Neither the Xbox One or PlayStation 4 will support backwards compatibility at launch, but Microsoft has revealed that its Azure cloud technology could be used to do so through streaming. While nothing has been confirmed, as Microsoft is still exploring the different possibilities of the cloud, senior director Albert Penello told Gamespot that such functionality could be possible.
"Yeah, absolutely," Penello assured Gamespot when asked if the cloud could offer backwards compatibility through streaming like Sony plans to do with Gaikai.
"That's one of the things that makes [the cloud] at the same time both totally interesting and hard to describe to people," he explained. "Because what the cloud can do is sort of hard to pin. When you say to the customer, we want the box to be connected, we want developers to know that the cloud is there. We’re really not trying to make up some phony thing.
"But there are so many things that the servers can do. Using our Azure cloud servers, sometimes it’s things like voice processing. It could be more complicated things like rendering full games like a Gaikai and delivering it to the box," Penello concluded. "We just have to figure out how, over time, how much does that cost to deliver, how good is the experience."
Although nothing is set in stone it's nice to see Microsoft is looking into backwards compatibility. Comparatively, Sony is looking to offer similar functionality with the PlayStation 4 through Gaikai's streaming technology.
[Gamespot]
