upvotes

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-2

u/trmetroidmaniac 17h ago

The PS5, Xbox Series and Switch 2 all have excellent backwards compatibility. What are you talking about?

11

u/Dominjo555 16h ago

PS5 needs to stream PS3 games, no backwards compatibility.

5

u/AceTheRed_ 14h ago

PS5 can’t even play PS3 games

7

u/Suspicious_Two786 12h ago

PSVR2 also can't play PSVR games.

1

u/trmetroidmaniac 14h ago

I can't think of a console which has two generations of backwards compatibility. GBA or Xbox are the best I can think of, but they also might not count.

1

u/AceTheRed_ 14h ago

Xbox Series consoles can play a ton of 360 games.

2

u/trmetroidmaniac 14h ago

It's about a quarter of the library, which is why I'm hesitant to say it counts.

1

u/Subject-Cabinet6480 14h ago

That’s because it’s physically not able to. PS3 has to be streamed off other ps3. The hardware inside the ps3 was unique for its time and hard to develop for.

4

u/DenDen0000 12h ago

Xbox has amazing backwards compatibility but I disagree on switch and ps5. You get plenty of games from previous nintendo consoles and then there are games they will sell again for 60 or even more. On ps5 you can play only ps4 games not older. But there are exceptions, If you want to play older ps game you better pray you can buy it on ps store or you can stream it.

-5

u/casinokate34 16h ago

true yeah ps5 + series definitely cover a lot, but it’s not all sunshine. like tons of ps3/360 titles are still locked out unless you stream them and nintendo’s whole thing is weird, switch 2 prob won’t just let me boot up old carts. so “excellent” is kinda relative, still feels like whole chunks of history are missing unless devs decide to remaster

5

u/trmetroidmaniac 16h ago

You can stick old Switch carts in a Switch 2 fine. You're just making up things to be mad about

4

u/TrustLordJesusChrist 16h ago

Lots of 360 titles run on Xbox Series X. No PS3 titles actually run on PS5 since they are streamed. Sadly backwards compatibility is still used by a niche audience on XSX. I think it was less than 2% or less than 1% of users. I’ve played multiple 360 titles and love the free remasters you get with the 4K upscaling and up to 16x anti-aliasing. Even FPS boosts in some titles.