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[Hawks Eclipse]

An illuminating and insightful read about what it was like for former Sony engineer, Tetsuya Iida to work on PS2's backwards compatibility feature. The Crash Bandicoot anecdote is particularly funny and harrowing:

It goes without saying that there’d be big trouble if the game locked in the middle of the demo in front of such a large audience. Unfortunately, I hadn’t nailed down what was causing these freezes to happen. All I could figure out was that as long as Crash kept moving, the game remained stable for whatever reason.

Sounds more like Crash Shark.


Shoutout to Tom James for the translation (it reads very well) and for having done work on Monster Hunter Generations, whose localization I enjoyed a lot.

 

[alabtrosMyster]

I am curious to see what a PS3 PRO would have been like, but I assume that with the nvidia video card inside, and the custom CPU (CELL) R & D cost alone would have made its cost unbearable.

 

[Hawks Eclipse]

This isnt true the article even says some games are black listed from ps2 playing them.

Well, at least I know you have read the article, cheers

 

[quickwhips]

Well, at least I know you have read the article, cheers

I cant imagine being moved from sound to gpu and getting all that done during crunch. Its a great story of passion and enjoying what you do i assume.

 

[stranno]

Playstation + PSIO + RGB cable is the way to go nowdays.

 

[Hawks Eclipse]

I cant imagine being moved from sound to gpu and getting all that done during crunch. Its a great story of passion and enjoying what you do i assume.

I didn't interpret that as passion, it sounded more like professionalism and/or resignation (to his fate).

Specifically, I was put in charge of emulating the PS1’s graphics processor, a request that utterly baffled me. Someone else was already supposed to be taking care of that and when I asked what was going on, I was told that they were quitting the company and that it was on me to pick up where they left off, no ifs, ands, or buts. Suffice it to say, after doing sound work up until that point, switching gears to the graphics side of things was quite the shift. But that didn’t ultimately matter, as I wasn’t given much of a say one way or the other. Like it or not, I had to accept the order, even if the whole ordeal was nothing short of confusing.

Though I imagine he did have passion for wanting to work on the PS2 in some way or another, so he stuck it out instead of quitting like that guy who got him into that situation to begin with.

 

[EverydayBeast]

Backwards compatibility has been a disaster for SONY in terms of PS3 being able to play PS2 games, and PS4 playing PS3, 2, 1 games.

 

[Mod of War]

This thread basically had to be rebooted due to the console wars derail right out of the gate.

Let’s try this again, shall we?

 

[Clear]

To be honest I don't think anything can really top the sheer effort krazy ken made when engineering the original PS3. Being a literal russian doll arrangement of hardware with PS3+PS2+PS1 nested inside each other

 

[Vawn]

Backwards compatibility has been a disaster for SONY in terms of PS3 being able to play PS2 games, and PS4 playing PS3, 2, 1 games.

What do you mean? My PS3 played PS2 games just fine.

 

[Birdo]

I don't think I ever used BC on PS2.

The PS1 just didn't have the nostalgia appeal for me at that time.

 

[cireza]

What do you mean? My PS3 played PS2 games just fine.

Sony half baked the BC. In Europe, the PS3 did not have a full hardware BC, but had an emulator for the Emotion Engine, which resulted in tons of problems. Typical Sony. I wonder if one day they will stop getting a pass for this kind of stuff honestly.

 

[Panajev2001a]

Sony half baked the BC. In Europe, the PS3 did not have a full hardware BC, but had an emulator for the Emotion Engine, which resulted in tons of problems. Typical Sony. I wonder if one day they will stop getting a pass for this kind of stuff honestly.

PS2 and PS1 BC on PS3 was far better than Xbox emulation on Xbox 360 (remember tons of glitches on Halo 2 and that was one of their best/most popular titles). It was not improved like PS2 improved PS1 titles, but worked well for what I can remember.

 

[cireza]

PS2 and PS1 BC on PS3 was far better than Xbox emulation on Xbox 360 (remember tons of glitches on Halo 2 and that was one of their best/most popular titles). It was not improved like PS2 improved PS1 titles, but worked well for what I can remember.

Who cares about Xbox ? This topic is about PS isn't it ?

