Why DVD’s Better Than Blu-ray
Mar/090
Blu-ray may have won the format war, but with HD DVD now soundly dispatched, an old foe refuses to retreat. Standard-def DVD still has plenty of fight left in it. In fact, there are plenty of ways in which the SD format is — dare we say — a better choice than Blu-ray.
Heresy, you say? Listen… We aren’t trying to assert that DVD has better picture quality than Blu-ray — that would be absurd. And of course there are cool features, like BD-Live, that seemingly give Blu-ray the edge. But when you really take an examined look at the big picture, Blu-ray isn’t for everybody.
There are hardware complexities, product availability issues, and most importantly — especially in hard economic times like these — Blu-ray is significantly more expensive. Taking all that into account, it’s easy to imagine a scenario where the majority of casual home video consumers will remain devoted to DVD for quite some time.
But is DVD really better than Blu-ray? Here are some reasons why we think so. Take a look and let us know what you think in the comments.
It’s Cheaper Than Blu-ray
Both DVD players and DVDs themselves remain affordable. Blu-ray releases tend to retail for an average of $10 more than their DVD counterparts (depending on the studio and title). Many DVDs are priced so cheaply that they could be considered impulse buys. Think about it… You probably wouldn’t own that copy of Renny Harlin’s Cutthroat Island had you not seen it in the checkout line display for $8.99. Would you have snatched up a Blu-ray version for double that price? Not nearly as likely.
The biggest obstacle for many consumers isn’t the cost of the discs, it’s the players themselves. A Blu-ray player will typically set you back an average of $250 to $300 (though the high-end players can go into the thousands). That kind of price tag is difficult to justify when you can find a perfectly decent DVD player for under $50. In fact, the most basic DVD player can be had for nearly the same price as a high-end Blu-ray movie.
And then there are the indirect costs. Most consumers will have to weigh the cost of the features they want against the cost of various players. It can be a headache before you even begin to start to consider other peripherals that will truly make upgrading to Blu-ray worth while. If you don’t have a widescreen HD television — a huge investment — there’s not much point in making the jump. And what about audio? Many home theaters are already at least 5.1 compatible, but to truly max out the new format you’ll need a 7.1 system.
The bottom line is that creating an appropriately awesome Blu-ray experience is going to set you back some major skrilla. And if you can’t afford to be all in, what’s the point?
Mo’ Technology, Mo’ Problems
Any time you introduce a new piece of hardware into your setup, there are going to be complications. Blu-ray players are evolving, but everybody knows that tested and tried technology is more reliable than emerging technology. Wouldn’t you rather have a product that’s been around a while?
Then there’s playability. We’ve all heard the complaints about Blu-ray load times. This sort of thing varies from player to player and title to title. The bottom line is that some people value performance and reliability more than innovation.
As long as you’ve got a basic DVD setup, the chances are pretty good that just about any disc you’re likely to bring home will play in your player without a hassle. The advent of BD-Live has led to a disturbing trend when it comes to extras, with some studios relying heavily on online content to deliver the same kinds of special features you used to get right on the disc. And if your Blu-ray player isn’t Internet compatible, you’re not going to be able to access any of those features, not to mention the frequent firmware upgrades required to play the latest releases.
And what if you want to take your video entertainment with you? Not bloody likely with Blu-ray.
The term home-entertainment is quickly becoming obsolete, as the living room is no longer the only place where you can consume entertainment. There may be portable Blu-ray players on the market now, but standard-def players are still much cheaper and far more common, both in stores and in our homes. So for now — and for the foreseeable future — if you want to pop a movie in your laptop’s DVD-rom drive, bring it with you on a long plane flight or just need something to keep the kids busy in the back of the minivan, DVD is the way to go.
Disk Swapping on Xbox 360 a Problem?
Mar/090
The DVD9 is certainly starting to show its age when compared to the Blu Ray. Even the smallest Blu Ray offers roughly twice the storage space as a DVD9 and the bigger Blu Rays can offer up to ten times the storage space. It’s clear that Blu Ray is superior to DVD9 in almost every way, but the question is about Blu Rays relevance in this gaming generation. As it stands right now, the DVD9 is holding up reasonably well only forcing a few multi-disk games on the Xbox 360.
