No joke. It's like they don't want people to buy it or something. First they make it extremely expensive, so much so that it's a painful decision to try to figure out whether it's worth $600 to play a few PS3 titles and really mostly upscale your PS2 games. Then they do this. It makes a pretty solid argument for picking up a PS2 and just sticking with that.

I was finally warming to the idea of a PS3 as a baseball machine with The Show and an upscaled MLB Power Pros which everyone seems to love (after all, you could glue MLB '07 into my PSP and it wouldn't faze me in the slightest), but what with the shifting backcompat and rumble I'm totally confused.

I think they said that users interested in backward compatibility have already purchased the console. New users aren't interested in it as a key feature.

According to their press release on Kotaku:

Wow, that is pretty crappy. I fully understand the financial reason behind removing hardware BC (since it cuts $20 or $30 off the manufacturing cost), but all this is about is creating an artificial reason for people to buy the more expensive SKU once the cheaper one arrives. That, or maybe they plan to eventually drop software BC from the more expensive model too. But whatever the case may be, I can imagine no reason why the software BC wouldn't work on this new model, and thus common sense would dictate that it is a half assed attempt to justify the price stratification.

All I know for sure is that I'm glad that I was able get a PS3 with the hardware BC. Combined with the PS2 upscaling, it has made playing older games visually bearable on my HDTV, which much of the time it was not on the old PS2 even through a component video cable. It frustrates me, though, that bascially there is one less reason why I could recommend a PS3 to a friend, since the experience they will get out of their PS3 playing PS2 games will be either inferior to mine (with software BC), or simply not possible.

Ugh.

Well anyway, if anyone is thinking of getting a PS3 any time soon, I would really recommend hunting down the 60 GB/hardware BC model before they disappear from the market.

Wow.

Way to cripple the machine for those who refused to pay $600. "People who want those features HAVE one already"? Seriously? I know *I* wanted those features, but didn't want to pay "Early adopter" prices... and judging by the other comments, a lot of people were in the same boat. Who did they "research" this with?

As much as I try to give Sony the benefit of the doubt, they never cease to continue to screw us over. Still, I guess we get what we deserve. People complained about the price as the #1 knock against the system, so I suppose we have to lose features if we want that lower price. Tough call, in the end, but I guess they did what they felt they had to do.

They have to do it sooner or later. The fact that Microsoft destroyed xbox development the day of the 360 launch is much more of a slap in the face. Even the GameCube got one last Zelda.

It's understandable to not want to kill the PS2 since it still outsells anything the company makes... but it IS that continued PS2 development that diverts their focus and gives consumers reasons to stay with the older model.

But I'm not sure that's the case, unless this means that they aren't going to bother continuing to update the software BC going forward. If they are going to just leave it as is on the existing systems, then yes, it's a cost cutting feature drop. However, if they are going to keep dev teams working on maintaining and updating the existing software BC, they are saving no money by leaving it off the new, cheaper unit. All they are doing is creating an artificial feature difference between their models.

Well, that or their software BC wasn't actually 100% a software solution, and there is some additional hardware component that they get to leave out of the unit by dropping the software BC from the feature list.

Oh, and for whatever it's worth, on the post purchase survey I filled out I listed BC as one the top feature that compelled my purchase of the machine. So I tried to help you out, Matt.

Absolutely, but, if they end up killing off PS2 support and the developers jump ship to the 360 instead of the PS3, they've now killed the seemingly never-ending cash cow that is PS2 game licensing revenue and replaced it with a much smaller source of income. The strategy could work, but it's awfully risky and could actually work against them if the cost-averse section of the market they're going after turns a cold shoulder to the machine they can't play all their old PS2 games on.

Is that how they determined this? I mean, realistically, I never play with more than 2 people, so 4 ports ARE really too many for me... but I do understand that 4>2. I guess they figure people with a PS3 already have a PS2... the software library of the PS3 is still too weak to be cutting this out, IMHO, but if most people are wanting the HD experience and don't care about BC, I guess there's nothing I can say about it.

Ah, I missed that part. Then it must be as KillerTomato and I guessed -- the software BC for PS2 was never actually purely a software solution, just a solution that let them dump out some (but not all) of the hardware components required for pure hardware based emulation. Now, to cut costs further, they are removing whatever hardware pieces remained, and thus their "software" solution no longer will work. The PS1 support remains, though, because that was possible purely in software.

Damn, that is rough. As Bill Harris is suggesting over on his blog, though, they need to get that price down any way they can. Stretching the truth about drop in demand for BC must seem like a small price to pay in order to get down to a price point where their system won't get washed out of the market by the competition.

PS: Maybe the "feedback" was a long string of comments saying that the PS3 is too damn expensive. In that case, I guess they're finding ways to cut down on mfg. costs.

They're probably gonna hook me.... I'll end up buying a 60 gig to futureproof my ability to participate happily in gaming conversations...

I'm being manipulated... I just know it.

seriously, I'm guessing this WAS the #1 comment.

I wish they'd just settle on one SKU and let people buy whatever else they want. Why offer a larger hard drive model, when they're nice enough to allow you to use ANY hard drive you wish? The Wii has it covered... no one else wants motion sensing. Get back to the damn rumble ASAP, end the confusion, and just start doing what you do best.

Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week.

I can understand Sony wanting to put focus on the PS3, but you'd think they'd at least wait until the PS3 had some games worth buying before cutting out the BC. Now people will have NOTHING to play.

Zero hardware cost does not mean zero cost. If anything, supporting software like this is even more expensive.