I'll kick you right in the Pii (the PS3 haters thread).

[Praxis]

I understand that with each passing generation the systems involved get exponentially more complex, but what the fuck is going on with backwards combpatability? Before systems just had it. Now suddenly it's this huge problem and companies can't deliver on what they promised.

What consoles had it? Other than PS1 > PS2, Cube > Wii and the GB series I can't think of any that managed it without special hardware (Master System to Genesis)

Actually, IIRC the PS2 had a PS1 processor in it.
Cube and Wii have the same architecture.

The GBA had a GBC processor in it (GBC was a faster GB). DS lacks this processor, which is why it doesn't play GBC games.

So the only systems to do it without special hardware are the Game Boy Color, and the Wii.

The GBA, DS, and PS2 all had special hardware.

The XBox 360 would need both the CPU AND GPU of the XBox (NVidia specific calls and different binaries), so instead they chose to just patch games.
I have no idea how PS3's BC works.

[Praxis]

That's just for the memory card emulation, and that should be relatively easy. Now, emulating the rest of the PS2 hardware will be much more involved, especially given the architectural differences between the two systems.

*pities sony*

So not only do they have to get a working and very good compiler for CELL, but they have to write emulation for the PS2 and PS1 games on it as well?

I'm not sure wether to laugh or to cry.

I wonder. Does the PS3 have a PS2 'emotion engine' chip on it? PS1 would be easy to emulate, but PS2 sounds like a pain.

Then again, with PS2 being the slowest system of the current generation, it's easier than, say, emulating an XBox.

[Vendetta]

PS3 backwards compatibility will work the same way as the Xbox 360. Software emulation. Different games need different routines depending on what they do with the CPU and GPU. Though remember that Microsoft bought Connectix some while ago, and so have some people with experience of making Power chips pretend to be x86s on hand. This is why they do not have every game running, mostly games that were easy to make work at first, and the more similar the games the more chance of them being included. For example, I suspect they wanted Ninja Gaiden to work, and since it uses practically the same engine, they got Dead or Alive 3 into the bargain. I expect that if they add Dead or Alive Ultimate they will get Dead or Alive Xtreme as well, as they use the same graphics engine.

Sony say that they will have every game working from the start. I can see that being easy enough for PS1 games, brute force emulation will work fine.

PS2 games? Not so sure. The PS2's vector units were highly programmable, although there were accepted ways of using them, so theoretically they could be up to anything, and the emulator will need to cope with that. This is traditionally a bit of a barrier to emulation.

[Arrow]

I wonder. Does the PS3 have a PS2 'emotion engine' chip on it? PS1 would be easy to emulate, but PS2 sounds like a pain.

I don't even think Sony knows, since no one's seen anything approaching final hardware.

Then again, with PS2 being the slowest system of the current generation, it's easier than, say, emulating an XBox.

The speed difference doesn't mean its easier, although it should provide some room for inefficients in Sony's emulator. The difficulty really lies in the complexity and disparity between the Emotion and Cell instruction sets.

[Arthur_Tuxedo]

Being slow for a complex system doesn't really help much at all. Look at the Sega CD. The first working emulators for it came out only a few years ago, more than 10 years after the launch of the console.