Watch a YouTuber Emulate PlayStation 5 Games on an Xbox Series X

The ultimate console crossover just went from a gamer’s pipe dream to reality. Modder Devran Cosmo Uenal recently posted a video on YouTube in which he plays a PlayStation 5 emulator on an Xbox Series X.

“Xbox backward compatibility is getting out of hand … now we’re adding PlayStation 5 to the list,” he wrote.

Uenal said in the video that he ran an experimental Xbox port of the open-source PlayStation 5 emulator KytyPS5. That emulator — which is itself a heavily modified version of another emulator — is meant to be run on PC, so getting it to run on Xbox took some effort.

Uenal didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Uenal’s video shows that he has the option to play PlayStation 5 versions of Gex Trilogy, Hellboy Web of Wyrd, Marvel Cosmic Invasion and Quake 2 on an Xbox Series X. These games aren’t graphically intense, like Marvel’s Wolverine or Ghost of Yotei, and less intense, smaller games are usually the first to be emulated. The games are also already available on Xbox, so you don’t need an emulator to play them.

Uenal plays Quake 2 in that video, and it runs at 20 to 40 frames per second for most of the video, with a few significant stutters. After watching this video, I booted up Quake 2 on Xbox Game Pass’s cloud streaming and didn’t experience any lag or other issues. 

“It’s early days, and compatibility is limited,” he wrote. 

Representatives for Xbox and PlayStation didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

In another video, Uenal shows the PlayStation 5 user interface screen running on an Xbox, and you can see the option to play the PlayStation version of Grand Theft Auto 5.

According to tech and gaming website BGR, GTA 5 is “surprisingly playable” on the PC version of KytyPS5, so we could see a video in the future of Uenal playing a PlayStation version of GTA 5 on an Xbox. We might even get that before Rockstar releases Grand Theft Auto 6.

Emulators are software that can mimic other hardware. In this case, the software allows you to play PlayStation 5 games on Xbox. According to Indiana law firm McNeely Law, emulators themselves aren’t illegal. However, their potential for playing pirated games raises legal concerns.

“It may be legal in certain, limited circumstances for a gamer to re-create a game they have purchased into a file playable by their emulator, it is generally illegal to share or download any video game files for use via emulator,” the law firm wrote online.

Because emulators fall into a legal gray area, I don’t recommend using them. Don’t get yourself in trouble just to play a nearly 30-year-old game like Quake 2. 

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Zach began writing for CNET in November, 2021 after writing for a broadcast news station in his hometown, Cincinnati, for five years. You can usually find him hanging out with his wife, son and dog. You can reach him at zmcauliffe@cnet.com. See full bio