Why Blu-Ray is bad for the PS3

[Andir]

GotchayeX said:
The point being missed here is that nobody is saying that BluRay doesn't offer some potential benefits over DVD. I commented on this earlier - those saying that it's 'necessary' this generation have to first show that it provides significant benefits, but they also have to show that these benefits are standard-setting.

BluRay clearly hasn't been shown to be necessary if games that supposedly use it, such as Heavenly Sword, Ratchet and Clank, or maybe even Resistance fail to be better-received than similarly-priced games which obviously can't use it, with Halo 3 being the clearest example. CDs were eventually shown to be necessary for certain types of games, and RPGs in particular. They allowed for as much or more content at much lower prices, and they shifted the market significantly. It doesn't seem to me that PS3 games would be any less popular were they on DVD-9s.

It's a similar argument to that which can be used against the necessity of HD consoles. The Wii is proof that people aren't willing to spend that much extra for these benefits.

I'll ask again, if BluRay is necessary simply because it allows for better games, or even if you believe that it already has brought about better games, how can you say that it's not necessary for a next-gen console to be a $10,000 beast? Much more powerful hardware would obviously allow for better games. The mere fact that the potential for better games exists does not mean that those benefits will be realized in a meaningful way, and it does not mean that those benefits are a net advantage for the system when you consider the costs involved as well.

Also, to Kamahl, who responds to my point about multiplatform games being generally better on the 360 by saying that the fact that they're multiplatform prevents BluRay from being used, that was exactly my point.

If BluRay were truly necessary, the market would be such that it would be well worth a developer's time and money to make PS3 games take advantage of it. 360 game sales would suffer because everyone would see how much better BluRay could make games, and the PS3 would probably pass the 360 in hardware sales in short order. This hasn't happened.

Prove to me that BluRay is the device that's the sole reason the PS3 cost is where it is. Prove to me that if they used DVD9, the console would cost the consumer $250.

You can't. You can't prove to me or anyone here that the BDROM in the PS3 is driving he price of the console up by $150 opposed to sticking in a DVDROM. I want prices from within the past week. Not the prices released last year.

BluRay is there because it can be. If the developers want ot use that space they very well can. BluRay is here to stay. They aren't going to remove it. It isn't going to cost anymore than HDDVD, and the disc price to manufacture is getting cheaper daily. Which is another challenge I give you. I don't want retail cost on a blank disc. I want you to prove to me that pressing a BD is more expensive than pressing a DVD.

Again, I highly doubt you can give me verifiable evidence of such. You can't even verify that it might cost more or less to press two or three DVDs instead of one BD.

BluRay doesn't have to make consumers "see" a difference. It can in movies, at 1080p, with high detail sound. However, on games, it's harder to see. It's not a video card which has the biggest impact on visual accuity. However, as I stated above, you may not see it in screen shots, but they could add far more variation to the worlds and levels of games than they could with DVD9. This is simply because of the space allowed to add tons more unique world meshes, textures, sounds, and even video if the designer so chooses.