Why did Sony discontinue backwards compatability with ps2 games on the Playstation 3?

I know that the most recent models do not support ps2 games....I have read that sony said the ps3 simply does not have the power to emulate the ps2 cpu and the ps3's gpu and still give the user a great gaming experience. Does this mean that my 60gig will be inferior to the current 80gig in terms of gameplay experience?|||ye the 60gb is the best one so far..and its very hard to make all the ps2 games work on ps3..it takes time|||Nope. 1st you either misunderstood or were given bad info, the ps3 has plenty of emulation power but there are too many hardware differences to do software emulation without at least having the ps2 gpu available. That is what the 80 gb and european 60gb models did, software emulation with the ps2 gpu. It works with about 80% of ps2 games.





Second, the 60gb is the less recent model, and contains the ps2's cpu as well as gpu, meaning it plays ps2 games perfectly without needing emulation. No way is it gonna be inferior to an 80gb. The only advantage the new 80's have over the 60, besides an extra 20g of drive space, is 65nm circuits in the processors, which are more efficient. Nanotechnology marches on...





Why did Sony drop the ps2 cpu, and then ultimately the ps2 gpu? Because people didn't buy the ps3 at launch. Too many people said "no way am I gonna pay $600" at first, and Sony was losing too much money and had to cut corners, as it was costing over $1000 just to make a ps3. Now a lot of people who decided to wait for a price drop are wishing they had bought one in the 1st 10 months instead.





Don't go trading in your 60 for an 80, except maybe if it's a european 60.





also the 60 plays all ps2 games, there is no need to quote percentages. A very few games have trivial issues, like I can't run a non-dedicated console-based server on star wars battlefront 1, no big deal.|||No. The 60 gig is the best model available as it plays over 95% of ps1 and ps2 games. The 80 gig can only plays around 85% of the games.





It came down to cutting cost. It was cheaper to use emulation software then the hardware that they equipped with the 60gb. Sony wanted to get the price down closer to the 360 and that was the most logical way to do it. Europe is stuck with zero backwards compatibility on their models.|||The 80GB still has BC, the 40GB doesn't, it was removed because of cost.





To get the BC on the ps3 there are two key components, something to emulate the ps2's CPU (or the actual processor used in the ps3, the EE, emotion engine, like the 20GB and 60GB), software emulation is used in the 80GB, and the GPU from the ps2, (graphics synthesizer)





The 40GB doesn't have the Graphics Synthesizer so it is impossible to have BC with ps2 games even with software emulation





This was all done to bring the cost of the ps3 down|||1. to cut the production cost. they preffered emulation to save money on materials needed.





2. to move on. it's a strategic move since backward compatibility is killing ps3 itself. how? ps2 is still the most popular console with the most popular games exclusive to it. people won't buy an expensive system if they only targets the ps2's game library since ps3's is still starting up to get good games. it's like promoting a different product than what is supposed to be. it also motivates the game developers to move on. since they know there are lots of people owns a ps2 system than ps3, they're going to aim to the system with higher profit regardless if the system is turning obsolete.


if they remove it then everybody doesn't have a choice but to move on. a double edge strategy but i still preffered more options while waiting to the games i like|||that is not true if sony want to make us buy more ps3 then they would have to lower the price (like the xbox360) and they can't get rid of blue ray since the ps3 is also a dvd player


there are upcoming games to attract people to buy it and the only thing left is to take out the backwards computability and the sd card slot and the memory card slot to cut the price hoping people might buy it and there is your prove it beat the xbox for the first month sell on 2008|||No, the 60gb (and 20gb) is the best model in terms of backward compatability. You will be able to play MOST of PS2 games while the 80gb can only play ~80% of PS2 games.|||Sony Can't Guarantee Compatibility Of ALL PS2 Games.


Sony Computer Entertainment Playstation3 40 GB Will Not Play PS2 Games GUARANTEED!!|||the gamesplay is exactly the same in all models. sony discontinued BC just to make a cheaper model that more people could afford and not all people need a model with BC.|||Well, my vote is for stupid.


I would love to have a PS3 that was backwards compatible. I know the 60 does but they want too much for them now because they do.