PlayStation 5 Backwards Compatibility?

General Discussion
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Hey all,

This thread is not meant to start a “console war” or anything, I’m honestly curious as I have not come across a proper answer for this anywhere: Has Sony announced how backwards compatibility will be working with their PlayStation 5 consoles?

We know how it’ll work with both Xbox Series S and Xbox Series X; it’s very robust and simple.

What sparked this question was the official picture of the box art for Mortal Kombat 11 Ultimate. You’ll notice on the Xbox version, it says Xbox One/Xbox Series, but the PlayStation copy says PlayStation 5 only. Thus I assume they won’t be using a service similar to Smart Delivery.

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No they don’t have Smart Delivery or a similar service. Here’s how I understand it:

  1. If you buy a game in PS4, you can play that game on PS5 (lots of “99% of games will work fine on PS5” kind of talk. You can decide for yourself how true that is.).
  2. PS4 games on PS5 will not receive any kind of upgrade.
  3. You can pay to buy upgrades PS5 software.

That’s it. The most egregious examples are things like MKX and Miles Morales, Spider-Man. If you buy the game on PS4 you don’t get the PS5 upgrade. Also, the PS5 enhanced version of the original Spider-man game only comes with the deluxe edition of Miles Morales (essentially a full price retail release) and ONLY if you purchase it on PS5. There is no way to buy it separately. So in theory it’s $20 on top of the $40 they are charging you for Miles Morales.

No console war is required. However it’s pretty clear that MS has a much more consumer friendly compatibility system in place. Sony is hoping you hear “we also have backward compatibility” and then don’t press for details. That’s why the details are so hard to find.

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That’s the impression I’m getting.

I know if you get the PlayStation 4 versions of Cyberpunk 2077 and Mortal Kombat 11, you apparently get the PlayStation 5 version for free, and I know they have that PlayStation Plus Collection, but otherwise, I can’t find anything other than “99% of PlayStation 4 games will play on PlayStation 5…”

So yeah, it does look like Sony is being very non-consumer friendly, which isn’t surprising to me at all.

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