Prediction #1: HDDVD

Hello all,

Its the end of the week... but since I only just started yesterday, I don't exactly have a weekend review. So today I will give you my first prediction. As I mentioned in my first post, I will speak about the return of HDDVD. Before I begin, lets just take a quick look at the old Blu-Ray, HDDVD battle that ensued.

Blu-ray and HDDVD are two different formats in writing HD content. The format with which HDDVD wrote was a much easier format to write and was able to get to market before Blu-ray. HDDVD was supported by companies such as Microsoft, Toshiba, NEC, and Intel, just to name a few. Blu-ray was backed by the likes of LG, Hitachi, Panasonic, Sony, et al. HDDVD's only downside and one of its major contributors to its discontinuation was the lack of support from more influential companies. The big names supporting HDDVD (Microsoft, Intel) could not hold out against the onslaught that was the big names in support of Blu-ray. Also, the introduction of Blu-ray into the PS3 was a major contributing factor. Not only was the PS3 a gaming console, but it was also a blu-ray player, two for the price of one. The Blu-ray supporters were able to sway movie companies and many other smaller companies to there side, leaving HDDVD supporters to fend for themselves. The supporters of HDDVD eventually dwindle and went their own ways. Toshiba went on to make Blu-ray players and Microsoft decided not to make any plans on making an external Blu-ray player for the 360.

Ok, now onto my prediction. Before I continue, if you have any questions concerning the actual formatting of each, leave me a comment and I'll let you know. Ok, here we go. So I have been thinking for a long time now, what is the future of gaming? When looking at what is out now and looking at the past actions of the gaming industry, we would expect to see new releases of next gen consoles every 4-5 years. But on the brink of when the new releases should be arriving we don't here about any new consoles. No Xbox 640, no PS4, no Nintendo X. What seems like that is happening though, is that these companies are planning a re-branding of sorts. Microsoft is coming out with Natal, Sony is coming out with Playstation Move.

What about Nintendo? There were rumors stating that the Wii could potentially be Nintendo's final console. If you look at what the Wii is capable of, it was the leader in motion sensing gaming, able to play all of its former system games on the virtual console, and its affordable, plus the added aspect of there not being any info on any future console also adds to this rumor. But when you look at what is happening to the gaming industry, both Microsoft and Sony are following in the footsteps of Nintendo. Nintendo has paved such a way for motion sensing gaming. But what else could Nintendo do that would help improve the Wii? I know, lets make is HD. The Wii right now is not HD, nor is it a DVD player. But how easy would it be to simply change a few things around and make an HD Wii. Nintendo doesn't even have to focus on the HD aspect of it if they don't want to. If they implant HD formatting, in particular HDDVD formatting, they would be able to expand their gaming experience to a new level. Imagine the amount of content they could implement into their games. Coupled with the Motion Sensor Plus, Wii would have a pretty hard hitting library and could even pull in some new third party support. Also, what better way to say screw you to Sony, their longest rival, than by bringing back what Sony thought they killed. But it doesn't stop there. Hey look, you now have an HDDVD player that is small and doesn't take up much space (for those of you out there worried about conserving space).

But wait there's more!!! (Now I sound like an infomercial) Lets look at the 360 now. With the announcement of the new 360Slim there is some room for them to bring back HDDVD as well. They probably won't be the first one to try and bring it back, but I see potential for them to certainly jump on the bandwagon. There are many things they could fix on the 360 that the Slim could answer. Once again, they could also implement would be to add and HDDVD player to their system. Microsoft did have an HDDVD external player, why don't they just take that and put it into the Slim. Not only would it help with giving the 360 a new and better feature, but it would also help game developers to keep there content to one disc rather than having to write everything to multiple discs like Final Fantasy 13, Mass Effect 2, or Lost Odyssey.

Sony has already been losing plenty of ground with their third party support. Many exclusively Sony titles like Final Fantasy has gone multi-platform. This perhaps was one of the biggest announcements ever. I can only attribute this to 2 things. PS3 had many issues when it first came out. Although it has fixed most of those problems it still looms over them much like the Red Rings of Death and the Blue Screen of Death does for Microsoft. With these growing concerns as to whether there would be enough systems out there for game creators to feel safe with staying strictly to Sony, many just decided to go multi-platform. The other issue I attribute this to is the difficulty of writing a game in Blu-ray format.

The potential number of HDDVD units sold, due to the number of new units sold by both Microsoft and Nintendo, added with the realization of the ease with which writing in HDDVD format provides, the HDDVD format will be reborn and bring to life again the competition needed that is the core of American economics. No longer will there be a monopoly on HD viewing, and thus driving companies, once again, to bring about the next generation of HD.

Hello and Welcome!!!

Hello world,

Welcome to my new blog. I appreciate you taking the time to come and visit my blog. I would like to start with talking a little about myself, my knowledge, and the reason why I am starting this blog. I am currently a Computer Engineering senior at Drexel University. I have had a love of video games and technology for many years. Throughout my life I've had plenty of systems to keep me busy. Just to name a few, I've had the NES, SNES, Gameboy, Playstation, PS2, Xbox, Xbox360, Wii, (ok maybe not just a few) and also a number of PC's. I am pretty knowledgeable on games, PC hardware, and technology in general. I read up on technology, games, and other such things daily and have pretty good input into such topics. If you have any questions with anything along those lines, be sure to leave a comment and I'll try to answer as soon as possible.

Just to give you an idea on what I plan to do. I will come out probably once every 2-4 days with a post on what I've read up on, regarding new information about upcoming technology or games, or just released games, etc, etc. Then, at the end of the week. I'll recap everything that was spoken about in the week and add any updates I've found since that post. If you have anything in particular that you want me to take a look at or talk about, let me know and I'll find out what I can. Every once in a while I might come out with a future prediction as to what I think might happen or be released in the future. Look for my next post where I predict the return of HDDVD.

Thanks again for taking the time to read my first post and I hope I can keep you interested in staying with me into the future. Until next time...