Slashdot Mirror
Video Games and the Hi-Def Format Wars
Pika the Mad writes "Reuters has a concise but interesting article up about how video games will help decide the format war between Blu-ray and HD DVD. According to industry analysts "What Sony and Microsoft decide to announce publicly or to dealers at E3 next week will be key." So this year's E3 could very well be a deciding factor in how you view your movie library for years to come."
So i doubt it will have much of an impact on me.
Though i might upgrade to one of them fancy color tvs i keep hearing about sometime this summer.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
The real determiners of the HD format wars will be the adult DVD producers. They put out over 12000 titles a year and this is the single biggest market of content repackagers / producers.
I hate to say it, but there's really no relation. The games we play will have no relation. This is just wishful thinking on the movie industrys part. I think they are statring to realize that people just are that interested in the HD format enough to spend the additional dollars to upgrade equipment. And, as more and more people start making noise about all the DRM garbage associated, they are just going to steer away for quite a long time.
I'm quite happy with DVD for now - and I'll be damned if I'm going to buy either standard for the foreseeable future.
I mean I'd like Hi-def, but the amount it's going to cost me to upgrade and all the hassles with the competing standards, the retarded prices they'll be charging, the 'oh this can't play on your PC as we don't like the connector you're using' blah blah
I just can't be bothered. DVD'll do me fine for a few more years - and after that I'll be sticking to media-less content.
It's really up to Sony right now to produce a solid, bug free console. If the system does not perform well and appeal to enough gamers then Blue Ray will follow Betamax.
Sony will release the PS3 below $500 and nobody will buy an $300 dollar external HD-Drive for the 360.
Within a year more then 1million consumers will have a PS3 and therefor will generate demand for blu-ray movies.
Blu-ray will win this war unless the hd camp has some trick. Microsoft released the 360 too early (not even enough production).
Altough the fight between game consoles will continue blu-ray will win the disk war.
200GB/2TB $7.95 Coupon: SAVE90DOLLAR
Porn is a million years old.
And still we are ignorant about who made the VHS vs. BETA decuision?
I know who will make the Blue-Ray ("Blu" isn't even a word) vs. HD-DVD decision.
If Sony releases the PS3 way cheaper than any Blu-Ray player... How would the other Blu-Ray players react to this? Who would want to buy another Blu-Ray player if the PS3 is the cheapest one and it is also a next-gen console, allegedly the most powerful of all?
I just don't get Sony's plans...
DVD-video was a success because it is the only digital format and all studios support it. From now on, it's a three-head race with Blu-Ray, HD-DVD and the good-enough-for-most-of-consumers ol' DVD.
I'm happy with what I can rip and view as I like ^_^
The only format war being waged now is whether to burn to single-layer DVD, dual-layer DVD, or just keep your torrented movies on 300 gig hard drives. New media formats are *so* irrelevant they're Jack Valenti.
Upconverted dvd playback vs HD playback? I can barely tell the difference. Dont believe me? Go checkout a demo at your local bigbox retailer. Just dont pay attention to the "HDDVD vs Standard DVD" demo. Try to check it out next to a 720p upconverted player.
turn up the jukebox and tell me a lie
I don't care about SACD or DVD-A, and don't care about the two HD movie formats either. I just want a bigger write-once media format to store my own stuff.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
Has anyone seen any estimates of how many 360 owners actually plan to buy the HD-DVD add-on? If HD-DVD's big hope is an optional extra to the 360, looks like they'll lose...
Meanwhile, it certainly looks like Sony are going to be able to use the PS3 to drive through a huge installed base of Blu-Ray machines.
From an experience point of view, why should we care? Well, I was at a conference in London where the dreaded Bill Gates spoke, but he did say something I found interesting: he said that "soon, the difference between TV/Movies and games won't be black and white, as it is now; there will be a spectrum of shades of grey in between".
I believe that Blu-Ray will enable some "playability" in movies - customisation, simple interactivity, etc. This could produce dreadful rubbish, or just be ignored, but it might produce some interesting new hybrids in a medium which is getting pretty stale. Not as a replacement for games, but as an enhancement for movies. Now I know what you're thinking - "Dragon's Lair" - but hey, it might be better this time round, mightn't it? Or not...
Anyway, I believe HD-DVD offers no such flexibility - so it's odd that Bill backs the format that doesn't do what he thinks will start happening to movies sometime soon...
I can't see it improving Jet Set Willy on my spectrum emulator, unless it makes the chunky pixels sharper...
