PS3 emulation has come a long way thanks to the developers behind RPCS3. But those are unofficial efforts, and if you want to play that generation's classics natively on a modern PS5 console, you're out of luck. A new tech analysis suggests it might not even be possible for console hardware to handle the challenge of PS3 games until the PS6 generation.
The issue holding back PS3 emulation in general is the console's notorious Cell processor, which had six of what Sony called "Synergistic Processing Units." The instructions powering PS3 games are built with those SPUs in mind, and apparently it's something of a nightmare to translate them for modern CPUs. True PS3 ports to modern platforms are rare – just look at the response the upcoming port of Metal Gear Solid 4 has gotten – and it's only been fan-run projects like RPCS3 that have made any real strides.
