Sony Not Planning on Doing Too Many Remaster Ports

[Riff Moonraker]

Sony Not Planning on Doing Too Many Remaster Ports

Sony will only be porting over previous generation games to the PS4 when it "makes sense."

"You can't have too many of these things otherwise next-gen just looks like rehashed last-gen and we certainly don't want that." This was a statement made by Jim Ryan, president and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe in response to a question about the success of The Last Of Us Remastered [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/video-games/editorials/reviews/12007-The-Last-of-Us-Remastered-Review-A-Very-Pretty-Apocalypse] and what that means for more games making their way to the PlayStation 4 in the future.

"I think we'll look at it as and when it makes sense," going on to explain that The Last of Us was a smart move given its extremely high Metacritic scores. Furthermore, Sony now has a new demographic of PlayStation 4 owners who previously only owned a competitor platform and thus weren't able to experience The Last of Us on the PlayStation 3.

That said, "I think the balance is just about right but you know, there are other games that could be looked at, but there'll come a point where next gen will have moved on and rehashing old-gen will have passed its sell-by date."

The Rise Of The Tomb Raider's timed exclusive [http://www.computerandvideogames.com/474307/interviews/sonys-jim-ryan-interview-we-dont-need-to-buy-exclusivity/]. "So do we feel the need to go out and buy outright exclusivity? Probably not... we showed updated videos of games that we had revealed at E3. That's because we wanted to keep the [Gamescom press] show itself full of new, fresh things. We think that gave us a good, strong, convincing portfolio of exclusive stuff and we're happy with that."

Source: GameSpot [http://www.gamespot.com/articles/dont-expect-to-see-too-many-more-ps4-hd-remasters-/1100-6421766/]

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It makes sense, I suppose. Its the same way on both systems, or at least it seems that way. They remastered and carried over The Last of Us, and I can understand why they did that. Microsoft did the same thing with Halo, and is bringing them all over to the One, and that makes sense, too. I cant think of but so many that would warrant this treatment... maybe the God of War series for Sony, and the Gears of War series for Microsoft?

 

[COMaestro]

"You can't have too many of these things otherwise next-gen just looks like rehashed last-gen and we certainly don't want that."

*looks at the PS4 games list* Let's see....here's a list of games which either released both on PS3 and PS4, or which had an "ultimate edition" release on the PS4 when the original game released for PS3:

Assassin's Creed IV
Battlefield 4
Call of Duty: Ghosts
Far Cry 4
Injustice: Gods Among Us
Metal Gear Solid 5
Rayman Legends
Resident Evil HD
The Last of Us
Tomb Raider
Watch Dogs
(and I'm sure I missed some....)

Hey, you're right. This generation does look like a rehashed last-gen. Thanks for letting me know so I could avoid buying a console even longer!

I wouldn't count games that released at the same time or close to it as re-hashed last gen. That's just companies wanting to break ground on the new gen but still gain the benefit of a large install base on the old gen to make more money. And let's not include games that do not exist yet. Doing that we only get two games: The Last of Us and Tomb Raider. Did Tomb Raider need to be remastered? Probably not. It was available for PS3, 360, and PC, so pretty much everyone had the chance to play it already. The Last of Us, however, was only on PS3, so only PS3 owners had a chance at it. With a new console generation, there will be some people who will be getting their first console in a while (or ever), or people who jump from their current console to the competitions (which MANY 360 owners said they were going to do after MS's disastrous E3 showing last year). Remastering it did make sense.

That being said, there's still very little need to upgrade to a new gen console until there are more titles that are exclusively new gen rather than the largely cross gen releases we are currently getting. I figure holiday 2015 will likely be the time we start seeing more new gen only releases which will prompt people to upgrade.

 

[youji itami]

Sony: We just couldn't invest the time and money in making the PS4 backwards-compatible with PS3 games, but taking the time and money to re-release individual PS3 games? That we can do!

Making the PS4 BC is easy it's just no one would pay $700 for a BC PS4 just like no one bought a BC PS3 they waited till it was removed and the console was cheaper.

Well, I guess I was ninja'd... Still, I disagree that the price would be that steep (they ONLY need the CELL and some competent programmers) and I think that there would be a market for a US$ 499 or a US$ 549 Deluxe PS4 with backwards compatibility.

The problem with the PS3 is that it was too expesive and it didn't offered a stripped down cheaper version (which eventually happened with the Slim).

Actually they would need the GPU as well for 'full' BC and that is for PS3 BC only for PS2 BC would require the all in 1 SoC from the PS2 slim so that's 3 chips which would require a larger motherboard and a beefier power supply plus an enlarged case.

It all adds up quickly and there is no guarantee that even if Sony were able to keep the price down to 'only' $500 with BC that it would sell anywhere near as well as the PS4 currently is.