Task Mangler
How could the 360 be a factor in determining the outcome of this format battle? The 360 is a standard definition DVD unit, and very few people are going to buy this vaporous external HD-DVD add-on. They have already paid more than they're accustomed to for the 360, and unless the HD player can add some key enhancement to the gaming experience it will be perceived as superfluous. No, the only way a new format can be helped by a game console is if it's standard equipment, as the PS2's DVD player was and as the PS3's BD player will be (as long as they finally commit to releasing it sometime this decade).
Part of the hardcore faithful who believed in Apple long before it was cool again to do so
Music industry promoted the classic black disc
Music industry promoted the tape
Music industry promoted the CD
Video/Movie industry promoted VHS/Beta
Video/Movie industry promoted DVD
Console games initially used cartridges then moved to CD then to DVD. They always had to adapt to the market directed by the music and the video industry. Actually the music industry is pretty much overwhelmed by the MP3/Internet "media". So I really think the video industry (and of course the consumers of that industry) will decide the new standard. The video game industry should adapt to that standard. Also the industry that is using a media optimally (meaning almost 100% of its capacity) will effectively promote that standard. I don't think video games will need to use 25 GB or 50 GB of data until at least 2-3 years. The video industry *actually* need that capacity.
For(k;;)(Fork();)
Honestly, I think somebody is paying all these analysts to hype the "next generation" DVD format because for now, at least, BOTH formats are too expensive, require too much investment in new equipment, and offer too little benefit to be worthwhile for at least a few more years.
....I'll tell you a little secret, though.... the hype isn't about what's best for consumers. It's about pushing new DRM onto the market to supercede the broken DRM (CSS) of DVD; that's it. The big movie companies could care less about the consumer or their experience, but if Sony and their fellow companies can sell you a new pricey $$$$$ kit along the way, why they'll do that too. In that respect, Hi-def DVD formats deserve nothing but scorn.
Perhaps if digital television had taken off a few years earlier, pushing higher-def TVs and better home theater sound into a majority of households, this might be a winning proposition... but for now, most people are quite happy with the DVD experience.
Unlike the transition between video tape and DVD, the improvements moving to HD are far more elusive, and when finally observable, are not really all that great over the "old" DVD format. Early reviews state that a clear difference is only discernable at very high screen sizes; and at the prices those extra-large format, hi-def TVs run, only the most affluent will be able to afford to see what the hype is all about.
In the end, there's no point declaring anybody a winner in "next gen" DVD until the Walmart crowd gets behind it, and "old" DVDs fade into oblivion.
Theres no way Sony could sell the PS3 for less than £1000 now as standalone players cost £800 about now. So from this I have to disagree that Sony will sell the PS3 for $500 as an earlier poster said, even if they could so this Sony will be undercutting all their manufacturers, and I wonder what they will have to say about that. Also markey anaylysts are already touting the PS3 as a major success because of the success of the PS3. I'll put it like this, it was average joe who made the PS2 what it is today, their friends had it so they bought one. I do not know ANYONE, not even techie people like me who is willing to pay £500 for a console let alone £800, so there is no chance that average joe will fork out this amount of money for something which is comepletely superfluous to their survival lol. I know I won't be buying either an Xbox360 or a PS3 and the PC is better IMO than both.
This was the first month I bought a game on DVD format instead of the 6 CD package. For the past year they've been charging a *premium* for the DVD packaging.
Who REALLY CARES what format the consoles select? It's a closed system most certainly DRM'd to the nuts. It'll be at least five years (after they make up their minds) before I see any games in a hi-def DVD packaging.
I'm another member of the "notachanceinhellthatillbuythis" club. For years new technology has come along and given us reasons to upgrade our equipment for this new wave of entertainment, but HDDVD and Bluray both leave me wanting more. The "awe" factor just isnt there for me. Sure it looks a little better but then I have to rebuy my TV so it can support HD, rebuy my DVD player, and then deal with DRM BS out the wazoo.
Forgive me for finally becoming that jaded old guy that screams about these kids now days and their damn gadgets.
The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
- Winston Churchill
the war between blueray and hd-dvd will probably be decided by microsoftin the end, if they decide that the next xbox games as well as their windows installation discs are to be put on HD-DVD discs well the war will end, i think that microsoft will choose hd-dvd for their xbox line as they are not going to buy technology from their main compeditor in the gaming world. it is also up to matshushita/nec as to what happens, they are the biggest laptop drive manufacturers in the world, whatever they decide will probably become the standard and judging by samsungs hd-dvd players blueray is dead already
The premise of the article is right - the game consoles are going to decide the winner in the "hi-def" wars.
