14 DAY TRIAL // Sony's latest is: "Format war is over" and Sony Pictures Home Entertainment worldwide president David Bishop pounded his fists on his chest to Video Business in reaction to widely reported Neilsen/VideoScan sales figures that show that Blu-ray is outselling HD DVD by 2:1: "The message that we're going to put out to the consumer now is, now it is safe to make a choice," said Bishop. "No more fence-sitting is needed... We have a critical mass of content, we have the biggest mass of consumer electronics companies in the world supporting this format. That has moved Blu-ray into the forefront."
No longer is the main concern who's winning the format war but rather what reason made the Blu-ray industry go through the roof in only a matter of months. There are two possible reasons and those are: massive number of titles launched in the past two months on Blu-ray format, 25 of them to be more specific, in comparison with only 11 launched on HD DVD or, people are starting to achieve Blu-ray reading machines. Nothing about games though.
So, while Sony is still having a pretty rough time with pulling the PS3 out of the dirt, the Blu-ray disc is like a pill for them. It brings a lot of comfort to them that they have a reason to say they have to cover Blu-ray diode manufacturing costs in making consumers reach deeper in their pockets for a PS3 system. But what about the games? Movies are Blu-ray worthy but games aren't, right? Now that Blu-ray is selling so well, should we expect a price drop for the PS3?
Today, Sony can enjoy its victory over the HD DVD but it won't be long until something else takes the Blu-ray's place. It's only a matter of time before discs disappear for good and everyone will use memory sticks/cards. I bet someone's already working on this seriously, I mean, it actually makes sense. They don't brake, scratch or need as much storage space as the plastic discs and besides, less fuss is involved.