As a bit of a Tech geek, I am not only interested in the new evolution of movies but the technologies involved in delivering them to me.
Back in the good old days of the Civil War of NextGen DVD Formats™ we had PS3 touting its new BluRay features, and in the other corner we had Microsoft’s XBox backing the HD-DVD with an addon unit for their console. We all know how that played out.
After HD-DVD addons couldn’t sell in the $20 bin at BestBuy it was only a matter of time. When I heard that XBox was now going to offer a BluRay addon, it just made logical sense. The one competitive feature XBox was now missing was a next gen movie capability. But apparently someone took the old rhyme “Blue and Green should never be seen…” a little too literal and the rumour that BluRay was coming to your XBox360 was shot down.
But Microsoft has again banished that rumour to way outside the Garden of Things I Actually Want, and reminded all of us, the consumers, that you bought your 360 to play GAMES on, not watch movies.
“”As we’ve said before, Microsoft has no plans to introduce an Xbox 360 Blu-ray add-on. Games are what drive consumers to purchase game consoles, and we remain focused on providing the largest library of blockbuster games available. “”
Hurm. A pretty ballzy quote from a company that wants its console to be the centre of my digital entertainment system.
Obviously Microsoft is hedging its bets in hopes that downloadable content will be more predominate than physical movie collections.
I was in the camp of “wait til the dust settles” on the Civil War of NextGen DVD Formats™ and this affected my next generation Console purchase as well (I have a Wii) but now that XBox is not bothering to pursue the Blu, I will be throwing my money at Sony.
If I have to pay $200-300 on a Bluray player AND a console system I might as well get more bang for my buck. Frankly I was rooting for XBox and was waiting for them to go Bluray, but if this isn’t happening they are making my mind up for me.
My gaming is on the PC anyways, so the gaming side of the console is purely for my kids. They can live with the Playstation library.