But the article totally misses the dark horse candidate which I, with my great knowledge and keen insight of the market, predict will be the real winner.
The losers will be both BLU-RAY and HD-DVD. The winner will be downloaded content.
All of the game systems are network centric. In order to get much benefit out of any of the systems you practically have no choice but to connect them to the internet and that is typically going to be a broad-band connection too.
Combine that ubiquitous high-speed internet connectivity with the high-powered processing built into these systems and you have the ideal platform for media distribution using new highly efficient codecs like h.264.
An hour of 720p encoded with h.264 to just 1GB looks pretty good. In most cases it looks a lot better than a DVD. A low-end 1.5Mbps (DSL) connection can transfer that 1GB in under 2 hours. A mid-range 8mbps (comcast cable) connection can transfer it in less than 20 minutes, and high-end 20mbps (Verizon FIOS fibre) will do it in under 10 minutes with plenty of bandwidth to spare.
This combination of processing and network throughput will make it feasible to sell direct downloaded hi-def video to anyone with one of these game consoles.
I believe that just as MP3's portability convenience trounced the non-portable high-def audio products like SACD and DVD-Audio, so too will downloaded (possibly, but not necessarily) pay-per-view hi-def tv and movies.
Of course the quality of 1080p at 8G/hr with h.264 will be significantly better than just 720p at 1G/hr - but for many people the lower quality will be still be more than good enough, and for the videophile, waiting a little bit longer for the download of a top-notch 1080p encoding won't be a terrible inconvenience.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
High-definition DVD and TV makes everything look fake and makes actors look like regular people. When you watch a program made for HDTV it's so easy to tell that the actors are on a set.... it completely destroys my suspension of disbelief. Plus.... you can see every pore, wrinkle, scar and tattoo of the actors, which is not pretty. I want my pretty people back!
If I remember correctly the porn industry is the biggest commercial consumer of DVD media. Is Forbes being polite in ignoring their impact or has their influenced waned? The game industry might be large, but I don't think it's as big as the skinflick industry...
My decision has already been made, regardless of what happens in the near future. A little about me: I'm not an industry insider, I don't know what secrets are cooking in either camp. I am an early adopter, the kind of guy who buys burners when they're 1000$ and the blanks cost 20$. I'm going with Blu-Ray.. why ? Because it seems that Blu-Ray burners will come out first, and offer greater capacity which makes them very interesting for desktop backups and the good ol' mega huge warez/mp3/pr0n compilation. The fact that Pioneer has had a Blu-Ray burner ready for several months now has a LOT to do with my decision.
I don't care what the format wars decide for the living room. I care what the formats can do for me today, on my PC where I do actual work. If Blu-Ray ends up trumping HD-DVD, hooray for me, if not then I'll just buy another burner if I really really want one. Seeing as I'm moving away from DVD discs entirely, and relying more on media-center functionality, I don't really care what the studios decide. I will end up ripping them to hard disk either way.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
I don't know about you but I am not crying out for higher resolution films and TV. I think DVD quality is just right and a huge and expensive transition over to another format seems pointless. It feels a bit like Microsoft forcing a new and unwanted Windows Version on us.
If people really cared about getting the ultimate quality in their viewing, DivX and Xvid would not be so popular as they further degrade the image quality.
The only benefit I can see in Bluray is as a storage medium. I have lots of stuff I would like to back up, and 25Gig disks would be handy. Then again hard drive capacities move so quickly that to me disks always seem inadequate for backups.
From a business perspective they are just trying to con us into buying our DVD collections all over again, in a format that is highly restrictive and much more difficult to rip. With so many people ripping DVDs so they can watch them on their portable movie player etc, I wonder whether an unrippable format would actually succeed commercially. You could end up with angry consumers going back to the shop and ranting:
"Hey this disk is faulty. I couldn't rip....er um, nothing. I just want my money back. Do you have the film in a DVD version?"
But now I find myself in the market for a new laptop, and whaddaya know, there are models out there that do HD-DVD. I haven't noticed any Blu-Ray enabled laptops yet, but it's probably only a matter of time. So now what? I don't want to get stuck paying >$2000 for a machine with capabilities that will be useless in a year, nor do I want to get wedded to a losing format. Ignore the new formats altogether and get something that does neither? It seems silly not to take advantage of the newest tech available when making a major purchase -- I want this machine to last me a good long while. But is the risk getting stuck with the equivalent of a BetaMax?
