I don't know how many of you have taken the plunge in to the High Definition pool of home entertainment but Warner Brothers released yesterday a statement that sent shock waves through the HD community. Warner who have been catering to both sides of the warring formats, HD DVD and Blu Ray, said in a statement that "In response to consumer demand, Warner Bros. Entertainment will release its high-definition DVD titles exclusively in the Blu-ray disc format beginning later this year..." This is heartbreaking news for those who have invested in the HD DVD format since it was thought that Warner would be their last hope in this war since the majority of film studios support either both formats or only Blu Ray. Warner has however released some titles exclusively to HD DVD, namely The Matrix trilogy and Batman Begins, titles sought after by movie fans, mainly because HD DVD's at that time superior software compatibility by offering Picture in Picture options in playback. This is no longer the case since Blu Ray has now the ability to do the same on their discs, but only if you have 1.1 profile player or a PS3 which is upgradeable.
Does this spell the end for HD DVD?
As one forum poster over at Highdefdigest.com so eloquently put it "I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of fanboys suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."
This war bugged the hell out of me but I've been a Blu Ray man since I got a PS3 and I was pretty sure that this format would stand victorious in the end, more family friendly studios (i.e. Disney) supported the format exclusively and the PS3 helped out allot. That and the fact that BD consistently out sold HD HVD in terms of movies, but not in stand alone players, I was pretty confident that this day would come, just not so soon.
The day before yesterday I was in a electronics store and I saw an HD DVD player there and while they had dropped in price since they first came over here just over a year ago, but nowhere near the price they are offered in the US, I was seriously considering getting one but since I had just bought a Hi-Fi set I decided not to. The next day this news hit and I was relieved that passed on the machine.
Have any of you got either format? If so by all means chime in give us your thoughts.
The first time I saw a BluRay and HD-DVD movie playing side by side on comparable screens, I was simultaneously disappointed by the grainy blotchiness of the Blu Ray title (Pirate of the Caribbean) and overwhelmed by the depth and detail of the HD DVD title (swordfish).
Though I initially assumed Blu Ray to be superior due mostly to those who backed it and it's larger capacity, HD-DVD, given its reputation as 'evolutionary not revolutionary' seemed the format that made more progressive steps on the software front than its rival. It used a new compression format (I believe Blu Ray still used MPEG 2) and had better early integration of menus and other digital features.
I always assumed Blu Ray would come out on top, but did it do so, in the end, because it was actually BETTER?... or because everybody else was assuming the same as me?
I've been blu since I picked up a PS3 a year back. I'm glad Warner is helping nudge the market towards a single format. Then maybe we can see a broader spectrum of cinema get released in hidef.
I have both, but was amazed to see it end this quick.
Not sure yet - unless some earlier WB titles are re-released in BR - like Dune, Road Warrior, etc I may still end up buying a HD player when I get back to the US in a few months. If anything the players will only get cheaper from this point on. I've already seen people talking about less than $100 per player including free movies.
Right now, upgrading individual movies has been outside my budget range given the vast amount of SD stuff I'm still trying to pick up that probably won't ever get the HD treatment. That may or may not change in the near future.
Well hopefully this does mean the end of the "war". I couldn't really care less who won just as long as it didn't take forever to happen and it really looked like it would before this deal. I just wish Blu-ray didn't have region encoding. Probably won't matter that much though, I'm sure people will figure out how to break the encoding soon enough.
I don't see any reason to upgrade or buy either format if you only watch and buy, which I do, foreign movie releases. I have yet to see any original Korean or Chinese region 3 releases in either format.. I'll continue to boycott both formats along with hollywood's crap and support the korean film/dvd industry.
There are some HK R0 Blu-Ray releases - INFERNAL AFFAIRS, FLASHPOINT... and a few US releases of HK films - KUNG-FU HUSTLE, CURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER. A few other foreign films are making it to Blu-Ray too, like OLD BOY, THE HOST, and THE LIVES OF OTHERS. Obviously those are higher-profile titles - will be interesting to see if smaller releases start making their way onto either format.
Hopefully this will prompt more foreign countries to start releasing their stuff on the HD format.
I regularly scout the foreign DVD stores to see if they have any of their releases on Blu Ray but so far there have very few, the Japanese have put a bunch of their biggest bands concerts on Blu Ray but very few films and it's also hard to find out if they are region coded, since I only have the R2 PS3 at the moment.
As soon as region free players are available I'm getting one (come on Pioneer, you know you want to)
Nice to see an end in sight to this stupid, counter-produtive format war. Now this means that all I'm waiting for is a cheap, thoroughly hacked player with all the anti-consumer restrictions removed. Then, I'll CONSIDER buying into Blu-Ray.
I tend to avoid being an early adopter of any format specifically due to situations like this. Just a few weeks ago I considered purchasing an HD-DVD player thinking Blu Ray might be the loser due to the recalls of a few high-profile titles. Glad I waited, but for now I'll stick to standard DVD until the "war" is officially over.
I'm with Rhythm-X. I'm not going to upgrade until a PC model comes out sub $100 and possible to strip our region encoding, unnecessary logos/warning/trailers/etc.
I heard people talk about Macs with Blu Ray drives that are going to be released soon. Sony has them in their laptops.
Wow, the HD-DVD folks seem to be in a scramble. They've canceled their keynote at this year's CES, and Microsoft's CES keynote was completely devoid of anything to do with the format.
New Line and HBO have, in line with parent WB, announced Blu-Ray exclusivity beginning in June.