Dev Eager to Fix PS4 Game Not Backwards Compatible with PS5

Disappointed it isn't the developer of Joe's Diner.

I really can sympathise with the whole ‘it just doesn’t work’ deal, there’s nothing more frustrating than things inexplicably not launching. It’s gonna be an incredibly tiny issue that ruins everything, it always is.

Good to see that people don't want to be on the list of shame

@nessisonett it's probably a semi-colon or a comma missing in some config. 9 times out of 10 it's something ridiculously simple but which takes hours or days to track down…

I saw the headline and got hopeful that it was referring to Joe's Diner. I guess this would be fine too

@theheadofabroom The absolute worst thing ever is when you’ve used the UK spelling for colour accidentally. It’s such a tiny issue and for eyes used to reading UK English it’s a bloody nightmare to spot, yet many languages absolutely need the US ‘color’.

Disappointed it's not Afro Samurai 2 Revenge of Kuma oh well at least I can play it through Remote Play

One down, nine more to go.

Hopefully Shadow Complex Remastered gets fixed too. Also runs Unreal Engine so something somewhere ain't going right there too lol.

I hope in the end, only Just Deals With It is the only game that's not compatible with ps5 😂

Cool seeing the dev wanting to patch the game to run on the PS5.

Sounds like a potential issue with specific versions of Unreal.

The fact that the issue is "won't launch at all" makes me skeptical about compatibility, I mean, is the given list just games that simply won't launch? Sony did mention some games not in the list might have issues while running, to the point they warn not to buy dlc until we know the game runs well...

I hope a dedicated group of fans team up and crowdsource testing all 4k games available, and update a wiki on what games have what kind of issues.

@Tharsman There's various lists around on what games got PS4 Pro patch, what runs better, what runs worse, etc etc.

Something like that for PS4 --> PS5 should be happening come November.

@theheadofabroom no kidding. I remember troubleshooting an issue with a config for hours. Line by line, until I eventually came across a value that was supposed to be 0/1 and someone had input 2 and the system didn't have a problem for years. The line of the config was never really used until we updated another component.

@PorkYoself And then thing no longer go boom?

“It just doesn’t launch on PS5 for some odd reason”.

I was assuming Sony had pinpointed a set of games with a certain architecture, or a too low fidelity, or used an incompatible peripheral. But now in my head I’m thinking they got an intern with a pile of discs to shove each one into the thing and see which ones didn’t work.

@MrGawain
4000+ games is a bit much for one person, but I hope they do have a team testing the discs one by one. I wouldn’t want them to make any type of assumptions, I’d want them to know for sure.

@MrGawain paid monkey with bananas. If he puts disc in and nothing shows up he ticks NO box

@themightyant
Sure, I doubt they played all games to full completion.

I wish they would fix the PS4 upgraded games save files not working. Leaving it down to developer choice means in the majority of cases it won't happen because most of them are lazy (the bigger ones anyway).

Why can't Sony release an app on PS5 to simply extract the meta data from the PS4 save and copy it into a PS5 compatible file system, which then creates it as a brand new save with the same data. It can't be that hard.

@MrGawain an intern? There are people that have years and years of experience testing stuff like this... and it won't just be a case of booting every game once or twice but hundreds of times each and play-testing each one to check for errors.

Is this the first time in the history of gaming where I read the lines "Sony is not responsible for X game not working on Y console — the issue has to be fixed by the developers"?

I see it now... A small light of hope for the community. It's tiny, but hope nonetheless.

Kudos to them. Tiny list will get smaller. Shame the Sony PR team handled all this so badly and let misinformation spread first.

@GADG3Tx87
Like many others, you seem to have misunderstood the wording when it comes to game saves on PS5. Sony didn’t say that PS4 saves would require the developers to make them compatible. PS5 versions of PS4 games will. This means that my PS4 copy of Spider-man will work just fine, saves and all, on PS5. However, Spider-man Remastered would require the devs to make the saves transfer over (which they aren’t in this case). In other words, backwards compatible games will run just fine with your saves, but if devs release an upgraded/remastered version, it would be up to them to implement a way to migrate the saves.

@Flipkick661
I'm not misunderstood at all. Thats exactly what I just said. Upgraded versions of PS4 games to PS5 is up to the developers to make the save compatible. PS4 games running as PS4 games are fine, I know this.

But my point still stands. Extracting the PS4 metadata and copying it to a compatible PS5 file system shell will be all it takes so an app would be ideal if they could wright one.

I've done this myself on PC with my PS4 saves when I needed to re-region them.

@theheadofabroom Took a long while for someone to find that dodgy code in Aliens Colonial Marines

@GADG3Tx87 So write it if it's that easy...lol

@Iroha
My coding skills are not up to the task. I never said I could wright one but I know how it works due to using a pre-existing method currently available to PS4. For more experienced people I doubt it's difficult.

@GADG3Tx87 I see, apologies for that, it’s a very common misunderstanding, due to the wording from Sony.
I still don’t believe it to be as simple as just changing some metadata. The PS5 versions are entirely different games, and could be built in a variety of ways and with a lot more variables (content, cosmetics, included DLC...). Same goes with today’s remasters. TLOU Remastered doesn’t work with the PS3 version either. I just don’t think a catchall solution could be implemented by Sony, making it up to the developers to handle the data migration, which in many cases isn’t worth the cost and effort.

@Flipkick661
No worries at all, I understand sometimes written text can be down to interpretation and re-reading my own comment I see that it wasn't exactly clear.

Of course I am no developer and my coding skills are quite limited. But in theory I believe it would work. Here is the example of my own experience.

I had a game, The Evil Within, which I had platinumed. An American friend of mine wanted the data to help him get an easy platinum using my progress. The save file was region locked to EU. Using a PC application I was able to read the file metadata and extract it to a file. Then taking his US save file I was able to overwrite his metadata with mine, so essentially it is my progress simply re-regioned into his.

My theory is that if that can be done, perhaps it's possible to extract PS4 metadata and copy it into the shell of a PS5 save file for an upgraded version of the same game. All it would take is an application that can read the metadata itself, which since it's Sony's proprietary file system they might be able to write a simple app for the console to do it on the fly.

It would be a better solution in my opinion so the users have the option and the choice instead of relying on the whim if a developer to do it for them.

@GADG3Tx87 there's very little incentive for them to do that, even if it is possible. This whole backwards compatible thing was simply to make transitioning from PS4 easier for some people. There is little to no money in backwards compatibility for them. It is literally money wasted.

@TechaNinja yep, all the danger pixies seemed happy. No boom.

I really hope a lot of PSVR games get a PS5 patch to increase the resolution as many VR games don't use the maximum resolution of the headset. Gun Club VR devs, please listen

@get2sammyb only seen two comments about the game. 3 including yourself. 🤷🏼‍♂️

It's good to see developers not wanting to be on that 1% list of incompatible games for PlayStation 5. Cheer's!