Compression costs time and hence money, wouldn't life be simpler if you had a tonne of space to fill and be lazy.  There really isn't any issue with DVD for this generation, developers are just getting used to being lazier and lazier with each generation.  The PS3 will never ever be pushed to it's limits like the PS2 was, the programming skill to optimise is becoming lost under a pile of SDK's that allow you to get the job done but with less efficiency.  This is all my rather subjective and likely complete incorrect opinion of course.

It was due to the time and cost of making the content not the amount of space on a DVD.

I think this is a real issue, HD content eats up a lot more space than SD and I think there are already some games even on Wii which have disc space problems (Metroid Prime Trilogy - okay, three games in one, SSB Brawl - although there is an insane amount of music and I'm told they were not really trying too hard to compress stuff). Of course you can use better compression methods on the better hardware etc., but high resolution textures and cutscenes will always use much more space.

Anyway, when I said it is a real issue I meant it from a developer's point of view - there's not much to worry about as a gamer. So it depends whether you are into these discussions or you just don't care as long as the game is good.

i personally think developers who complain about the storage issue of the dvd format m$ choose for the 360, should just shut the hell up. why, simple. because they knew after awhile dealing with blu-ray from the ps3 versus dvd for the 360, what each format's advantage was over the other. sure it would be nice to have extra storage for a game on the 360 using the dvd format. if u are going too make a game for the 360, u know by now its plus's versus its cons, same for the ps3. also ppl who complain about multiple game disks for the 360, i still cant understand why ppl use this as a con for the 360, are ppl nowadays that damn lazy that u cant get off your lazy a$$es to change a disk, i mean come on ppl . if thats the best u got , just go away and never come back.

Actually it is. Don't kid yourselfd. Bluray is possibly the biggest reason the PS3 saw slow sales at first, it was/is too advanced for the average consumer, especially given the fact that less than 50% of American households have an HD TV. Then consider that the only games that use Bluray to it's fullest are exclusives. Why? because Nintendo and MS went the cheap route, they went with tried and true DVD. Looks like it paid off. 

Did you ever wonder why MS didn't give devs the option to use HD DVD? The answer is quite obviouse, they wanted to wait and see who won the HD media war.Now, Sony did win the HD war, but at great expense to their gaming dept. Next gen I would expect MS to use a Bluray drive in thier console. I'm not sure about Nintendo though.

All in all, Sony played thier cards well, their gaming dept. loss is small fries compared to what they gained by winning the HD media war. And next gen they may make a comeback, It's anybodies game.

Agreed, I really honestly don't care what the 360 gets, I really don't, as long as it has no impact upon design/planning for the PS3 version (and vice versa), as it should be.  Every multi-platform game we see is literally gimped on EITHER end, because developers refuse to put in the quality time to optimize efficiently and properly for EACH machine.  Really, that's my only major issue with this generation.  Devs taking the middle ground, because they know people will still buy the games in droves.  Unfortunately, people don't hold them to this high a standard (I don't want to get into a debate about this, it's simply how it is), and so the devs never learn.

If it weren't for Sony's (and Microsoft's) first party studios, we would never have seen what these machines are truly capable of.

Are you sure about that?  I seem to recall MS stating they did this because the 360 HD-DVD player was an attachment, thus their entire base would be forced to adopt said optical device, before even being able to contemplate purchasing the game.  I suppose another fairly valid reason would be that MS charges additional fee's for each disc over 1 they launch games on.

As for Blu Ray, given how the PS3 reads/processes data, I think it was vital that the PS3 have that drive.  The low amount of VRAM makes it imperative to have not only installed data, but a large pool of data on the disc that can be accessed during gameplay. 

This issue would be resolved with mandatory installs. But then this would screw over all the HDD-less 4 GB S Model, Arcade and Core owners.... It's bad enough that you can't play the online co-op mode for several high profile games (Halo: Reach included) without a HDD.

Some would say that Microsoft was short-sighted for going with DVD and a HDD-less sku. But back in November 2005, Microsoft made the right decision. They put out a $300-$400 Xbox 360 at launch a year before the PS3 while the PS3 was $500-$600 a year later. That combination of more affordable pricing and the year head start played a role in the Xbox winning (as well as third-party support and the difficulties third-parties had with the PS3 at the beginning). It's like disolitude said. The Xbox 360 is already 5 years old (around the length of a typical console generation). It's storage limitations are starting to show the hardware's age. If third-party publishers don't want to work around the issues, they are free to release PS3 exclusives or gut out content from the 360 version and make it exclusive to the PS3. They have that choice. They just won't do it because they know that they'd be walking away from a lot of money if they alienated the 360 base like that.

And Microsoft would be foolish to come out with a Xbox 720 anytime soon because there is no need to do so until third-parties are really serious about defecting/favoring the PS3. This isn't happening.

Poor explanation on my part, I meant that they didn't give devs the option do release DVD and HD DVD versions of games. But the HD DVD drive being an add-on only enforces my point that MS wasn't about to pull as bold a move as Sony in the HD media war. They made it clear that they were backing HD DVDs but wouldn't put everything behind it. It would have made their console to expensive. They made a good business move on that since they weren't heavily invested in any HD media.

As for the PS3, yes it needs the Bluray drive with it's hardware set up, but the console specs would have been different if they had chosen to go with a DVD drive.

you definitely need to relax and put things in perspective, and possible read posts before you become billigerent just because someone doesn't agree with you doesn't mean they are making worthless posts, constructive criticism is a good thing

anyway RobotechHeaven raises a good point that the whole point is moot now as the 360 has a dvd drive and it would be a really bad idea to abandon the 360, plus honestly higher capacity optical drives in 2005 were a lot more expensive than in 2006, but a counter arguement would be that next generation needs greater storage capacity if visual trends continue and that is the rationel for these comments, plus by the time next gen roles around I doubt blu-ray drives will be terribly expensive, then again maybe solid state (just a dream on my part I know) will be viable again due to ever dropping prices on flash memory or maybe some wonders can be done with compression, but it has its limites