So far, the only way to experience the PlayStation 3 is with a real console, emulation, or paying for an expensive PlayStation Plus Premium/Deluxe subscription. In the latest XboxEra podcast (at 2:58:03), industry insider Shpeshal_Nick says that could soon change. Sony plans to make some PS3 games playable on the PlayStation 5. This complements a previous report that announced the arrival of PS3 emulation on the PS5.
The key word here is “some,” which means you probably won’t be able to insert whatever PlayStation 3 disc you have in your hands. Unfortunately, it’s unclear whether games will benefit from an improvement in resolution and refresh rate. This will likely require a patch and is why Sony decided to limit the titles. Additionally, the PlayStation 3’s unconventional cellular architecture means that a game will need to go through a translation layer to run on x86 hardware.
If so, Sony is expected to introduce this feature alongside the PlayStation 5 Pro later this year. It would be a shame if this feature was exclusive to the PS5 Pro, but given the lukewarm pace of hardware updates, it would certainly help sell more consoles. As always, the above information is rumor and should be treated as such.
