As reported by Eurogamer, the reason that PlayStation 5 users are 'unlikely' to see many PlayStation 4 games running at 120 fps is that they require a native port. This is completely different from the Xbox Series X, which has seen games such as Call of Duty: Warzone and Rocket League only requiring a "minor patch". Here's a full quote from Psyonix explaining why they updated the Xbox Series X but not the PlayStation 5's version of Rocket League for 120 fps to Eurogamer:
"Our team's main focus this year was our recent free to play transition and updating major features like our Tournaments system," Psyonix told Eurogamer.
"Due to this we had to make tough decisions on what else we could achieve. Enabling 120hz on Xbox Series X|S is a minor patch, but enabling it on PS5 requires a full native port due to how backwards compatibility is implemented on the console, and unfortunately wasn't possible due to our focus elsewhere."
Richard Leadbetter of Digital Foundry (whose last name sounds like a 90's FPS action hero) said that 120hz is something that has been supported for years. Rainbox Six Siege was the only game that did that for a while, but Microsoft has "always implement[ed] features like this and VRR (variable refresh rate) ahead of time so display manufacturers had target hardware to work with, mostly so the foundations would be in place for next-gen games." He also explained that Sony limits 120hz titles to native PS5 games, so what is a relatively simple patch for the Xbox Series X backward compatibility version of a game becomes a full native port for the PlayStation 5.
So that's why the PlayStation 5 will not have 120 fps backwards compatibility right now: they don't allow PS4 games to reach that threshold, so it's not reached. Developers have better things to do than to port a game for one feature, so they don't do it. Hopefully Sony fixes this quickly, as it's a definite advantage for Xbox right now.
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