I highly appreciate it.

Not to me..

I don't play older games... Once I move to next gen, then that's it.. I will keep my 360 for my bedroom simply to stream video.

I like it, its a decent selling point on wii u. I can enjoy all the wii games (far too many, like many others i neglected some great stuff on wii) i missed in hd on wii u. I think its a great novelty to unplug my wii and replace it with the wii u and know my wii can sit in its box for a long time.

I play PS1 games on my PS3 so yes I love BC

I suppose I'm gradually getting over the lack of backwards compatability because I'm keeping my ps3 but with so much still to come out like dark souls 2, beyond and South Park it is a shame I can't play them through my ps4

Not with physical titles. We can always buy a PS3/360 again. Digital though? That would have been nice... God knows how long they'll give us before shutting down downloads of PS3/PSN/360/XBL games. That worries me, slightly.

I don't worry about Steam because Valve hasn't added a completely new store for newer PC's or anything. So, why worry? If we could get clarification from Sony and Microsoft that we'll be able to download the things we purchased on the PSN/XBL for many years, that would be great!

This is super important! $$$ is tight!!! No one wants to pay for games twice over and plus it would great and easier to justify a purchase of a new console especially if I could play all my old game with no charged asked.. Also, if you skipped out on a generation like I skipped out on the Wii but ALL the old games are ready to on the Wii U.. It just makes sense to buy the Wii U, for me... I am having so much fun play Mario Gal 1 & 2, Twilight Princess and ton of other games @ a fraction of the actually price!!! Not only that I can use ALL the same controllers (beside the Wii Remote U Plus) back to even the wave bird I believe.. WOW now that's backwards compatibility!!!

Yes, I think it is important, while i am waiting for new games to be released, instead of having to have two or three machines cluttering up the room, I like to play older games, and playing the old and new all on one machine is very convenient, so yeah if you like to play older games on your current machine then yes, for me I think it is Important. it's why I went with the wii and now wii u.

BC, very necessary, and IMPORTANT

Yes

BC, The main reason i had a Wii U bcos i cannot settle for Wii (alias adv. GC) but a ps3.
The 2nd reason is the Gamepad

With so many great games still out there and more coming, yes, BC is important.

With all this investment in streaming, maybe both can have a service where each system could access your online profile and digital games and have them available for you to play on your new system.

Sucks for retail copies but maybe down the line they could provide an emulator as the 360 did for the original Xbox.

I thought it was going from PS2 -> PS3, but now I have every intention of keeping my PS3 around because of my huge back log. I might never get rid of it as some have said, keep it for a secondary stream device.

Its not important but it would be nice.. I don't know how that stuff works but i would think that after Sony ms and nin putting out a few consoles already that it shouldn't be such a issue to do...

It is very important at release, but not as important by the end of the generation.

Microsoft's statement about "less than 10% of xbox 360 owners play original xbox games on the system" is true, however, they are looking at the demographic at the end of the generation, where backwards compatibility isn't as important.

But let's look at the launch of a new console. The new consoles come out, and gamers want them, but they might not have games at launch that everyone wants, but they might have a couple. Also, keep in mind that not everyone can afford a new console at launch.

If a system is backwards compatible at launch, people will sell their old systems, effectively taking care of 25-50% of the cost of a new system, depending on who they sell to, which model they have, etc. Say someone gets $200 for their top of the line PS3. What if they also have controllers to sell? What about a few games they don't want anymore, and some accessories. They could effectively sell it for most of the cost of the new system, making it much more affordable. But the amount of people who want to do this is much less if it doesn't have backwards compatibility.

If people have this option, a lot more people will do it, and sales will go up. People will get the new systems for less, Sony/Nintendo/Microsoft will get the same amount of money as they would have if people would have bought them without selling, because 3rd party markets would have already bought them, and 3rd party markets such as gamestop/target/walmart/etc would all get more business.

I understand that it is cheaper to not put in backwards compatibility, and not many people use it by the end of the generation... But at launch of a new system, backwards compatibility can be very important, and can lead to a lot more sales.

@KimikoGaming

You are right !!!

Along time ago like many gamers here I owned and played and loved my ps1. unfortunately my ps1 broke down and it made me really sad. then I heard about the ps2 and how it can play any ps1 games. I jumped for joy and the ps2 became the best console ever with the ps1 library and the ps2s library. With the ps2 I was still able to play my ps1 games regardless of my broken ps1, and I can still do it now if I want to because my ps2 is alive and kicking! where as my ps1 has been dead for over a decade.

BC is very important and it makes games last for a very long time

Nope, If I want to play an old console, I will simply set it up. When next-gen hits, I doubt I will be playing any 360/PS3 game anyways with GTA V being the only exception.

It would of been easier and quicker for the 80 million people to upgrade to PS4 knowing their PS3 games will still work. And PS4's launch lineup is laughable. XboxUno is just as laughable. Those that say/dissed BC can't all of sudden praise HD remakes and Gaikai. Especially Gaikai.

Not important if it's a complex design.
Not important if it halts the evolution of devices (smaller sizes).
Not important if the previous machines are still on shelves.
Not important if it's capable through software at a later date.

Definitely not important if you already own the previous machine.

Not if I have to pay for it. I don't like being charged again for something I already own.

no, i enjoy having my library of games made obsolete each generation and having to clutter up my living space with dozens of consoles in order to keep enjoying my games.