The Playstation 3 is certainly a well manufactured console and may be a little too ahead of its time. In case gamers haven’t noticed, Sony likes to be the first to brandish new technology in their consoles. They did it with the Playstation 1 with CDs, they did it with the Playstation 2 with DVDs and they’re trying to mirror the same success with the Playstation 3 by pioneering the Blu Ray. So far in this generation, Blu Ray has mainly shown its use in terms of movies, but apart from a couple of standouts such as Metal Gear Solid 4, it hasn’t really shown its necessity as a video game medium.
For the most part, the only time the Playstation 3 is allowed to take advantage of the extra storage space on a Blu Ray is with games exclusive to the Playstation 3. Even though it’s likely that the Playstation 3 versions of multiplatform games could handle a bunch of extras such as missions, costumes and voice tracks, they’re rarely included. For the most part, Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 multiplatform games are identical. What Sony should do in order to showcase the superiority of Blu Ray over DVD is to pay development studios for exclusive content that could easily be stored on the same Blu Ray disk as the game. If the tables were turned and Microsoft had the console with an edge like Blu Ray, they would undoubtedly make public knowledge of this superiority, but Sony doesn’t seem motivated enough to do so.
The recent release of Star Ocean: The Last Hope has arrived on the Xbox 360 in the form of three DVDs. This doesn’t cause too much of a problem but the entire game could undoubtedly fit on one 50GB Blu Ray. Problems that Star Ocean: The Last Hope on the 360 does have is poor packaging and an odd or forced choice of Tri-Ace to reinsert earlier disks in order to backtrack through areas. Regarding the packaging, it’s nowhere near the quality of old Final Fantasy games on the Playstation 1. Rather than having individual disk holders and a larger package overall, you are faced with three disks stacked on top of each other. The problem with this is that more often than not, the top disk will come loose while opening the game and may result in scratches on the disk. For people who like to keep their games in excellent condition, it will be somewhat upsetting. On top of a top disk that loves to propel itself at you, since each disk is stacked on top of each other, the likelihood of scratching any disk while attempting to get another is greater than it would be with individual holders. These problems may seem minimal, but much like Lost Odyssey, the poor choice of packaging for these multi-disked games may result in one or more disks not working. This is quite annoying when you’re halfway through or further in a game.
Sony seems to have made a fine choice by including Blu Ray in all of their Playstation 3 consoles, but this generation of gaming is already 3-4 years in and Blu Ray isn’t showing itself to be a necessity in gaming as of yet. Although Metal Gear Solid 4 is a gorgeous game, it’s not something so utterly fantastic that it ruins the visual appeal of anything on the Xbox 360. As of right now, Sony seems to be promoting the Blu Ray as the necessity for films rather than video games. However, it’s still early in this generation of gaming and it’s quite possible that gamers will see the gap between the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 widen, but no one is able to predict the future.
It’s a shame for Sony that the Xbox 360 seems to be the console to get for JRPG gamers this generation so far, because the Playstation 3 could be the perfect console for hardcore JRPG support. Anyone who dislikes english voice acting in their JRPGs is going to be quite upset with their copy of Star Ocean: The Last Hope for the Xbox 360. There is no option for japanese voice acting and it’s likely due to the size of the DVD9. There is tons of spoken dialogue in Star Ocean: The Last Hope and it may have resulted in another disk being needed to include the japanese voice track as well. This isn’t a tiny gripe at all, because when you’re expected to play a game for upwards of fifty hours and you’re being forced to listen to aggravating english voice actors that you’ve heard a thousand times, it’s enough to make you want to lose your damn mind. A character named Lymel has quite an annoying voice actor in Star Ocean: The Last Hope and she is particularly aggravating as she says “kay” after almost every sentence. The Nightly Gamer hasn’t heard the japanese voice acting for Lymel, but it can’t be any worse than it is in english.
