Xbox Series S Can Now Play Classic Gran Turismo Games

[NoStopN]

I believe that both Sony and Microsoft have said that the percentage of people who take advantage of backwards-compatibility on previous consoles was fairly low. However, that backwards compatibility is still an extra feature for consoles, which potentially means extra money on the table. It attracts "older" players to newer consoles, since they don't have to worry about their older games being useless and, depending on who you are and where you live, it really helps in saving space (I pretty much have 7 gaming platforms corralled to 3 devices) and keeping things relatively organized. While I am very much a believer of "go where the games [you want to play] are" and have no real allegiance to any one company, I do think that Microsoft's openness to BC titles is one of the very few areas where they 100% wipe the floor with Sony, and I am still frustrated that Sony still seems to barley get the hints.

I know that many people keep some of their favorite older games (hell, I do) & whether I have to hold onto older consoles or buy a new one that can play many older generations of games is not a losing proposition. Sony has already sold us the PS1, 2, 3, or however many each of us has owned. They've made their money. Allowing backwards compatibility is a sort of "buddy feature" if you ask me. It's like Sony's saying, "Hey, if you buy our new console, you can still play all of those other games you enjoyed." Some people like a trip down memory lane. I still have GT2, GT4, GT5 & 6. I have a PS2, PS3, PS4 Pro. Like many of you, I don't have room to store all of these. And that's not counting the retro console to play my NES, SNES, & Genesis games.

 

[GTP_Remo]

Meh

 

[Tornado]

Few things:

1. Since all emulation is piracy is the official standing of this forum, I'm kind of surprised this is a GTP news piece at all.
2. Sony (though perhaps not to the extent of Nintendo) is a company that is incapable of feeling shame when they are in a market leading position. They've looked at BC with contempt for a console generation and a half now. It's something Sony executives regularly claim that people don't care about, even as Microsoft has pushed it harder and harder and even as HD collections and remakes/remasters of legacy games have been a common fixture since the end of the 2000s (frequently even by Sony themselves). They stonewall on everything that doesn't have an immediate monetary bonus on their end or they didn't do first because they don't have to care, since they know people will happily toe the company line on their behalf even when it is over something that is completely absurd for them to not allow (like cross platform play). We saw it as soon as the PS4 launch when they went to town ripping into Microsoft for all of their awful initial Xbone policies while Sony quietly replicated some of them. We see it every time Microsoft does something that Sony doesn't, to the extent that I'm surprised the PS5 even has the ability to play UHD movies on the model with the disc drive.
3. PSX games were emulated completely in software by Sony since the 2005-ish model of the PS2. They had 3 different game consoles with an online store that allowed you to buy a wide variety of PSX games for play across any system you had a PSN account for. That's four different completely different systems that emulated PSX entirely in software (on top of the selection of PS2 and PSP games on the store also being emulated in software on PS3 as well). Despite the wide popularity of that access, despite the trivial nature required to emulate the entire PSX library even on 2006 hardware even when you're not the company that originally made the thing, despite undoubtedly millions of people taking advantage of it by buying PSX and PS2 games off of PSN, they still sunset the entire concept of buying legacy games on their platform digitally basically as soon as the PS4 came out; and recently went so far as to disallow access to those sections of the PSN store unless you are using the awful PS3 interface for it. And if you have any interest in playing them now? You can rebuy some of them (again) on PS4 after PS2 games were put on the PS4 PSN store a couple years after launch. The one you want that you already bought on PS3 isn't there? Well sign up for Sony's cloud gaming subscription service instead, where you can pay a monthly fee to have a limited amount of games from that era. Don't want that, since it's a joke of a solution regarding consoles that could emulate a lot of these games with less processing power than it takes to run their UIs; or just want to play PSX games? Well, I'm sure you can still find a PSX Classic in clearance bins; where you can enjoy an awful selection of games with terrible emulation done by an open source emulator Sony downloaded off the internet.

None of this is going to change Sony's stance on backwards compatibility, even if running Playstation games off of emulators was a directly condoned use of Microsoft's developer mode for their console like was suggested in the other thread (which it's not). Until there's some sort of closer parity between the system sales, Sony has no reason to do anything but what they've already done; which is publicly state no one cares about it while happily selling you subscription services for it or making you repurchase titles off of the PSN store that you may have already owned on the PSN store before (nevermind on disc) or selling HD collections.

 

[Famine]

Also, I'm surprised (but not at all bothered by) to see an article about this on the front page. I know that GTP isn't 100% anti-emulation, but I was always under the impression that direct discussion of the means of emulation was a no-no.

Since all emulation is piracy is the official standing of this forum, I'm kind of surprised this is a GTP news piece at all.

Emulation is a thing. Pretending that it doesn't exist would be silly, and it isn't always illegal/piracy - the PS5 essentially emulates PS4, and PS3 and PS2 essentially emulate PS1 (and PS3 both emulates PS2 and has the actual PS2 hardware, or neither, depending on what particular PS3 you have). This story is nothing more than a recognition of the fact that, with this process - and the legality is somewhat murky - you can play Gran Turismo on Xbox...