Absolutely. Consoles eventually fail, but the software still works and is great in many cases. I have several old games i cannot play anymore. Kids still play alot of Wii games on the Wii U. I would like to keep playing the Halo games on X1, sure those will be the 1st to hit that list for MS.

for me, its only important at the start of this next gens life since my ps4 game library will be tiny in comparison to my ps3s.

over time i will probably not care too much since i will be concentrating on all the awesome new titles coming out for it.

obviously this is the same for my 360/One games too.

Yes, it is. I would love to replay the Resistance 3 story with a DS4. I would play a lot of my older games on the ps4 just to use that dualshock 4 with them. I feel like these past gen games are going to be forgotten since we can't play them again. Why can't we just pick and play them when we want? I understand that you can just buy a ps3 and play that way, but to some that haven't bought a ps3, sold it, died on them, etc. it isn't fair that they miss out.

its a con. they want people to keep buying ps3s. they dont want to make their own product obsolete so they simply dont add backward compatibility to the ps4. that way, if you want to play a ps3 game, you either have to buy a ps3, or download it online from their store.

makes perfect sense from a business point of view, but makes absolutely no sense to the consumer. we just want to play games and have technology which is as accessible as possible. nobody wants to be faced with these BS walls built with greed which prevent us from enjoying our own software as conveniently as possible.

This is one of those topics where I don't think everyone will ever be in 100% agreement. You'll always have those that think it's very important, and others who could care less.

The way I see it, all of us on here are gamers, and we already own our console of choice, so I look at it as it's not that important because I'll just hold on to my PS3, and play my older games whenever I want (Plus it helps that most new TV's all have multiple sources to plug in all your systems, so not too much of a pain to switch).

As far as Gaikai, I like being able to possibly stream games that I might have missed this gen, but when/if I lose my internet connection, then what? I would hate to have to depend on streaming online for "backwards compatibility" for all my current gen games.

But what would I know?

Not to me as I tend to keep my prior consoles till they die. WIth the PS3 though, i'll try and keep one around for as long as I can, I bought over 200 digital games from PSN!

I would love to have that feature but its never been a game changer for me because I keep my old consoles.

it's a plus for me. this is what i actually love about most PC games (although you can't really refer to it as "backwards compatibility"), since I can still play games that I missed from ten years ago, on my current PC/laptop.

for consoles, it's a plus, since you don't have to buy a new console just to play the previous generations games, especially if you've missed them.

It's not needed but it is handy, i don't want so many consoles set up in one place, i don't have the space.

I never thought so until my PlayStation 3's laser broke this past week and now I'm forced to buy 2 consoles.

Yes.

After the new Wii U update, I've realised just how important it is now that I can play Wii games off-screen.

I'm playing them even more now, 1 to 6 years after I got them, than I have ever played them.

Tell me again how the multiplatform strategy was supposed to fix everything. Look at your results and compare them to Nintendo, which keeps thriving with exclusives. Your loyal fans are gone. And let’s not forget the pile of IPs you purchased only to let them rot.

The worst thing is this is down from last years numbers/expectations which was down from the previous years numbers/expectations. You think about how long “down” has been a consistent part of the communication and you realize those subscriptions are what’s holding that boat together. The price cut of gamespass is still a price raise in a string of price raises. They are trying to use players to offset the missing revenue. Now call of duty is out of gamespass, which is literally WHY they bought the company. To draw people to the subscription. They realized they missed a boatload of money and that wasn’t sustainable. Now you pay for it like you would have if they never bought the company… so why buy the company? Mind you those billions still need to be paid back. Yeah it gives you a chance to say we make the biggest FPS… but the internal conversations must be brutal at high level on topics that really matter. Like revenue. Profitability. And ROI for the shopping spree.

Is this like the 10th quarter in a row they're down 33% on hardware how is that even mathematically possible. You would think their mediocrity would Plateau

Helix will be expensive but it's still a day one for me.

Oh, my days...
So Nadella meets with the US president multiple times to ensure AI regulations are minimal if any at all, donates to the inauguration and ballroom, and his boy not only won't regulate AI as farmers lose land and billionaires/corporations buy up farmland to build data centers...but because he's insane and compromised, he starts a war on behalf of a rogue colonial zionist state and [further] destabilizes the Middle East, restricting component access and helium supply.

Now the head of Xbox is saying the hardware pricing "could impact" next generation hardware pricing? Asha,...your boss at a minimum played a direct role in this. What are we even talking about?

Yea because a $3 trillion company can’t absorb the majority of the cost to keep the product lower for consumers.

Expensive… oh no, here comes another flop.

Could? Strange how prices rise for virtually everything we buy, yet when things settle down, prices don't come down. This has been happening in the UK probably before I was born. With that, how much is a next gen console going to cost? Look at the price of the PlayStation 5 Pro, which has been a flop for Sony. On that note, we don't need the next consoles for another 5 years.

I guarantee if people just stopped buying this kinda stuff all together. This would all be sorted within 2 weeks and everything would be back to normal.

We seen the exact same thing through the COVID period. Companies just jumped on the bandwagon realising that they can get away with charging far more under false pretences and fear mongering.

Consumers now have this fear of "you know what, I only live once. I'm going to spend all this money I earned through my hard work" Or "I only live once I'm going to take a loan out and enjoy my time here".

Silicone Valley spends literally billions of dollars researching how much they can push society to the limits to increase spending. You can research it yourself. There's published written documentation about it. Have a look for yourself into their group research into subscription programs to see how evil they are and why it's such a giant focus of current civilization. Its the very essence of corporate capitalism.

Just delay all new consoles. I could easily go another 5 years with my base PS5.

could? it's already affecting current gen pricing.

It is greed. Apple are selling at the same price, while Microsoft Surface increases 500$ per unit. Karma will tell.