Michael
"No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality;..."
The real determiners of the HD format wars will be the adult DVD producers.
Conventional wisdom is that adult DVD doesn't want high definition, as the 480-line output of standard definition production hides the imperfections in erotic actors' skin.
..which one will make a better frisbee?
"You're everywhere. You're omnivorous."
I know everyone's talking about downloadable content as the next stage, but I really hope it isn't. DRM is bad enough as it is- if and when the movie companies succumb to downloads, those things are going to be way too hard to do anything with. Personally, I'd like to see the new holographic media thats supposed to hit the PC market next year. It promises an extremely high data density, and functions as a raw medium just like CD's do, so DRM will still be semi-controlled.
I think it will be definitely interesting, not to mention one of the other important genres which has yet to follow one specific platform which is the adult industry. I have a feeling that Sony making Blu-Ray really their own may contribute to it not being the accepted format, as most people will want to feel as if they can use the format in all devices and even if this is possible, people will still feel the Blu-Ray is associated too closely to it's producer.
Business Voyeur
What games have you been playing that chose 6 CD over DVD in a platform that would support either? I know a lot of early PS2 games (i.e. Tekken Tag) Fit on a single CD and therefore didn't ship on DVD media.
Every game that has exceeded the capcity of one CD was put on DVD. Sometimes publishers still opt for a two-disc packaging rather than a daul layer DVD packaging (Xenosaga was dual layr DVD, the sequal packaged as two single layer DVD).
The point is, printing one DVD is cheaper than printing a set of CDs, even when PS2 first hit the scene. Game publishers weren't hesitant, they went where the economics took them.
But I do think the video game console uasge of the media will not significanlt influence things. PS3 video playback is the only thing potentially relevant, and I think Sony's standard will be in trouble if they bank on that. Fact is HD-DVD is beating them to market with players. Right now it means little as the library is small and the players exorbitantly expensive, but by the time PS3 ships, one of two things will happen. Either PS3 is the first Blu Ray device on the market in a sea of resonably priced HD-DVD players (they will come down) and a significant HD-DVD section at your local Best Buy, or other Blu Ray players will get to market and play the significant role over which one becomes predominant. Either way, I think the PS3 movie playback capability will be a moot point.
I would laugh at any suggestion that video game format would even slightly influence the industry. There is no need for interoperability with other devices, so a consumer with Tekken 10 on Blu Rary could give a rats ass about wanting a Blu Ray video player because of that. Video game hardware prices may be affected by the cost of the drive hardware depending on market for their lasers, but that is probably the extent of things. Dreamcast shipped a funky optical drive unlike anyone else's (GD-ROM), and no one really cared one way or the other. They were still able to price competitively and no one even thought about GD-ROM as a larger format. They just did't get quality games/marketing.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
For the same reason, the DVD wil still be with us years after the HD-DVD and BluRay are forgotten. How else will we watch our massive collections of "old DVDs?"
On your HD-DVD or Blu-ray Disc player, as both will be compatible with legacy DVDs just as LS-120 was compatible with legacy 1.4 MiB floppies.
What the media is sold on I dont give a crap about except insofar as the format has to allow easy transfer to the mediaserver. And it appears neither of these obsolete-before-they-hit-the-shelves formats are going to deliver.
HD-DVD allows the owner of an authentic disc to make a so-called "managed copy" on a conforming (proprietary) media server.
OK, I understand that a higher storage capacity DVD is always good for computer users for backups and such... so I am not complaining there.
But seriously, how many people really want a higher def DVD player? How many people are going to really care about the difference?
The new "format" that is going to beat both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD will be the net. How many people are buying high-end CD walkmans? Do they even make high end CD walkmans any more? Everyone wants an I-Pod or some sort of MP3 player! And how many people are gonna go out and spend $600 on a new DVD player, when clearly Tivo (or a Tivo like service) and Movies On Demand service is what people really want.
I see now, in car commercials, cars are being built with ipod docks, and with XM or Sirius satalite recievers. In audio, people are choosing quantity and choice over quality.
If you gave people a choice of renting super high-def movies in the traditional model from blockbuster, or getting a old-school res movie instantly by pressing a button at home - for half the price - I am afraid you are going to find that no-one but the audiophiles and video geeks really care that much.
So I think that both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD will be duds.
Even in the console wars, the winner will be the one with the best online service.