... and we've done it before.

What we don't do is say that you should, or give any directions on how to do it. That sticks with the long-standing site rules that would cover the topic:

You will not use the forums to violate any laws nor to discuss illegal activities.

You will not use the forums for the purposes of sharing or distributing viruses, licenses, registration information, software keys, pirated commercial multimedia files, “cracks”, or other information designed to do harm to or allow unlawful access to any computer software or systems.

The reason we had to pin threads in the older game forums with a slightly sterner line on the subject of emulation was an influx of users who were getting close to, skirting, or crossing that mark, and it was putting us in a very grey area.

There are actually plenty of threads in those forums that discuss things that are not possible without some of the steps required for emulation but, as far as I've seen, nothing that actually discusses, promotes, or provides technical information needed for emulation itself.


In any case, reporting on a thing that's news is not the same thing as using the forums to discuss the process - and as you'll note, I totally forgot to mention the software used and the steps you need to take to get games to run on it...

 

[mika haka]

Thing is its not piracy. Xbox allows the feature without doing anything to the console.

Sony could easily do the same and allow developer rights to the person actually buying the console

 

[Famine]

Thing is its not piracy. Xbox allows the feature without doing anything to the console.

The piracy part comes from getting the disc-based PS games to play on an emulator on a console with no disc drive...

Even if you own the original, it's incredibly shaky ground legally.

 

[MisterWaffles]

I think the deal with piracy is pretty simple. If the game is no longer offered for sale by a company, emulating an old game should not be considered piracy, it should be considered as preservation.

If a game is still being sold on online stores or new in physical locations and you're emulating it, that's piracy.

GT 1/2/3/4/5/6 are no longer being produced physically or being sold digitally, so they have been discontinued. Emulating them should be fair game as Sony isn't making a profit off of them anymore.

 

[Tornado]

Thing is its not piracy. Xbox allows the feature without doing anything to the console.

That literally has nothing to do with it.

.. and we've done it before.

I'll note that people questioned the disconnect in that thread too, even though it was far less a grey area (since you needed your original game disc for Bleemcast to work and Sony lost all the court cases against it and the information in that piece was nearly fifteen years past relevancy) than it is here; but your point is still noted.

 

[UltimateYosh]

Thing is its not piracy. Xbox allows the feature without doing anything to the console.

Sony could easily do the same and allow developer rights to the person actually buying the console

It is piracy, however, when you use roms and bios images that were likely downloaded off the internet. I also don't think loading emulators onto the console was something that Microsoft intended the user to do.

 

[mika haka]

Only thing ill say if its piracy xbox wouldnt allow it but they do

 

[Tornado]

Yes, we saw when you said that the first time. It's still wrong.

 

[Wolfe]

Only thing ill say if its piracy xbox wouldnt allow it but they do

Microsoft does not allow emulators to be published for the Xbox or Microsoft Store -- policy 10.13.10 -- which killed off multiple emulators offered for Xbox. This method is more of a backdoor solution.

"Doing something to your console" (ie. using an exploit to run homebrew software) is a violation of the console maker's terms, not piracy. Using that software to run pirated ROMs or ISOs is piracy.

 

[OptiMystik]

I'd be really happy to play GTAIV and Max Payne 3 on PS4/PS5. Thus new XBox has a cool hidden feature!

 

[goongumps]

I wonder how well the Series S can emulate Gran Turismo 3. Considering it is less demanding than GT4

 

[Daz555]

I think the deal with piracy is pretty simple. If the game is no longer offered for sale by a company, emulating an old game should not be considered piracy, it should be considered as preservation.

If a game is still being sold on online stores or new in physical locations and you're emulating it, that's piracy.

GT 1/2/3/4/5/6 are no longer being produced physically or being sold digitally, so they have been discontinued. Emulating them should be fair game as Sony isn't making a profit off of them anymore.

Emulating should not be considered piracy as such in my view. Using content you do not own (a game ROM for example) is where you getting involved with copyright theft (piracy).

I own Gran Turismo 1&2 on Playstation - still have the original discs. I play the games from time to time via an emulator on my PC. I am not committing any copyright theft in my example. Each nation has its own laws of course so may not be true everywhere.

 

[daan]

I own Gran Turismo 1&2 on Playstation - still have the original discs. I play the games from time to time via an emulator on my PC. I am not committing any copyright theft in my example. Each nation has its own laws of course so may not be true everywhere.

Owning the games is not enough. Do you own a Playstation?

 

[BigShamrock]

Do you not listen to old music? Watch old movies and TV shows? I can't imagine not watching classic films from the 60s and 70s again because they're "from the stone age era".

Fun games are fun games, no matter how old.

bingo

pokemon games used to be fun but now game freak took the new ones to a crappy level

anyway in regards to gt it's one reason why i haven't sold my ps3 yet. 5 made me love it.