If Star Ocean: The Last Hope would have appeared on the Playstation 3 as well as the Xbox 360, hardcore fans of JRPGs would have undoubtedly gone with the Playstation 3 version because the Blu Ray disk could easily accommodate the japanese voice track. The DVD9 is holding up considerably well among most genres besides the RPG. However, many RPGs on the Xbox 360 need multiple disks and lack the much appreciated japanese voice tracks with english subtitles. For this reason, it’s nice to see the JRPG support on the Playstation 3 growing with Demon’s Souls and White Knight Chronicles, but there has to be many more to come.
For now, The Nightly Gamer is undecided as to whether the DVD9 is too outdated to compete with Blu Ray. On one hand, Xbox 360 exclusives in most genres look and play almost identically to what you would expect from a Playstation 3 exclusive. On the other hand, RPG fans are getting shafted by Xbox 360 exclusives not including the japanese voice tracks and being forced to reinsert earlier disks in order backtrack through areas.
Analyst embarrassed: says non-Blu-ray PS3 incoming
Feb/090
Industry analyst Mike Hickey of Janco Partners believes a PlayStation 3 price-cut is imminent. He embarrasses himself by claiming that it’ll be the removal of the console’s Blu-ray drive that’ll help Sony make the cut.
In his latest industry note and posted on Gamedaily.com, Janco Partners analyst Mike Hickey reveals that a PlayStation 3 price-cut is probably-maybe on the way. He states that “recent channel checks indicate increased speculation for a PS3 price cut announcement from Sony in the next couple of days.”
This in itself isn’t laughable. I personally agree that all signs point to a PlayStation 3 price-cut sooner rather than later. In fact, I argued that April 2009 would be the perfect time for such a cut.
April will mark the end of Sony’s 2008 fiscal-year, meaning a price-cut won’t impact the Games Division’s 2008 profits. A cut is likely to occur after March 31st since the company can make their losses up during the 2009 fiscal-year.
Unlike Hickey though, I don’t believe the announcement will come in the next few days. Not only for the above reason, but because Sony will want to corner Killzone 2 consumers that will buy the console especially for the game. After they’ve made the jump, the price-cut can attract a whole new set of buyers.
However, what do I know? I’m no analyst! Hickey is, and he believes that the cut has already been brought to the attention of retailers:
“Sony is meeting with retailers this week in Phoenix, where SCEA is holding its annual Destination PlayStation conference. We think the company needs to reduce the current price by $100 to effectively restart unit velocity at retail.”
This is perfectly fine, but Hickey believes that Sony will afford the cut with the following strategy:
“We are also hearing continued speculation that Sony is working on a non-Blu-ray PS3 console, which could enable them to make the aforementioned hardware price reduction.”
A non-Blu-ray PlayStation 3? Riiight. That’d make sense, since who wants to buy a PlayStation 3 that plays Blu-ray films and…PlayStation 3 games!?
Perhaps Sony will begin releasing PS3 games on DVD’s and Blu-rays. Or perhaps they’re ahead of the game and will releases all of their titles digitally. Still, that leaves all previously released PlayStation 3 games in the lurch. ‘Hey, buy the new cheap PlayStation 3 that can’t play Metal Gear Solid 4, LittleBigPlanet or Killzone 2!’
What’s a PlayStation 3 without a Blu-ray drive? Since it can’t play PlayStation 3 or PlayStation 2 games - it’s simply a PlayStation 1 that can play DVDs. Splendid. I’ll buy one of those for £40 please. Now that’s a price-cut!
Nonetheless, Hickey does make a reasonable point by stating the obvious:
“We believe the market is expecting a PS3 price cut in April or by June (E3) at the latest, so a near term aggressive pricing decision by Sony could provide a positive catalyst for video game related stocks including GameStop, Activision and Take-Two Interactive.
“If Sony does not cut the price of their console, we expect the continuation of languishing PS3 hardware sales and the potential for publishers to accelerate their reallocation of resources away from the PS3 console.”
It’s a harsh warning to Sony, but we doubt they’ll be removing the drive from the console that won the high-definition format war.