I can't think of one single person, aside from reading on the internet, who has said the PS2's DVD player sucks.
I apologize for only being able to say this through the Internet, but I can give you a more concrete reason why the PS2's DVD player sucks: it can't play all-region DVDs that don't match your TV system. I bought a copy of Wobbl and Bob Volume 1 (all-region PAL), which my Windows PC with DVD-ROM (region 1) and my $60 Apex AD-1200 DVD player (region 1) play fine. My $150 slim PS2 (region 1, NTSC U/C), on the other hand, just displays "TV system doesn't match". Why did Sony not add TV format conversion to the firmware between the old PS2 and the slim PS2?
More important than technical capabilities will be how Wal-Mart consumers perceive the outer boxes.
I think we're in for a surprise at the show based on naming conventions, as with Nintendo's Wii.
"Today, Sony finalized the offering for
the Blu-Ray format by dubbing it: "Very
High Samplerate" otherwise known as VHS
In a surprise announcement, Microsoft's
internal codename "AlphaMin" for HD-DVD
was finalized to ' Beta-Max '
No, my VHS and DVD players should work pretty much the same way they do now, for the foreseeable future. Considering the installed based of non-HD TVs and DVD players hooked up to them, I don't see Plain Old DVD disappearing from the shelves any time soon. (Just look how long ye olde VHS held on.) So I'll just continue watching my library of VHS tapes and buying/renting PODVDs until these mutually-damaged upcoming "standards" have run their course (which shouldn't take long) and something new comes along to replace them (probably net-delivered anyway).
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Try running your Spectrum emulator in Scale4x or hq4x mode and seeing if it makes the pixels sharper.
If we can't get the patent holders to come to some sort of comprimise maybe we can get the content producers to do so. In fact, they have incentive to resolve this mess because the market won't really take off if people are hesitant to risk purchasing a format that may become obsolete in a few years. This is bad news bears for the content producers who want to rerelease Jaws SUPERDUPERBIT Platinum Plus edition and the like to reap insane profits. So in order to fix this two-standard mess content producers need to distribute their media on double sided discs. One side HD-DVD, the other Blue-Ray. This way, no matter which player you buy, you can watch it on either. This allows content producers to rerelease old films and make insane profits. Win-win for everybody. Yaaaaaaay.
You'll have to see which side AOL is on.
People have to stop going to this guy for prognostication on videogames. He doesn't have a freaking clue. Seriously, the only reason he stands out in my mind is because he keeps being referenced by mainstream media in these articles and he always turns out to be so wrong he almost wraps around to being right.
Will there even be time for a format war? The rate things have been going these days I'll be buying a 24x BluRay-RW/HDDVD-RW/DL DVD+-RW/CDRW compatible burner for £30 in a few years, with low-end dual format players going for about £20.
The only technical difficulty will be how they'll fit all the logos on the tray door
So this year's E3 could very well be a deciding factor in how you view your movie library for years to come.
Who says I have to buy into whatever HD format they choose? Last time I checked it was still the consumer who's in charge. If nobody buys the format, it will just turn into the next LaserDisc-drops-while-VHS-puffs-on story. If I don't have an HD TV (which I don't) is there any reason for me to upgrade to a differnet format, other than lots more DRM headache?
Humor detectors must be broken today.
I don't believe that the console will be the sole item that swings the decision. I think it might be the PC; if OEM's start putting in HD-DVD / Blu Ray drives; that could swing the multimedia adoption.
I don't see why people are thinking that Blue Ray will surge over HD DVD. Just because the PlayStaion 3 will use them? I personally think (and you don't need to agree with me) that HD DVD will succeed because 1) it has a logo similar to that of the existing DVD's, and 2) it has the initialism DVD in it. The general public, the ones that buy DVDs will see a familiar logo along with a familiar name and buy it.
But, I could be wrong.
Ryan - http://www.thecosmotron.com/
HD-DVD? Blu-ray? Games?
Games nowadays barely fill up a single DVD (and a large percentage still comes on 1-2 CDs), what are we talking about here?
Put DVD disc in drive... wait... sit through copyright warning.. wait.. watch stupid asinine 'pirating dvds is an evil thought crime' mini-feature....wait... watch previews of upcoming releases... wait...studio credits scroll...wait... wait while stupid pointless menu displays... wait.. finally start feature (what you wanted to happen when disc was inserted).. wait while the same stupid studio credits scroll.. wait... try to fast forward and your player tells you the 'operation is prohibited'?? wtf? its *my* player, and its *my* disc.
