Summary
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Modders ran RPCS3 on PS5 via Linux, allowing many PS3 discs to be played on PS5.
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Works only with PS5 firmware 3.XX–4.XX, requires a Linux installation and your own decryption key.
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It is unofficial and complex to configure; Updated or newer PS5s may be incompatible.
It feels terrible to have a physical library of games for an old console that never received backwards compatibility support. To revisit your favorites, you have to keep your previous generation hardware plugged in, and every time you press the power button, you worry that it might be the last time before the console finally gives up the ghost.
Fortunately, for people who are fans of the PS3 library, work is being done to allow the PS5 to emulate them, something that Sony could have enabled it, but never did. Now, another development in the modding scene lets you use your physical PS3 discs in your PS5, although there are some crucial caveats you’ll need to consider.
You can now play your PS3 discs on PS5, with some caveats
Modders did what Sony didn’t
A while back, the PS5 modding community got a big boost when someone managed to install linux on it. At first glance, installing Linux on a PS5 is great in its own right; Basically, you can turn your console into a gaming PC and run Steam games from it. However, some people had another idea: to use the Linux base to install RPCS3 on the console. From there, they could use RPCS3 to read PS3 discs to the PS5 drive, meaning you can now run your physical PS3 library on the newer console. It’s not a native solution, but it’s the closest we’ve come to a key feature that people have been asking Sony about for years.
Above, you can see tinkerer @retropierdolnik playing the Motorstorm: Pacific Rift album on the PS5. This is what they say, automatically translated:
RPCS3 on PlayStation 5 is the best thing to happen to this hardware lately. Motorstorm Pacific Rift runs like a dream. Only on PS5 3.XX -4.XX with integrated Linux.
Therein lies one of the limitations: you must have a PS5 with firmware 3.XX-4.XX. If you updated your PS5 or purchased a newer model that came with later firmware versions preinstalled, you may be out of luck. You also have to provide your own decryption key and configure everything, which is not easy. However, if you can check all the boxes, you can get the PS3 compatibility that PlayStation fans have wanted for years.
