There’s been a big brouhaha in recent weeks about select titles not supporting cross-save for free PS4 to PS5 upgrades. Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales will allow you to transfer your data between consoles day one, for example, while third-party titles Yakuza: Like a Dragon, DIRT 5, and Maneater will not. We’ve been keeping tabs on the current cross-save situation through here.
As part of a PlayStation Blog post, Sony’s Hideaki Nishino has explained that it’s up to individual developers to implement the functionality. “The ability to transfer game saves between a PS4 version and a PS5 version of the same game is a developer decision, and will vary title by title for cross-generational games,” he explained.
This is how it’s always been on PlayStation platforms; there were quite a few titles with cross-save support on the PS Vita, but it was ultimately down to each individual developer to implement it. To be fair, it doesn’t sound like Sony’s solution is particularly streamlined; Sackboy: A Big Adventure will get a post-release patch to incorporate the feature rather than offer it at launch.
Our hope is that developers will be paying attention to the, er, robust consumer feedback, and will either patch the functionality at a later date or squeeze it in before launch. To be fair, this is only going to be a headache during this short window of cross-generational games, and it’s reassuring to know that the feature is available to third-parties should they choose to implement it.
[source blog.playstation.com]
Comments 25
As expected, no out-of-the-box, but perfectly possible.
I wonder why. Really. This should be followed by a technical explanation, otherwise it seems fuzzy.
Terrible. It shouldn't be up to the developers to figure something out. Sony should have a good way of helping them fulfill a mandate. We knew it could be done, but this should not be allowed unless Sony is given a good reason frankly.
Cross-save would lead to more consumers trust and look ad Studio Project Red where people buy their game on trust alone
Seriously wish there was a proper mandate for this that forced all developers to comply with cross save functionality like they did establish with PS4 backwards compatibility for new or upcoming PS4 games. Xbox may not have any games that interest me in particular that aren't a year or two or three away, but everything else around that console has managed to catch my interest or come off as a really good PR or pro-consumer move.
@TheFrenchiestFry Xbox does have some where saves are iffy such as FIFA, NBA, etc basically games that don't use smart delivery/has own verison but does raise the question why 3rd party games Yakuza 7, Dirt 5, etc use smart delivery but saves not on PS4 to PS5
Will this require PS Plus though? I know on Xbox it works because there is free cloud storage,
gasps you mean... It's just like it's always been?
@masofdas Well FIFA is because EA just flat out rejected it entirely to come up with their own program because they're EA
I wouldn't be surprised if Take Two followed a similar line of reasoning
The Yakuza, Maneater and Dirt 5 situation is even more baffling given they're all confirmed to be Smart Delivery titles on Xbox but not on PS5 at all
Part of me hopes that Genshin Impact's save data doesn't transfer so I can get a free reroll.
@viciousarcanum Imagine that.
Lance McDonald (a famous Souls modder that has some friends in the industry) said early this week that Sony actually gives the tools needed to make cross-saves happen.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/504459164391571458/764193283936616448/image0.png
@Enuo I think the saves are stored on the developer's servers not on your local device. So they are likely to be able to transfer to ps5
@ED_209 Yeah, seems to me the reason some games don't support it is because the developers are lazy. Sure however, the xbox fanboys will keep blaming Sony to try and make the PS5 look bad though.
it should be mandated by sony. simple as that.
I honestly expected a transfer like you do between PS4s or Nintendo Switches. Just plug in a USB-stick into your PS4, choose to make a backup, and then insert this USB-stick into the PS5.
This is very disappointing, and if there isn't an easy way to transfer all my save data to the PS5 at once, what is even the point of backwards compatibility? Am I supposed to restart all my characters in Skyrim, Fallout 4, etc.? And even if Bethesda choose to make crossplay available, what are the chances some more obscure game like Overload will? I'm not replaying that game from scratch.
@Agricultural Backwards compat saves and PS4 to PS5 upgrade saves are different though. All your saves for your PS4 games will still work on the PS5.
If Sony implemented something like quick resume from Microsoft I think this is the issue with the cross platform save files. I think PS5 will just make suspended sessions for games instead of save files or checkpoints and you can jump in exactly where u last left the games, same like emulators on PC.
kinda mentioned this in Ghosts discussion, but this is one big problem with remastered Ps5 games. If the saves don’t transfer, that is a big deal. I don’t subscribe to appointment gaming or games that demand I redo the title from scratch. Some games take a hundred hours to beat, it’s lame to be halfway there and be asked to start over. And it would be nice to see this as a nonissue for at minimum all first party titles.
@TheIdleCritic I see. It makes sense that there is a distinction between playing a PS4 game on PS5 and playing an upgraded PS4 game on PS5. There upgrades could include things that makes it hard to use the same save file.
Huh? That would mean some of these developers need to answer some questions because it looked like this was a Sony issue but this seem to say otherwise. Unless im reading this info wrong or something lol.
Of course.
Well at the end of the day.... I dont care haha
@-Sigma- all sony said here is that it's up to the developer to do ALL the work. They didn't say that Sony gives them an API to call and make it happen. The dev will likely be on the hook for somehow placing the save data in a non-sandboxed storage (most likely a server) that the upgraded game can read from.
Consoles typically make it VERY hard, or impossible, for games to read data (stored in the console) that belongs to other games, for many safety reasons.
@Tharsman So in the end developer are consumer friendly if they dont have too do anything too make it happen understood. 😆 👍
@Flaming_Kaiser in the end, this should be a basic platform feature that allows the developer to simply flip a switch instead of forcing them all to reinvent the wheel.
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