The DVD experience is just so bad, and its guaranteed to only get worse with HD formats since all the stupid, cheesy ideas the studios have to 'add value' by ramming advertising, previews and propaganda down your throat as well as 'rich media' navigation screens will simply mean it takes even longer to just watch the f**king movie you wanted to.
Since I have experienced the simplicity and ease of just choosing video files to play off a Freevo menu, I dont think i'll ever buy any kind of video disc player again, unless it comes bundled with a computer which I can use to extract the content that I actually find relevant or desirable, and archive for convenient viewing.
If the MPAA/RIAA dont like the idea that I will choose to spend my time watching only content I find relevant or desirable (for which I am happy to pay for), they can go f**k themselves.
I gots ta ding a ding dang my dang a long ling long
Coming back to the article, it would seem that the analyst predicts a different story than that of the summary:
Video game analyst Michael Pachter of Wedbush Morgan Securities sees the DVD standards war determining the winner in the current video game console battle instead of the other way around.
To be honest, this doesn't seem like it would actually apply. Not many gamers, to my knowledge, care about the DVD standards of their system. But this could be from my skewed knowledge of predominantly using consoles to play games. If someone actually used it just for DVDs, I can see Prachter's vision as being correct; otherwise, it seems a bit backwards. The market for consoles as media centers appears to be only a niche in the industry as a whole.
Fun Zoid RPG
Why buy anything if there are competing subscription companies available (ala Netflix, only with direct downlaod or video on demand). Who would buy any type of disc for $15-20 if for $20 per month you can watch any movie you want, at any time? That's less than cable TV. And I and a lot of people won't care if it's (* limit 10 movies per month). I don't have time to watch 10 movies per month.
I'm also excited for subscription audio services.
My other first post is car post.
Those trailers are encoded in H.264 (MPEG4 AVC).
I would think you could do okay at 1G/hour in H.264. I would think 2G/hour in H.264 would look nearly identical to the MPEG-2 8G/hour source materials.
That having been said, the poster sets the bar absurdly low. "Better than DVD"? DVD looks like poop. I'm not going to buy a movie in a format that looks only as good as DVD.
In the end, I can play a DVD as long as I want and take it to other places. These downloads will be DRMed to high heaven, locked to a given machine. I'm not real interested in that.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
I will possibly purchase so HD movies, but no equiptment other than an HD monitor. Why? Because I won't buy any Hi-Def content till someone's pulled a DVD Jon on it/them.
Backwards compatibility didn't help LS-120 make it over the hump. In the end it was the CD-R that did all of these devices in.
However, I do get the feeling that Blu-Ray players will be capable of playing HD-DVD discs but it's certain that HD-DVD players cannot read Blu-Ray.
-------- -------- Support Wesley Clark for president!!!
Honestly, I think somebody is paying all these analysts to hype the "next generation" DVD format because for now, at least, BOTH formats are too expensive, require too much investment in new equipment, and offer too little benefit to be worthwhile for at least a few more years.
Duhh
-------- -------- Support Wesley Clark for president!!!
I've already bought all the "old" movies that I like on DVD. You can't tell me that "Ghostbusters", "Big Trouble in Little China", or "This is Spinal Tap" are going to look any better in HD. The fact is, that in order for the HD-DVD's to sell, they have to release GOOD NEW movies in the format. So unless X-Men 7 or Spider-Man 5 are all that great, I don't see how they expect them to sell. They have to increase the quality of the movies before anybody is going to care. Basically I've noticed that I buy less and less new movies on DVD. Last year was a real dud, with the only new movie I liked was Wedding Crashers. and God knows we don't want to see guys like Owen Wilson in HD. 480p is just fine thank you.
As I recall, the access to high capacity media is what drove many adventure games with movie cuts onto Sony as opposed to Nintendo. Video games are highly driven by technology and the "gee-wizz" factor. More polygons, more resolution, faster frame rates
So if you asked me whether gamers care about the resolution of the videos inside their games
-------- -------- Support Wesley Clark for president!!!
There are massive volumes of rummage sale VHS collections available for sale. Those same people would have told you that their VHS tapes were good enough. Something tells me that the DVDs will find their way to the same place. I'm doubly convinced when you consider that DVDs are far less durable than VHS tapes (just like CDs aren't as durable as cassette tapes).
I'm deeply dissapointed with Sony's decision to scrap the encasements for Blu-Ray discs.
-------- -------- Support Wesley Clark for president!!!