 

[Big_Boss_Mantis]

Snip

Actually they would need the GPU as well for 'full' BC and that is for PS3 BC only for PS2 BC would require the all in 1 SoC from the PS2 slim so that's 3 chips which would require a larger motherboard and a beefier power supply plus an enlarged case.

It all adds up quickly and there is no guarantee that even if Sony were able to keep the price down to 'only' $500 with BC that it would sell anywhere near as well as the PS4 currently is.

Well I didn't say it was "easy"... I meant that it sounds manageable. I bet they could find a way for the PS4's GPU emulate the PS3's, since it is better (to my recollection, the PS3's GPU wasn't known to be that great, with the Cell helping out with the graphics in the more demanding games, like the Naughty Dog's ones) and they would have a shit-ton of RAM available.
The CELL architecture seems like a beast to emulate but, to my knowleadge (as a layman), the rest of the PS3 doesn't share the same complexity. And the PS3 seems to emulate PS2 fine, even the newer models without the emotion engine.
And you don't NEED to have everything working at the same time... Shutdown the CELL when you are playing PS4 games. No problem with overheating, no need for more power supply.

Sony has been working with that hardware for nearly 10 years. They COULD have figured a way around these problems. And I, personally (as a layman, again) think they could have made it happen cost efficiently.

They ditched backwards compatibility because, in the end of the day, they figured ou that it was not interesting for the market.
They DON'T want you to play the games that you already paid for. They want you to buy new ones, or pay again to play the same games (remastered, or via PS Now, or Nintendo's Virtual Console)
There is little profit to be made from backwards compatibility (since great old games are dirt cheap and constantly offer hours of fully-fledged experiences), and the industry finally figured that out, unfortunately...

 

[youji itami]

Snip

Actually they would need the GPU as well for 'full' BC and that is for PS3 BC only for PS2 BC would require the all in 1 SoC from the PS2 slim so that's 3 chips which would require a larger motherboard and a beefier power supply plus an enlarged case.

It all adds up quickly and there is no guarantee that even if Sony were able to keep the price down to 'only' $500 with BC that it would sell anywhere near as well as the PS4 currently is.

Well I didn't say it was "easy"... I meant that it sounds manageable. I bet they could find a way for the PS4's GPU emulate the PS3's, since it is better (to my recollection, the PS3's GPU wasn't known to be that great, with the Cell helping out with the graphics in the more demanding games, like the Naughty Dog's ones) and they would have a shit-ton of RAM available.
The CELL architecture seems like a beast to emulate but, to my knowleadge (as a layman), the rest of the PS3 doesn't share the same complexity. And the PS3 seems to emulate PS2 fine, even the newer models without the emotion engine.
And you don't NEED to have everything working at the same time... Shutdown the CELL when you are playing PS4 games. No problem with overheating, no need for more power supply.


Sony has been working with that hardware for nearly 10 years. They COULD have figured a way around these problems. And I, personally (as a layman, again) think they could have made it happen cost efficiently.

They ditched backwards compatibility because, in the end of the day, they figured ou that it was not interesting for the market.
They DON'T want you to play the games that you already paid for. They want you to buy new ones, or pay again to play the same games (remastered, or via PS Now, or Nintendo's Virtual Console)
There is little profit to be made from backwards compatibility (since great old games are dirt cheap and constantly offer hours of fully-fledged experiences), and the industry finally figured that out, unfortunately...

The PS3 never emulated the PS2 the first PS3's had PS2's in them (go look at the BC PS3's on ifixit it shows 4 big chips 2 for the PS3 and 2 for the PS2).

There is no x86 CPU that can emulate the CELL accurate emulation is hard.

This article from 2011 shows that even top of line tech can not accurately emulate a SNES! (http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2011/08/accuracy-takes-power-one-mans-3ghz-quest-to-build-a-perfect-snes-emulator/)

 

[SilverUchiha]

*snipped*
So yeah, stop making excuses for them.

whoa, Whoa, WHOA! Slow down there. I was not making excuses for Sony. I was merely bringing the same bullshit EVERYONE brings up whenever I shit on Sony for not offering options of backwards compatibility. I may not understand the technology behind it 100%, but it isn't a stretch to say that this isn't just an excuse, but within the realm of possibility that it isn't a feasible thing for Sony to do.

That being said, don't assume I'm defending Sony by any means. As I said before, I refuse to buy a PS4 BECAUSE of the lack of backwards compatibility. The lack of effort in trying to make it work or picking more compatible technology to make it work, it doesn't matter the reason. I agree with you that Sony is a collective asshole in this sense. But please don't offend me by assuming I'm making excuses for them and calling it good. The fact I'm holding onto my original PS3 (with the backwards compatibility) and outright refusing to by the PS4 (or XBone for that matter) should tell you I'm in the same boat as you where I'd be willing to pay a significant amount more for a PS4 IF and ONLY IF they could make full-backwards compatibility a thing.