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It's been long speculated that Sony was working on backwards compatibility for the PlayStation 4. People have even seen some users playing PS2 titles in their activity feed.
However, today is the day in which Sony officially confirmed that they have been working on PlayStation 2 emulation for the PlayStation 4. The following statement was sent to Wired earlier today.
In a rather fun twist, the PS2 emulation is actually out right now. The first games to support it are a handful of classic Star Wars titles including Star Wars: Bounty Hunter, Star Wars: Jedi Starfighter, and Star Wars: Racer Revenge. Digital Foundry found that the games all feature upscaled 2D art. The 3D elements have been bumped up to 1292x896 due to the nature of the emulation software at work. Framerates also seem to be improved with Jedi Starfighter hitting 60FPS.
As mentioned, this seems to have been in the works at Sony for quite some time now, with some reports saying development began as early as last year. This is certainly not some knee-jerk reaction to Microsoft's introduction of backwards compatibility on the Xbox One.
The methods with how future titles will work with backwards compatibility are not yet known. Of course, most fans would prefer it if they could simply pop in their old PS2 discs and have it work, but only time will tell.
However, today is the day in which Sony officially confirmed that they have been working on PlayStation 2 emulation for the PlayStation 4. The following statement was sent to Wired earlier today.
"We are working on utilizing PS2 emulation technology to bring PS2 games forward to the current generation. We have nothing further to comment at this point in time."
In a rather fun twist, the PS2 emulation is actually out right now. The first games to support it are a handful of classic Star Wars titles including Star Wars: Bounty Hunter, Star Wars: Jedi Starfighter, and Star Wars: Racer Revenge. Digital Foundry found that the games all feature upscaled 2D art. The 3D elements have been bumped up to 1292x896 due to the nature of the emulation software at work. Framerates also seem to be improved with Jedi Starfighter hitting 60FPS.
As mentioned, this seems to have been in the works at Sony for quite some time now, with some reports saying development began as early as last year. This is certainly not some knee-jerk reaction to Microsoft's introduction of backwards compatibility on the Xbox One.
The methods with how future titles will work with backwards compatibility are not yet known. Of course, most fans would prefer it if they could simply pop in their old PS2 discs and have it work, but only time will tell.