Sony to bring 'PS2-less' PS3 to US, Japan?

[wraggster]

News from the register

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Europe may be the first region to get PlayStation 3 consoles that lack the PlayStation 2 Emotion Engine chip. It has been claimed other territories will also get the machine later this year as Sony strives to boost its profitability.

So says a Nikkei newspaper report, by way of Reuters. It alleged the move was being made to cut the next-generation console's production costs.

Sony has already admitted the version of the PS3 to be launched in PAL territories on 23 March has no Emotion Engine - the brain of the PS2 and the means by which the PS3 is able to play many PS2 games.

Instead of hardware support for old games, the paper claimed, Sony will offer software that emulates the missing chip. This is the approach Microsoft took to allow the Xbox 360 to play original Xbox games, even though the two machines use entirely different and incompatible processor architectures.

Arguably, it's an approach Sony should have taken from the start. The move should allow the consumer electronics giant to begin offering cheaper PS3s, to boost demand, at the cost of limiting backward compatibility, which many users probably don't care about - they want to play new games, not old ones.

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I live in the UK and plan to import a PS3 from SuccessHK, i want a PS3 with the emotion engine intact

via register

[Shrygue]

So Japan and America could possibly have the PS2 chip removed in new PS3 consoles sold there, huh? I guess that would mean Europe wouldn'd be the only one without the Emotion Engine absent inside the console, if it happens.

[Uchuu]

This would only make sense. Sony would seem like a bias company (against the PAL regions) if they don't bring the emotion-engine-less PS3 to the US and Japan. I always thought they were going to, just when?

To all the people in the US and Japan that don't have PS3 yet, but are thinking of getting one... one incentive to get it sooner than later is that you might end up buying one w/o the EE chip in it if you buy later.

Hopefully software emulation gives BC to lots of PS2 games. I'm just praying for like........60%? Oh well.

[Emeriastone]

They better not. I don't have the spare $ for a PS3 right now, but backwards compatibility is extremely important to me, and I would be quite upset without it.

[808]

They better not. I don't have the spare $ for a PS3 right now, but backwards compatibility is extremely important to me, and I would be quite upset without it.

Removing the chip doesn't mean you loose backwards compatibility.

[Uchuu]

yes you just get less.......BUT if BC is that important to you, why not just keep your PS2. I know I will, since mines can play backups.