And did you play PS2 games on PS3 on a European console ? Because it is us Europeans who actually had the shitty Emotion Engine emulator.

 

[Panajev2001a]

Who cares about Xbox ? This topic is about PS isn't it ?

And did you play PS2 games on PS3 on a European console ? Because it is us Europeans who actually had the shitty Emotion Engine emulator.

Yes, I still own a launch 60 GB EU unit... only thing I regret not trying with that console is SACD playback.

Referenced that when the “they always get a free pass” was brought in and I think it was less than fair.

 

[cireza]

Yes, I still own a launch 60 GB EU unit... only thing I regret not trying with that console is SACD playback.

Referenced that when the “they always get a free pass” was brought in and I think it was less than fair.

There is a list here showing that it is far from being as good with the CPU emulated :

List of PlayStation and PlayStation 2 games compatible with PlayStation 3

 

[Panajev2001a]

There is a list here showing that it is far from being as good with the CPU emulated :

List of PlayStation and PlayStation 2 games compatible with PlayStation 3

It could have been better and they started cutting corners with the EU launch as well, I do remember. Had launch gone better and customer really really threw a stink about BC they would have not gotten away with the PS3 Slim model and software would have been improved. CELL was capable of emulating the EE well.

Still, the list was not horrible, just not quite 98% or more like the U.S. and JPN units... still a very high compatibility list when you take into account how many titles you have to emulate well if you sum PS1 + PS2 catalogues and how many tricks these titles used and abused to get performance out of the system. Just see how even early PSOne titles abused system memory and initially undocumented behaviour.
All in all, it would have made even a much smaller compatibility list a great accomplishment.

 

[cireza]

It could have been better and they started cutting corners with the EU launch as well, I do remember. Had launch gone better and customer really really threw a stink about BC they would have not gotten away with the PS3 Slim model and software would have been improved. CELL was capable of emulating the EE well.

Still, the list was not horrible, just not quite 98% or more like the U.S. and JPN units... still a very high compatibility list when you take into account how many titles you have to emulate well if you sum PS1 + PS2 catalogues and how many tricks these titles used and abused to get performance out of the system. Just see how even early PSOne titles abused system memory and initially undocumented behaviour.
All in all, it would have made even a much smaller compatibility list a great accomplishment.

Having your customers beta testing your features is not the way to go (same thing with the boost mode in PS4 Pro, "try it yourself guys !"). Europe had the console several months later already. Having to discover by yourself if your game is going to work or not is unacceptable to me. And Xbox 360 BC was a total joke as well.

 

[Trogdor1123]

I hope ps5 does BC as well as Xbox has. If they don't and it just plays the games it will be quite the lost opportunity.

 

[Panajev2001a]

Having your customers beta testing your features is not the way to go (same thing with the boost mode in PS4 Pro, "try it yourself guys !"). Europe had the console several months later already. Having to discover by yourself if your game is going to work or not is unacceptable to me. And Xbox 360 BC was a total joke as well.

In my experience the games I had all worked well and they, Sony, had an online compatibility list for people to check. There is a big difference from them not testing it at all and legally covering your ass if there is the slightest bit of issue in some remote part of an obscure game which is what happened.

Europe got the console later and Sony needed more time to switch to EE emulation... so? It does not make what they achieved with PS3 BC less impressive considering the amount of titles available for PS1+PS2 (the list is immense) and the crazy custom stud each title in those days pulled off to get performance out of the system and power up it’s engines. So, give credit where it is due.

 

[cireza]

So, give credit where it is due.

Give credit if you want but I certainly won't. PS1 and PS2 are hardware BC, so there isn't much to be impressed by. And in the only occurrence where they actually had to make an effort, it was with the emulated EE in European console and games had problems.

 

[Panajev2001a]

Give credit if you want but I certainly won't. PS1 and PS2 are hardware BC, so there isn't much to be impressed by. And in the only occurrence where they actually had to make an effort, it was with the emulated EE in European console and games had problems.

Problems with a minuscule, overall, set of games and credit is still due even for the HW BC because they delivered that. People give credit to Xbox One BC (as they should), but even that one, while it does give plenty of improvements over the way those tiles ran on their respective HW, is a relatively small selection of a much smaller list of games.

