Slashdot Mirror
Blue-ray 'Not a Burden' For Sony
Via Opposable Thumbs, an article at GamePro in which Phil Harrison clarifies that Blue-ray on the PS3 is a 'game design' decision. From the article: "Once we had that storage capacity on Blu-ray Disc, adding the movie playback functionality was extremely cost-effective, [the cost] is actually non-existent. So games like Resistance which, as a launch title, is up to 20-something gigabytes already. And that's day one -- think about four years, six years from now. We'll be pushing the 50 gigabyte limit with dual-layer Blu-ray very quickly. So we absolutely need it as game designers, and in that regard, the consumer is getting the movie functionality effectively for free." I probably would have had a follow-up question there, but that's where the interview ends. So what do you think? Which came first for Sony: Blue-ray as new movie media, or Blu-ray as answer to design challenges?
Sony is repeating their past efforts. The PS2 won wide acceptance in part because it was a very cheap (at the time) DVD player. I believe that in Japan, a PS2 was actually priced lower at launch than any other DVD player available in Japan, so thousands of people picked it up simply for DVDs, and the games were an afterthought.
Sony is taking the same strategy this time around. Blu-Ray is Sony's technology and they NEED it to succeed. History is not on their side though - Betamax, MiniDisc, UMD... Sony just can't get their formats off the ground. Their solution? Package it in with their most popular product, the PS3. That ensures that there will be more Blu-Ray capable DVD players than HD-DVD players in households, thus ensuring that Blu-Ray will earn top billing and finally make Sony some money.
Will it work? Time will tell, but I doubt it - the $600 price tag is simply too high for most people to justify.
So, to answer the question, Blu-Ray came first, and Sony is trying to justify their huge price by claiming that it was needed by game designers. It's not.