CES 2009: Blu-ray format could be in jeopardy, might bring down PS3 with it
Jan/090
It’s fitting that the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) takes place in Las Vegas, because at this show we learn which companies have gambler’s instincts. Sony went all in betting that Blu-ray technology would win the next-gen video disc wars, adding Blu-ray capability to its PlayStation 3 consoles.
Microsoft, on the other hand, hedged its bets with the HD-DVD format. While the console didn’t come packaged with HD-DVD capability, gamers could purchase an add-on drive to upgrade. So at the last CES (2008) when Warner Bros. ended the war by announcing it would no longer support HD-DVD, it certainly looked like a win for Sony.
A year later Sony and Blu-ray still have not garnered that much anticipated victory. One of the biggest obstacles is potential customers doing an end run around Blu-ray by downloading movies digitally. Since Microsoft is equally happy to see you on the Internet as it is to see you on its game console, it jumped on the downloading craze by partnering with Netflix (although Sony refuses to do so, at least for now). Xbox Live Gold members that are also Netflix members can download movies to their console in addition to whatever DVDs they order by mail. LG Electronics has announced a new line of high-definition television that can connect directly to the Internet without a need for any set-top box. It will be able to use video on-demand services including the aforementioned Netflix.
Estimates by Digital Entertainment Group put 10.5 million American homes as Blu-ray equipped. At the beginning of the year, its anticipated figure was nearly 15 million. There is good and bad news for Sony there. An estimated 8 million of the Blu-ray homes are PS3 owners. But at least some of those owners would be hardcore gamers that would have purchased the console without Blu-ray.
The head scratching development is the runaway success of the Nintendo Wii, the least high-tech of the current gen consoles. Nintendo has sold 40 million Wiis worldwide with a console that doesn’t even play DVDs, let alone any high definition discs. Had anyone known a $250 game machine could even compete, let alone potentially win the console war, some different decisions might have happened at Sony and Microsoft. If Blu-ray is going to be the deciding factor in the console war, now would be a really good time for it to start.
Black Friday was a big day for Blu-ray with many stores opting to discount Blu-ray players to more affordable price points. That was buoyed by The Dark Knight, the biggest event movie since HD-DVD gave up the ghost. The Batman sequel moved 600,000 Blu-ray discs in a single day.This week at CES is also key as Blu-ray ‘s backers need a strong showing to convince millions who haven’t adopted the new technology that all the cool kids will be doing it. For better or for worse, the fate of the PS3 and that of the Blu-ray format will forever be intertwined.
Is Blockbuster the PS3’s Answer to Netflix?
Dec/080
Are Sony and Blockbuster looking to form an alliance to bring Blockbuster’s streaming download video offer to the PS3? We’ll know by ‘early next year’ says Blockbuster.
Sony and Blockbuster have some history together already. You may recall that Blockbuster was one of the first retailers in North America to decide that they were going to be supporting Blu-ray on a much bigger scale than HD DVD. That announcement really got the ball rolling in Blu-ray’s favor at the time.
Fast forward a year and we have Netflix signing streaming deals with every manufacturer they can find including an exclusive game console deal with Microsoft. Netflix has signed deals with TiVo Inc, Samsung , LG Electronics.
Now comes word from Blockbuster that, in the wake of their launch of Blockbuster OnDemand, they are actively seeking a partnership with Blu-ray player manufacturers. With Samsung and LG already in Netflix’s corner, could this lead Blockbuster to seek out Sony as a BD player/game console entry into the market?
Unlike Netflix’s “Watch Instantly” feature, the Blockbuster on-demand service will be open to customers who do not subscribe to its DVD-by-mail service.
Blockbuster Chairman and Chief Executive Jim Keyes said,
“The service is essentially a rebranding and expansion of Blockbuster’s Movielink.com Web site, which offers about 10,000 on-demand movies for download to personal computers. About 2,000 of those titles, such as recent DVD releases “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”, “Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants 2″ and “Get Smart”, can be downloaded to TVs via Blockbuster OnDemand. Blockbuster also is pursuing deals to package the new service with Blu-ray players and is considering alliances with video game console makers, but is not ready to disclose the details.”
Unless the Wii comes out with a HDD in the new year that can only mean they are thinking of the PS3.
