| Blu-ray/HD DVD: A Gamer's Rant |
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| Written by BigDMcgee | |||
| Monday, 22 January 2007 | |||
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As we are having our fun in gamingland, a bitter war is raging in the realm of reality (I just found out since I only return to reality to collect my mail). Many of us have embraced one of the two competitors, Blu-Ray or HD DVD, while many still have rejected both. And of course there are those that have decided to let the problem fix itself. Well I'm here to tell that percentage of the population that I don't think the problem will fix itself. Before I continue, let me remind you that a format war DOES have major impact on the gaming industry (Imagine the short-lived cartridge vs. compact disc battle only on a mammoth scale). Each format camp is taking the "Let's throw money at the problem until we win" approach, and that will only drag things out longer. Personally, I feel that things won't be dragged into a situation where one format is victorious. Instead you might find yourself looking at the same movie but in two flavors, just like people had to choose between widescreen and fullscreen for regular dvd's(Warner Bros. Total HD disc could be a big help here). Let's just say then that this turned out to be true and we were really only choosing which player, not which movies. How would this apply to gaming? Well the true application of this would be the console war. Sony put a large bet on the Blu-ray format with its Playstation 3 in order to take over the living room. Of course many have said that buying an Xbox 360 and its HD DVD add-on is just not as good a deal as a PS3. They also have argued that Blu-ray's slightly better library and use for games could give PS3 an edge. If movies start coming out on both or Total HD becomes widespread, then format could become almost a moot point, thus reducing the console war to a games vs. games brawl which is of course what it should be. The main point of my rant is this: deciding which console you buy based on format may be ok now, but don't count on that in the future. Movie studios and game companies will find ways to reach every market: for example, imagine if games for 360 and PS3 came on one hybrid disc like Total HD). So don't get your panties in a wad if you loved Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest and own an HD DVD player. My prediction is that sooner or later if noone wins, then with dual-format, we could all win. As for Microsoft and Sony, Dual-format could either eliminate format from their arsenal, or eliminate their console completely. P.S. If you guys found this opinion piece a complete waste of time (or you loved it) let us know. We'd love to hear from you people more.
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