Many of the who's who of the video game industry was in attendance at Square-Enix's release event in San Francisco on Monday night. Microsoft was one of the bigger players with a number of Xbox "suits" participating in the festivities. Luckily for The Game Guys, Microsoft's director of global platform marketing for Xbox Albert Penello gave his two-cents on the possibility of blu-ray capabilities on the Xbox 360.
His (and seemingly Microsoft's) view on the subject is simple: "Go spend $150 on one," he told Game Guy Barry White.
It seems that rather than listening to the growing demand of gamers who want to have a blu-ray capable gaming machine that isn't Sony's PlayStation 3, Microsoft would rather not deal with the issue.
Cost, of course, is a factor in this. The ill-fated HD-DVD technology and the special external player that Microsoft sold as a peripheral for the Xbox 360 console definatly left a bad taste in the company's mouths.
Industry forecasting is another factor. There is writing on the wall, as it were, as brick-and-mortar video stores begin to become less and less profitable other video services are picking up steam. Mail-order DVD and blu-ray rental services such as Netflix are very popular but digital distribution is becoming more and more commonplace and it seems that Microsoft is more inclined to embrace such a business model.
Netflix has already started streaming a number of movies and television show episodes on the Xbox 360 (and PS3) and other services are sure to show interest as market demand grows.
But for those dead-set on having an Xbox 360 and blu-ray capabilities, Penello does have a point. The $150 price-point he stated, however, might be a little inflated; Amazon.com lists a stand-alone blu-ray player (http://www.amazon.com/Magnavox-Blu-ray-Disc-Player-NB500MG9/dp/B001DI1LBK/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1268177376&sr=1-10) for $109.95.
Once developers become more familiar with the Blu-ray format, I'll also want my consoles to use it. But until then, I prefer the format that is the most efficient, which is still Dual-Layer DVD.
Adding Blu-ray to the Xbox 360 would be no different than Sega adding SegaCD to the Genesis/Megadrive. And we all know how that turned out.
However, if Microsoft is still using standard Dual-Layer DVDs for their next console, I would be surprised and disappointed.
cheapest ftw thank you