Not sure why you want to belittle the partially emulated BC efforts of the launch EU PS3 (still a very high percentage of a humongous list of titles, take a look at how many titles they had to try to support) or swat away what they managed to do with the US and JPN models.

 

[-Arcadia-]

I had no idea that the PS2 BC was partially emulated. It runs so well, I always just assumed all the major PS1 hardware was shrunk down, inside the box.

It’s always interesting to find out how much hard work goes into these things. The story about Nintendo endlessly testing the entire GB and GBC library. to make sure the GBA BC function worked was... illuminating.

When I enjoy backwards compatibility on the Series X or PS5, I’ll definitely be thinking of the people that made it happen, rather than taking it for granted.

 

[JimboJones]

I remember being amazed at the texture smoothing option when I first tried it. I still played a lot of ps1 games well into the PS2 lifecycle.

 

[cireza]

Not sure why you want to belittle the partially emulated BC efforts of the launch EU PS3

I am not belittling anything, simply stating the clear facts about the situation we had in Europe. If it was fine in US and Japan, good for them. In Europe it was not. Many games had glitches and problems, and that's not only the most unknown games, even big games had problems.

I'd rather have a selection of games that work perfectly well, than a "try it yourself BC" that is supposed to be 100% but is not.

Reminds me of Grandia BC on Vita that hangs somewhere at the end of disc 1 and was never fixed as well.

 

[TGO]

Sony half baked the BC. In Europe, the PS3 did not have a full hardware BC, but had an emulator for the Emotion Engine, which resulted in tons of problems. Typical Sony. I wonder if one day they will stop getting a pass for this kind of stuff honestly.

Yeah but to be fair even that(the European version) that I had played nearly all my 130 games I own.
The main problem was it was a HD machine hooked up to a HD TV emulating games in SD

 

[Panajev2001a]

I am not belittling anything, simply stating the clear facts about the situation we had in Europe. If it was fine in US and Japan, good for them. In Europe it was not. Many games had glitches and problems, and that's not only the most unknown games, even big games had problems.

I'd rather have a selection of games that work perfectly well, than a "try it yourself BC" that is supposed to be 100% but is not.

Reminds me of Grandia BC on Vita that hangs somewhere at the end of disc 1 and was never fixed as well.

I would prefer a machine that has way over 90% of BC support in a next to flawless way... which is what PS3 delivered in EU for most customers, myself included. I did not have any problem with the PS1 and PS2 titles I own.

In EU the situation was much better than you want to acknowledge and the task they had at hand was monumental given how many titles they had to work with and the crazy stuff many of them pulled to work the way they did (an emulator’s nightmare if your try to go for 100% accuracy).

 

[Rest]

I remember being amazed at the texture smoothing option when I first tried it. I still played a lot of ps1 games well into the PS2 lifecycle.

I remember people complaining that it made games look worse. Like what, you like jagged, blotchy textures? There wasn't a PSX game I played on the PS2 that didn't look way better.

 

[ahmyleg]

I thought the PS2 ran PS1 games natively, with no emulation. Did I read the article wrong?

 

[quickwhips]

I thought the PS2 ran PS1 games natively, with no emulation. Did I read the article wrong?

It played most games but some were blacklisted by sony.

I thought it was all of them until i read this article also.

 

[01011001]

I had no idea that the PS2 BC was partially emulated. It runs so well, I always just assumed all the major PS1 hardware was shrunk down, inside the box.

It’s always interesting to find out how much hard work goes into these things. The story about Nintendo endlessly testing the entire GB and GBC library. to make sure the GBA BC function worked was... illuminating.

When I enjoy backwards compatibility on the Series X or PS5, I’ll definitely be thinking of the people that made it happen, rather than taking it for granted.

the GBA is a funny one, do you know how that BC function gets activated? by a little plastic switch that gets pushed down by GB and GBC carts but not by GBA carts. because they literally couldn't figute out a software solution to switch modes lol
and do you know why the GameBoy Micro was not backwards compatible? because it didn't have that mechanical switch to switch modes!
they literally cheaped out on a small switch to bring the price down.

the GB Micro's hardware is fully backwards compatible with GB and GBC but it doesn't have the switch that activates back compat mode xD
I think you can mod in back in tho if I remember correctly... or maybe people found a software solution to activate it? not sure.

