Rainbird said:
selnor said:
Rainbird said:
Let's get one thing straight. When using blu-ray, you pay royalties to the Blu-ray Disc Association, which consists of lots of different companies, each of which gets a part of the royalties that are payed to the BDA. Sony pays royalties to the BDA too, but it gets a small part of this back because it itself is part of the BDA. So Microsoft's royalties would be slightly more expensive than Sony's, but PS3 games cost the same as 360 games already. This royalty doesn't change anything.
And secondly, why in the world should Microsoft have a new factory line opened to produce their own discs when they can benefit from the increasing mass market production of blu-rays? Why spend money developing something new, when the stuff that's already here will more than get the job done?
Using blu-ray means Microsoft will save a bunch of R&D costs and Microsoft can offer a machine capable of playing blu-rays. It's not going to make your games any more expensive.
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First. If you are right then Nintendo just made the biggest error in the history of games. Not using bluray. Yet have a new type of disc the same size as bluray.
2Nd. Bluray has peaked. It will never mass market like DVDs. Even pcs in pc shops still have a limited number that include bluray. Not to mention the dwindling floor slace given to bluray films.
3Rd in my country it is not uncommon to find ps3 games 5 pound more expensive than 360. Say hello dirt 3. Some shops will match prices. But usually upping the 360 version. ( Thanks bluray ). Game doesn't do this though thank god.
Hddvd would be the best option. It costs very little to convert DVD lines for hddvd as Toshiba stated years back. And the tech already exists. I can see them doing this. As the film side of things is going DD very very quickly indeed. Last HD film figures says it all. And Zune marketplace is performing amazing in that field. Having no bluray on 360 and quality and quantity on Zune for HD stream or Download has helped push forward DD of HD films. You can now buy tvs with internet and HD film downloads service as software.
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1) They did the same with DVD on the Wii, I don't know why they prefer it that way, but they do apparently...
2) Did you see websites I pointed you to? Blu-ray growth dwarfed DD growth last year in the US (Microsoft's key market). Blu-ray is nowhere near having peaked.
3) I can't speak for the UK (other than saying your prices seems to have had a bumpy ride in the last few years), but where I live, the games cost exactly the same.
HDDVD would not be the best option, blu-ray would. As a multimedia device, the NextBox should be compatible with the popular disc standards, so unless Microsoft wants to give Sony a point in their favor, they need blu-ray. And looking at the US in 2010, DD had 12.2% of the total movie revenue (with a growth of 21.9% compared to 2009), while blu-ray had about 18-18.5% (derived from numbers in the first link with this link) of the total movie revenue (retail sales growing 64.2% and rentals growing 105.5% compared to 2009).
So regardless of the quality of Microsoft's services, in Microsoft's key market, blu-ray not only had a 50% larger marketshare in 2010, but grew more than four times as much in 2010 than DD did.
If Microsoft wants to rule all our livingrooms (and they want to), then they need blu-ray in the NextBox. End of story.
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