You realise Wii u isn't using bluray. It is cheaper for MS to use the HD DVD format for games or another Taylor made format larger in space then DVD using the same laser. Which is possible. It would mean more revenue for MS to. Not going to Sony. The only reason MS would use bluray would be for films. But it just isn't that big. I know only 1 person who owns blurays and only 5 films. 5 Years after its release.

Whilst the next Xbox certainly needs a larger and possibly faster media format I personally have never liked Bluray (was always a fan of HD-DVD... but think it should have been called HDVD instead) so I don't know how I personally feel about Bluray being in the next Xbox as it would definately be an improvement but would leave me feeling a bit 'flat'. To a certain degree I think Microsoft feel the same way and have on numerous occasions shunned any attempt to be associated with the format, so they may well be thinking in different directions.

Personally I would love to see USB 3.0, or similiar, as being their physical format of choice... they would then have scaleable capacity and yes it would be more expensive to make but would likely take up considerably less space to ship (depending on choice of packaging), thus allowing more to ship in the same container meaning cheaper transportation. Either way it wouldn't be so expensive as to kill the profit. Plus USB and the like all have faster transfere speeds than nigh on all disc formats. Another plus is their damn near invincibility I have stepped on a few of mine, washed some and even snapped two in half and they all work just as well as when they were new (atleast as far as USB 2.0 is concerned).

lol and yet if someone owns high definition movies on discs they can't play it on the xbox but can on the ps3... furthermore in terms of streaming not everyone has high speed internet and are in a position to stream high def movies what sbout them?

oops double post

I really don't care either way as long as they have some sort of media that is at least 2-3 times storage space of DVD's

I hear you. But it works both ways. Bluray films are not available in every shop. And in many cases not all blurays are stocked. Add to that bluray films are expensive and some people just can't afford to spend 50 pounds on 3 films.

So bluray isn't exactly that accesible. Especially when you can get in many cases 15 DVD films for the same price. The players have come down in price but the films are rediculous. Some releases are 25 pound in some shops for bluray. Not everyone shops online to get much better prices.

This, the only reason Sony pushes blue-ray is because they have their own agenda. MS does not have a stake in the distribution of physical medium and I see no reason why they need to add costly royalty fee that will inevitably pass down to the consumer. As long as the format they use can support roughly 25 gb of data like the Wii U then everything is fine!

Not having that much time on my hands anymore I personally go for quality over quantity. I rather watch 2 great movies on blu-ray a month then a bunch of lower quality 'hd' movies over Netflix, psn or xbox live.

Maybe if I could get the whole blu-ray through download with extras and commentaries. However that's pretty much out of the question with a 40gb a month download limit. Never mind downloading 2 blu-ray discs worth of content would take forever. And I like the boxes on the shelf, to have something to browse when friends/family come to visit and want to watch a movie.

It is a useful check mark on the box for Microsoft. It will not take away from their download store for the reasons you stated, but it could be a deciding factor for people like me which console to get.

I still think it will be a smart idea for MS to experiment with a download only console. 2 sku's, one with a physical drive, and one with a 1tb hdd. I'll go with the former. The 2nd will be cheaper but will restrict you to download only. It will be interesting to see how many people will go the download only route.

There is a 3rd option, sell a disc or digital download that unlocks blu-ray playback by installing the software. Sell it with a special remote (you don't need if you have Kinect) for an inflated price, perfectly in line with MS's strategy this gen :)

I dont care what microsoft uses as long as it can hold more gigs

Wii U is using a disc format with 25 GB of space, so if Microsoft go with something smaller than blu-ray, the NextBox will be the lowest common denominator in terms of disc space next generation. And using HDDVD would be silly. You would have to build new factory lines for producing them (seeing as no one makes HDDVDs anymore), which would be expensive, and the mass market adaption of blu-ray means it will only continue to get cheaper. Using blu-ray for games would definitely be cheaper than HDDVD, and would give some nice advantages over DVD as well. Not to mention that the NextBox would be able to play blu-ray movies, which is very nice if you want an all in one media machine.

As for the bolded part, I don't see any useful evidence on your part. I can however present evidence that says blu-ray is seeing healthy growth with ever increasing popularity. And not only that, but blu-ray is significantly outgrowing network sales. I don't see why Microsoft wouldn't want to get on that boat...