Backward compatibility for all PS4 titles won’t be fully available at PS5 launch

During Sony’s The Road to PS5 live stream event, we learned about the PlayStation 5’s backward compatibility. It’s a hot topic for the upcoming consoles, and Sony promises that all PlayStation 4 games will be available when the PlayStation 5 launches during the holiday 2020. However, every game won’t be readily available at launch. A handful of select titles will be first chosen to be ready for it, and will slowly come out as the new console’s lifetime continues.

The reason all PlayStation 4 games won’t be available on the PlayStation 5 is because of the new console’s strength. It’s too strong and fast of a console for the old games to operate on, meaning these games can’t be played on it yet.

The PlayStation 5’s internal hardware can process information too quickly. Previously, games on the PlayStation 4 had to use a unique method to hide the loading time while players transitioned into new locations on a map. Marvel’s Spider-Man, for example, used the subway system, where Spider-Man would talk and interact with random NPCs on the train when a player used the fast travel system on the map.

The SSD on the PlayStation 5 won’t have this issue and will be able to process information at an extremely high speed. It’s so fast, loading times between new locations and even a player dying are rarely seen by those playing the game. Sony will need to go into the PlayStation 5’s system to help slow it down and compensate for natural loading times of older games to ensure they don’t break, everyone who plays it has the same experience when they initially played the game on the PlayStation 4.

Sony will be sharing additional details about what PlayStation 4 games will be available for players to play on the PlayStation 5 closer to the new console’s launch.