 

[MidgarBlowedUp]

Playstation + PSIO + RGB cable is the way to go nowdays.

I didn't know that existed, and now i have to make more room for another console.

 

[ethomaz]

Never used this feature on PS2.

 

[stranno]

I didn't know that existed, and now i have to make more room for another console.

It is a bit expensive, compared to other flashcards (ED64Plus or 3rd party GDEmu), but it has 100% compatibility, the installation is pretty much like a PS1 chip and the build quality is pretty high. It totally worth the money.

Just be sure to buy it new, since firmware is tied to serial key and AliExpress PSIOs don't usually bundle it, so you won't be able to update it, while they're not much cheaper.

 

[bhunachicken]

I played a few PS1 games on the PS2 when it came out, in particular FF9.

 

[FranXico]

What do you mean? My PS3 played PS2 games just fine.

He only had a Slim PS3 (when PS2 BC was removed), I imagine.

 

[stranno]

I thought the PS2 ran PS1 games natively, with no emulation. Did I read the article wrong?

GPU is emulated, that's what the article is about.

Even all PS3 models use some sort of emulation. The most backwards compatible model only has the Emotion Engine + Graphics Synthesizer chip, the rest is emulated in the SPUs (sound, io, magicgate, etc).

 

[Tarkus98]

I remember being amazed at the texture smoothing option when I first tried it. I still played a lot of ps1 games well into the PS2 lifecycle.

Yeah the texture smoothing did wonders for Vandal Hearts. Was a nice feature at that time.

 

[diffusionx]

Sony half baked the BC. In Europe, the PS3 did not have a full hardware BC, but had an emulator for the Emotion Engine, which resulted in tons of problems. Typical Sony. I wonder if one day they will stop getting a pass for this kind of stuff honestly.

Those PS3s ended up hitting all markets. Europe missed out on the first run which had full hardware BC, but those didn't last long for us either.

They did improve the emulator with firmware updates IIRC, but eventually of course they took it out entirely and as such stopped working on it.

 

[LordKasual]

I really do pray the PS5 being 4-3-2-1 backwards compatible is true. I feel like the PS5 should have enough horsepower to brute-force emulate the PS3? Maybe? IDK.

It would add a ridiculous amount of value to the console.

 

[Slateee]

Playstation + PSIO + RGB cable is the way to go nowdays.

I've set my eyes on that add-on and am currently saving up.
heard people complaining about the price but I'd pay anything to be able to play any and all PSX games on my original hardware!! (and to not have to deal with CD-Rs and disk swapping anymore)
HOW DIFFICULT WAS THE CHIP INSTALLATION?

my current CRT only goes as far as having an S-video input. I have a couple other inferior monitors lying around and it's an aspiration of mine to one day learn to modify them for either component or RGB input (or both?)

 

[JSoup]

This thread basically had to be rebooted

Remastered. This is a Playstation thread, it was remastered.

 

[Gamerguy84]

I had an OG PS3 and barely used the BC..

I understand PS4 not having PS3 BC because the jag probably couldnt emulate cell. I think Sony could have done PS2 and PS1 though.

I sub to PSNOW and you can download the PS2 games and play them locally. That could be the answer. They want you to sub to PSNOW.

Its great they will be including BC for PS4 games but knowing myself I probably wont use it much. The only retro gsming I like is my Commodore 64, Sega Genesis, and some Atari.

 

[theclaw135]

I am not belittling anything, simply stating the clear facts about the situation we had in Europe. If it was fine in US and Japan, good for them. In Europe it was not. Many games had glitches and problems, and that's not only the most unknown games, even big games had problems.

I'd rather have a selection of games that work perfectly well, than a "try it yourself BC" that is supposed to be 100% but is not.

Reminds me of Grandia BC on Vita that hangs somewhere at the end of disc 1 and was never fixed as well.

Sony never provided the PS2 with a compatibility list for PS1 games in Europe.

 

[Clear]

To be blunt, if you think its likely that Sony would devote the sort of manpower required to QA the literally tens of thousands of titles that make up the entire Playstation library since 1995, you're off your fucking rocker!