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Image: Damien McFerran / Push Square

Phew! A bullet has been dodged! After Sony made the bizarre decision to release inferior 50Hz PAL versions of PS1 games with PS Plus Premium in NTSC nations like Taiwan, many gamers expected the worst. The Japanese launch offered hope, as the platform holder plumped up for the superior 60Hz builds – but it had little choice, seeing as they’re the only versions that feature Japanese language support.

The acid test was North America, then, and we’re relieved to report that all titles available so far use 60Hz NTSC format. This means they run faster and smoother than their slower PAL counterparts. This applies to all games, including first-party releases like Wild Arms and Ape Escape, which opted for the 50Hz versions in some Asian countries. It’ll come as a relief for North American players who were understandably worried they would get worse versions of the games they grew up with, similarly to the PS Classic console.

Now this doesn’t completely absolve Sony, to be honest. Some of the filters and aspect ratios used by its emulator are still weird, as pointed out in a recent Digital Foundry video. There’s also the small matter of Europe still to come, where we’re likely to end up with the 50Hz versions due to licensing and language support. We could forgive Sony for this sorry situation if rivals such as Nintendo hadn’t already come up with a solution: offer both ROMs and allow users to choose.

Of course, we’ve got our fingers crossed the company will be listening to feedback, and we hope this can all be resolved in due time. In the meantime, if you’re curious which PS1 games you can expect to play with PS Plus Premium, check out our list of All PS Plus Games through the link.