Xbox 360 Blu-Ray: Not Happening, Now Or Ever
I hate this rumor. Really, really hate. It keep popping up like a spring daisy and refuses to go away. The Xbox 360 is not getting a Blu-Ray drive. You know it, I know it and for some reason it keeps rearing it's ugly head. Why you say? Well, it's feisable after the failure of the HD-DVD, and Microsoft having at one point released an external HD-DVD drive for the system, it only makes sense that they would support the "successful" medium. Yes that deserves quote marks.
Now, Robbie Bach has pretty much itemized why it will never happen. From a business standpoint this all makes perfect sense, and frankly I'm not that upset that they went so far out of their way to basically extinguish the rumor.
- It's not a feature we get a ton of requests for. We really don't. When you ask people the list of things they want to see us spending time creating in Xbox, Blu-ray is way, way down on the list.
- The second thing is, from a technical perspective, it doesn't help us in the core of what Xbox does, which is in gaming. We can't have publishers produce games on Blu-ray disc. Because then they won't play on the 28 million Xboxes we've already shipped. So it doesn't help us in the core gaming space.
- The third thing, and this maps to all three of those, is that it costs a lot of money. And so the scenario is, OK, let me get this straight: I'm going to add something to the product that's going to raise the cost, which means the price goes up, consumers aren't asking for it, and by the way, my game developers can't use it.
Maybe the Xbox 720 or whatever it will be called will contain a Blu-Ray drive. Honestly, if I don't get to see games making use of the expanded media, I don't really see the point in paying the extra money.
Q&A: Microsoft's Robbie Bach on economy, Zune glitch and iPhone [Tech Flash]
Asterick
Posted to Video Games on 9 January 2009
· Comments (5)
Other stuff like this: bluray, please let it die, the rumor that won't die, xbox 360
Who said anything about a blu-ray drive being used to play games??? I thought the demand(?) was for a blu-ray player for movies like the HD-Drive was only for HD-DVDs.
But with Blu-ray not doing so good who cares really!?!
You were angry when you wrote this. I see several errors at a glance in proofreading =/
Sorry, it's a compulsion of mine.
This leaves out the fact that Blu-Ray is an enemy to Microsoft. They sell HD video through XBLM, they sell codecs and DRM to Netflix and others. It's obvious where they want the trend to go: online distribution dependent on their licensed technologies.
They took a gamble on HD DVD because they were selling technology both for the most commonly used video codec and for the interactivity features. They don't have their claws anywhere near as deep into Blu-Ray, and they'd rather see the consumers shift to online distribution anyway. Too bad for them that market is actually going to Apple.
I think that most of the people that wanted a Blu-Ray player, either bought a PS3 already, or just grabbed a standalone player.
I've yet to see the PS3 really take advantage of the OMG WE NEEDZ THIS STORAGE SPACE FOR GAMEZ!!! like they claimed that they would.
so really, if we have a floundering new format, when we know that MS wants to make the Apple Music/Video Store +12, who in their right mind thinks that MS is going to opt for Blu-Ray?
I completely agree.
Gaming makes no sense at all. Most developer will create only the DVD version to keep production cost down (why produce games on multiple media for the same console, or limit your audience?). It has slower read speed (although installing it on the HD will help - still something that annoys me btw as I still believe consoles shouldn't do that, plug and play!).
Movies wise, they will inadvertenly fund their opponent which is a very bad idea. Besides, digital distribution is the way to go which I think Microsoft is placing their bets on. A standalone bluray player is very cheap right now.