Backward compatibility is a touchy subject when it comes to new consoles. Would people rather be playing the new games they bought the system to run or would they continue to play the old games they loved in the previous generation? In an interview with Time, Sony’s Global Sales Chief Jim Ryan doubts backward compatibility is a widely-used feature in new consoles.
“When we’ve dabbled with backwards compatibility, I can say it is one of those features that is much requested, but not actually used much,” Ryan said. “That, and I was at a Gran Turismo event recently where they had PS1, PS2, PS3 and PS4 games, and the PS1 and the PS2 games, they looked ancient, like why would anybody play this?”
While Ryan doesn’t believe gamers would want to replay seemingly archaic titles on their new console, that hasn’t stopped Sony from reselling PS2 games on PS4 or PS1/PSP titles on PS3 and PSVita. On top of this, the company does offer a quite expensive streaming service, PlayStation Now, which allows users to stream PS3 games onto their PS4 or PC. In fact, one of the biggest criticisms of Sony during the previous generation was the removal of native PS2 compatibility from the PS3 after its original manufacturing run. Ryan’s statement comes off as an extremely hypocritical one when looking at the company’s business ventures, but do Sony’s claims actually add up?
With Xbox’s fantastic backward compatibility service, we’ve seen solid proof that gamers do want to revisit older titles on their Xbox One. For example, Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption received a sales increase of 400% following its arrival on the backward compatibility program; many other games have also had dramatically boosted sales after arriving on Xbox One.
In December 2016, Xbox Boss Phil Spencer revealed on Twitter that nearly 50% of Xbox One users were taking advantage of backward compatibility and companies such as Ubisoft were praising the company for bringing a beloved feature to the Xbox One. The numbers prove that users not only want, but use backward compatibility features on their consoles.
Now over 300 back compat titles. Nearly 50% of XB1 owners playing BC games is great to see. Thanks for supporting the program.
— Phil Spencer (@XboxP3) December 13, 2016
How do you all feel about this? Do you agree with Jim Ryan? Tell us your thoughts on backward compatibility in the comments below.
Source: Time
Lewis is a games journalist, freelance gaming and consumer-tech journalist. They contributed 344 articles to ICXM between 2015–2017, focused on opinion pieces, game reviews, Windows and PC, and Xbox news: has since served as Editor-in-Chief at StealthOptional and Gaming Editor at MSPoweruser, with bylines at Gfinity Esports and FRVR.