Why would Microsoft ship Windows on HD-DVD when there are so few players available. They don't put Windows of Office on DVD right now. About the only think you're likely to see this with is MSDN.
... why would game publishers ship on a format when most of the units out there do not have a player available for it???? This could only happen AFTER Microsoft ships a drive standard with every unit and even then adoption would be slow for the previously mentioned reason.
When you make money selling upgrades, you have to sell whatever matches equipment. I remember dealing with stacks of 16 floppy drives when CDs were available in the marketplace.
Regarding X-Box
In a couple of years, we may finally see Microsoft shipping everything on DVDs. Don't expect them to ship on Hi-DVDs for another 10 years. By that time, I'm sure they will rather have you simply download all software from their servers directly.
-------- -------- Support Wesley Clark for president!!!
Increased storage capability? I don't need more storage. I felt myself running a bit short a while back and picked myself up a 500Gig external drive - problem sorted.
Now I can't be bothered wandering off and doing sums, but it's going to be quite a while before it works out cheaper for me to buy a BR drive and a pile of media than an external hard drive (which is much more convenient).
In fact the more I think about it, the more is seems the only reason I'd need a huge amount of storage space is to store rips of the new hi-def disks...
I've put up with the new standards up until now, but enough is enough - I just WISH everybody would stop banging on about BR/HD-DVD and which console will support which. I just want a good game, or a good movie. I mean the same game/movie might be a teensy bit better, but really.... I don't care enough to even carry one posting this post.............
Who would buy any type of disc for $15-20 if for $20 per month you can watch any movie you want, at any time?
People who have single-digit-year-old children who prefer to watch the same 5 movies over and over. And what about the extra $360 per year cost of broadband vs. NetZero dial-up Internet access and the price of real estate in broadband-serviced areas?
From my harddrive, downloaded from the internet with bittorrent, encoded down to about a gig.
Blu ray's ships with java. I think to do the interactive stuff (maybe some light games as well.). MS hates it (java).
For the ps2 while Sony cared about tagging along the dvd feature to the ps2 they weren't really pushing the dvd player inside the ps3 that much and if it was the perfect dvd player it would be harder to sell their standalone players. The dvd format would definately win and there were no high stakes.
With Blu-ray there will be a format war and sony stands to profit greatly should they succeed in winning. Royalties from other players and discs sold in the format would amount to a great deal of cash should they succeed.
The ps3 will be released within months of blu-ray's and it's almost like a trojan horse. Sony has a lot more motivation this time to make sure the ps3's movie displaying capabilities and functions are top notch.
Hmmm... Pie...
All these hollywood films were shot on 35mm film, which has a resolution far far exceeding our current SD (NTSC/PAL) video signals. 35mm also exceeds the resolution of hd video 1080i and 720p, so there is a marked improvement if the film print is scanned at these higher HD resolutions.
HD captures approximately five times the amount of the ORIGINAL scanned image, than your normal tv signal does, even from films shot as far back as the 1920's
There actually was a third system, superior to both VHS and BetaMax. It was called Video 2000.
I thought porn was supposed to be the kingmaker here.
Does this mean that a porn-themed game will be what really decides?
Or wait! I know! A porn about computer games!
I can see it now.
SAMUEL L BRONKOWITX PRESENTS:
FRAGGED!
A tale of hard disks and big memories.
So does photoshop (or equiv video software) and/or lense tricks and the old trick with vasaline rubbed over the lense.
One of the real problems with super high-definition video that I could see (for those that want the detail) would be getting equipment that can actually record at such a high depth or level of detail... not to mention the on-the-fly storage requirements.
As to your link, I don't see the content developers suddently deciding that they should give a fair deal.
CDs are cheaper than cassettes to produce. Which costs more to buy with songs on it?
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
You've obviously never seen a CD or DVD after a teenager has handled it. Scratched up to all hell!!!! Often unplayable.
You can break casette tapes in different ways, but you can't scratch them out of playing properly.
If the Durabis coating in Sony does what you say it will (resist steel wool) then that is great. But I seriously doubt it.
-------- -------- Support Wesley Clark for president!!!
You probably don't need the storage ... But others have serious backup needs. And a lot of these people really don't like backing up hard drives to other hard drives. Ther is still a need for removeable storage out there. Zip still manages to sell it's latest backup solutions.
Don't you worry yourself, computer users will find plenty to do with a 27GB-60GB optical disc.
-------- -------- Support Wesley Clark for president!!!
