One, I think the whole cost element here is being exaggerated. PC games had similar content for ages before the PS3/360 - this isn't some cutting edge recent thing. It's just that this time the 360/PS3 really are getting a lot of titles that former would probably have been PC only - where do you think all the PC demographic is going?

The Wii is really the only current console that represents a small increase from previous consoles, the PS3/360 were designed to cater to games that were formerly focused on PC market and to cater to those tastes. The Wii is fine and all (look I have one!) but from day one it was never going to be the home to a lot of genres, particularly FPS/TPS and online. You're not going to see the current graphical levels of big FPS/TPS suddenly being cut back to target the Wii - it's just not powerful enough.

Also, it's pretty clear most games still fit onto a DVD. So far the games breaking one DVD are mainly RPGS with lots of CG cutscenes, etc. That's what's taking up a lot of the space. On PS3 the BR just makes it easy to accomodate both. Most titles on PS3 will be using a fraction of the space on the BR, while whenever a FFXIII or MGS4 comes along all that extra space is able to handle the CG cutscenes and all the additional assets.

Now, there is a trend to add content/variety, again nothing new to this gen, and sure we are also starting to see games like Uncharted 2 (and Rage by the looks of it) that need more space than a single DVD for their assets, but that isn't hugely new in terms of capacity, it's to do with consoles not using installs normally (yes, even the PS3).

A big PC game on DVD is totally compressed, then when you install it it decompresses and on your HDD you might have 10GB or more of game. On consoles, unless they go for decent HDD and full install approach a'la PC the assets need to be readable from the disk, which means they can't be that compressed which means as more PC like games and games at the edge of the trend for texture variety hit consoles they run into space issues.

The cost element is there, but the fact is most developers struggling are those fighting for a share of competitive genres where there titles just aren't as good. FPS/TPS in particular is brutal right now on 360/PS3. An average FPS is going to struggle unless it launches in a quiet period and get's decent reviews. Add in the recession and this has just been compounded. Like everything for every top flight developer/title there's probably 5 or more average ones. When there is economic trouble some of the more average titles/developers take a hit.

What is happening, and will continue as a theme, won't be downscaling of assets for big games, because that's the developers problem, the customer already has the established standards and will inevitably want more, but improving the tools to make the games to reduce costs.

That's why the Unreal engine is used a lot, why id is releasing Tech5 as a multiplatform development toolkit and Crytek are bringing their engine to consoles. That's why developers are talking so much about the need for really good console SDKs, for really good multiplatform engines and tools.

As for DVD / consoles, yes it will get limiting, and either all consoles (certainly those looking to satisfy the demographic for FPS/TPS/Online such as Gears, Uncharted, Assassin's Creed, etc will go BR or something similar, or we'll see more disk swapping being accepted, or more HDD installs.

Clearly, what this means is that currently, the PS3 does have an advantage with BR over DVD as it can cater more easily with 1 disk to all the titles hitting at the moment and for the foreseeable future, while in some cases (a minority of cases I reckon, at least for a while yet) the 360 will have multiple DVDs instead.

If it's good enough for PC games it's good enough for consoles imo. Final Fantasy XIII is only like 6 or 7gb of actual gameplay the rest is FMV CS. And I don't mind swapping discs..not a big deal really.

@ Reasonable

The realtime ingame cutscenes in MGS4 also take up a lot of space. PS3 exclusives make excellent use of Blu-Ray disc while also taking advantage of maximum compression (it makes sense as the Cell can decode faster than the extra time it takes to load from disc).

I think PS3 exclusives are and will take more and more advantage of realtime generated cutscenes, not because this could save space, but because you get a more seamless experience (same assets, better transitions).

God of War 3:

"Everything you see is 100% in-game. All camera features, including motion blur, run real-time in the cinematics and in-game."

"For this game we decided to try and blend in the cinematic sequences with the in-game sequences, so all models and assets are used for cinematics and for in-game.

“The Kratos that you will control will be the same you see in extreme close ups, no smoke and mirrors, no model switching. There is no CG cutscenes like the ones in previous GOW games. What you see in cinematics is what you get in-game, no difference. We didn’t want to have any jarring changes in detail between gameplay and story.”"

This game will take up a lot of Blu-Ray space.

Shams said recently that he was able to cut his erm 'Fower something, sorry Shams!' Wiiware game down to half the size of the PC release without cutting any content. Its just a different mindset really when you're talking about essentially unlimited space vs limited space on the consoles. In addition to this I would say that having multiple levels of textures, unused or rarely used textures and a lower level of texture compression if they are supporting lower level DX assets probably take up a lot of addition space too. Im not sure which but its either 8:1 or 10:1 texture compression on the Xbox 360 whereas IIRC DX9 calls for 6:1 texture compression.

@ WilliamWatts

The type of compression you seem to be talking about sacrifices texture quality. I think lossless data compression if possible is preferred.

No, lossless. Lossy compression of textures has a much higher ratio.

Sounds strange, why not do this compression in DX9 as well if it's lossless?

Because its not in spec. Textures are just xxx by xxx bitmaps. Very easy to compress those.

My bad, I was trying to remember something off the top of my had, and I got the numbers screwed up. It wasn't "pulled out of my ass" as you say, just bad recall on the part of my memory. I saw this picture over a month ago, and I just didn't recall it correctly.

http://www.bme.eu.com/news/avatar-vs-modern-warfare-2/ 

Now, despite the *big* flub in my numbers, as of the beginning of this year, MW2 made $750M in profit, and add on whatever it has sold since the beginning of January. Couple that with them making $100M a month on WoW, and that guy that said "you'd think they would post in the black" just looks silly

Being that we’re (almost) 5 years into the generation, and DVD has been more than adequate for the vast majority of games, I think this mostly validates Microsoft’s choice of DVD as a media format; and indicates that a larger format (most likely a Blu-Ray based format) will be necessary for the next generation.