Schultz Wrote:And this is actually what has pissed some people off in the Blu-ray side of the house. Is because Sony will be undercutting them with the PS3 that will play blu-ray discs and Sony will also recoop the costs because they will be getting money from game sales with the console.

elcoholic Wrote:I'll repeat, bluray movies will not be region free, not on the ps3 and not anywhere. Maybe in a few years we'll see region free players but not in the first batch.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PS3#Region_coding

elcoholic Wrote:Well, you're correct that bluray players will have a red laser for dvd's (atleast the ps3 will). But that's a different kind of laser than the hddvd one. It would be a bit expensive to put both new formats in 1 machine and I doubt they would want to pay royalties to the competitor.

They'll probably be made but they'll be even more expensive. And its almost guaranteed that in 2/3 years there'll be only 1 format left. I put my bets on bluray for the supperior storage, its inclussion in the ps3 (instant user base of tens of millions of users) and its supperior studio support. Bluray has WAY more (exclusive) support. Plus hddvd will never have a full catalogue of movies due to sony having quite a few studio's that they own.

desfunk Wrote:But if the PS3 console ITSELF is Region Free like they've stated. Then it doesn't matter if the blu-ray discs are region locked. Since the PS3 will still be able to play everything.

elcoholic Wrote:Well, I'll believe it when I see it on the shelf. That thing will be very expensive and it remains to be seen if the two camps will allow it. At any rate in a few years half of that machine will be useless.

1. MS is backing it on paper. If they'd really backed it they would have put it in the 360 and then things would turn arround 180 degree's. You'd have a few million users right now. Also i'm not sure if ms is backing HDDVD or just want bluray to fail. Also MS is powerfull but sony is not the only company making bluray.

2. I never heard about manufacturing errors but I'll take your word for it. I do know that they're very scratchproof.

3. Then i wonder why most studio's still back bluray. Btw, there's not 1 studio in that link of yours,just sony ceo. And it doesn't say anything about the cost of HDDVD. DVD's were expensive in the begining and that came down nicely. No sorry, this point is not valid.

4. Yes, more restrictions and movie companies love that. Its actually one of the reasons they're backing bluray. But how about HDDVD? You only list negative things about bluray but nothing positive about hddvd.

Why do you think they'll win? Now come my points.

1. More storage. 30 gig v 50 gig. 50 gig wins.

2. Its in the ps3 for less money than a standalone hddvd. Instant user base of ten million+ in a few months and might attract people to buy a ps3.

3. Supperior studio support. They might switch but then again, they might stay exclusive. Right now all we know is bluray has more backing.

It'll be interesting but I'd be truely amazed if HDDVD wins. Most analists are predicting victory for the bluray camp aswell.

elcoholic Wrote:I think the player will be region locked for movies but the games will have no region coding (or coding for all regions).

Just like the psp. It can play games from all over the world but the umd movies are region coded Like I said, i don't think movie companies will appreciate a region free machine so early in the lifespan, certainly not the ps3. But if they would do it it would be awesome.

Quote:March 22, 2006 - In a QA session following the platform keynote address at GDC 2006 this morning, Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios President Phil Harrison confirmed what was heavily demanded for import gamers all over the world and yet previously thought unthinkable for a major corporation: the PS3 will be region-free for gaming.


The move was not unexpected, as SCE had previously mentioned considering the possibility of opening up the region structure for PS3 games recently (the newly-released PSP system has but does not use a region code system for games, but that's more a standard for portable games than a new development for region-free gaming.) The system is, amongst other things, hoped to help combat piracy - many import fans "chip" their consoles with region-free mod chips to play import games, and while that desire has some legitimacy, it also opens the doors for pirates to release illegal copies of games. (Funnily enough, it's most often easier to run illegal games on a console than it is to run legit games from other countries due to the way most mod chips work, leading to a slippery slope for importers hoping to stay legit but finding the road difficult to maneuver.) Region-free gaming also allows game publishers to release games across the globe simultaneously, either through e-distribution or on disc. The capacity of Blu-Ray had previously been mentioned to allow for multiple languages of a game to be encoded onto the same massive-capacity disc.

The one caveat of this new region-free structure is that games made for specific regions' electrical and TV standards may have problems on your TV set. A PAL PS3 game, for instance, will have difficulty running on an NTSC TV, unless the developers have thought ahead and planned for that issue. It is currently unknown how the PS3 will cope with this problem (whether there will be a warning when you run an import about possible TV incompatibility, or if possibly there might be a no-play screen for incompatible games depending on your PS3's TV settings.) Luckily, modern HDTV standards go a long way towards making that problem moot. Also, games made in other countries will naturally only have the text and dialog it is programmed with, so don't put your pre-orders down so fast on all of those Japanese RPGs and Dragon Ball if you don't know a lick of kanji, because English will only be in if the developers have planned for it. (It's unknown if there will be any type of "patching" system for multi-language releases, although that might be possible on supported games post-release now that the PS3 is carrying its massive HDD and flash memory support.)

We'll have more details on how this impacts publishers and importers as soon as we know more about SCE's plans for region-free PS3 gaming.

wrxh8r Wrote:Digital downloads arnt going to happen for a long long time.For it to take off(with major support) it needs to be world wide.Or at least everyone beleives that the case with next gen dvd formats.So why would movie companies flag that idea and go internet when so many people dont even have it and the majority of the rest havnt got fast enough connections.Then theres the paying a monthly fee to an isp on top of the movie costs.Restrictions on data caps.
People like to see a product in their hands.And a monthly fee would buy you both a hddvd and bluray player in no time at all on hire purchase.Not to mention piracy and storage options.
No one has mentioned that hddvd apparently uses a better video codec that may actually produce better resilts.

In nz the cost of 25 gigs of download through a cheap nasty isp is about $60US (our internet sucks here,Telecom hold nz monopoly and everyones waiting for government intervention)Australia just had a similar problem and the govenment have started phasing out analog tv and set minimum requirements for that and internet providers.Still both countries are only now making the move to 25 mbit at huge expense and about 2 minutes of downloads before data cap is reached.