Here's from your link:
"Now that the cost of distribution is effectively zero, it does not make sense to try to mark-up the distribution costs so as to pay for the production costs. After all 2000% of $0 is still $0."
You are working from a cost model. Speaking of what "doesn't make sense" (quotes not there to be patronizing, just the sentence reads wrong without it). That's where you work from the idea of fairness. This market isn't working that way, it is working from a "whatever the market will bear" model. They'll cut prices when they think they'll make more by charging lower prices, not when their production costs drop.
Hollywood does not universally work on the principle that only 10% of productions make money. Right now, with DVD profits and such, virtually all movie producions make money, even after advertising costs. Production companies aren't in the business to lose money, they wouldn't keep making movies if they didn't make money on them. The fiction that movies lose money is just Hollywood doing what they do best, telling stories. Look up Buchwald v. Paramount for an example.
I don't believe TV productions in general work on this "90% lose money" principle either. There are many small productions made cheaply, and they are all made to a cost with a general idea of the amount of revenue they can realize and a knowledge that they will almost certainly cover their costs.
Perhaps your description does fit TV productions, as historically if a TV show didn't make it into syndication, it was very likely to lose money. This is temporarily not as true as usual, with DVD profits even from cancelled shows helping out a lot. But likely it will return to normal as the hot market for old TV shows on DVDs dies down somewhat. Also note that with the breadth of cable channels in the US hungry for content to air, many series go to syndication with fewer than 100 shows.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
(me) Production companies aren't in the business to lose money, they wouldn't keep making movies if they didn't make money on them.
... license fees are less than what it costs to produce the show" and that it is based on the hope that if the show does well that they can earn more on future deals, including syndication and dvd. http://www.blogmaverick.com/entry/1234000617063228 /
(you) Which explains why there have been a number of spectacular implosions due to very expensive productions bombing out. For example - Heaven's Gate took out UA, Cutthroat Island took out Carolco and Raise the Titanic took out ITC. On the other hand, there have been plenty of underestimations - UA and Universal both took a pass on Star Wars, even Spielberg expected Jaws to be a career-ending bomb after he had finished shooting, and of course the titanic of underestimations - Titanic, expected to bomb so badly that Cameron had to forfeit his enitre salary of $8M plus his share of the gross just to keep the production afloat.
I am aware of companies going under. I think Cutthroat Island is a little less direct than those others, but either way, Carolco did go the way of the dodo. Well, sort of. I mean, Cinergi is here, right? If movies lose money, why did Vajna start a new company doing the same thing? As Einstein said, foolishness is doing the same thing and expecting different results.
Cameron giving up his money was because of the total cost of the production compared to even an average or above average take, not becuase it was expected to bomb. It cost so much it would take a super-huge blockbuster take to cover costs. And it did that (and more) in the end.
But either way, a few cases don't prove the rule. You said 90% of movies lose money. Then you list a couple that did. Your two statements don't agree. And you completely disregard the current business climate when attempting to refute my statements that indicate the impact the current DVD sales market have on balance sheets. It's very possible these bombs actually made money given the current DVD market. It's just it came too late for these production companies.
Anyway, often the problems that cause these production companies to go away are structural or legal technicalities (like wanting to escape liabilities). SKG made plenty of money in their time to stick around, it seems they just spent too much doing it.
(me) I don't believe TV productions in general work on this "90% lose money" principle either. (You deleted my comment about most productions being done to a cost with an idea of the revenues ahead of time.)
(you) Got any hard numbers to support your beliefs? If it weren't 6am in the morning I'd dig up a ton of links to support mine, for now you will just have to be satisifed with Mark Cuban's statement that "more often than not
I think you are forgetting the largest part of the market. Again, TV is mostly cable now. Cable is mostly crap. These small productions ("World's biggest ships!" and other cheap content) are what I was referring to them. You seem to overlook them, instead looking at other end of the market, the wildly speculative productions done by Mark Cuban. You can't use a person who took the biggest chance in movies (releasing simultaneously on DVD, cable and in theaters) as an example of the entire market situation.
Anyway, I know these productions are crap, but they do account for the majority of the productions. They're the least interesting ones, but the largest part of the market, at least by volume.
Yes, I do agree the high-line (network, etc.) market is more speculative. Much of this is done by the networks themselves now (NBC, HBO), but there are still things like "Book of Daniel" out there that underscore your read of this market very well.
Again, on the DVD front, note that even cancelled TV shows hit DVD now. I have the "Keen Eddie" DVDs for example. Plenty of peopl
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95