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Do HD Graphics Matter To Gamers?Do HD Graphics Matter To Gamers?

January 19, 2009| schommer| 0 Comment| 7:31 pm

hdtv The question of the day, “Do HD graphics matter to gamers?” If you’re currently rolling with a PS3 or Xbox 360 and you’ve got HDMI and or sweet component cables you’re probably saying, “duh, of course they do.” What about everyone else, those Wii consoles for instance, there are so many of those. What about gamers that do not know what HDMI means?

Let’s face it, an estimated 21-million people are still using over the air TV broadcast signal and a large portion of those think that their TV is high definition because it doesn’t have an analog dial anymore. Recent Nielson ratings are showing most gamers are still pushing PS2 hardware, which isn’t high definition.

In the US, HDTV sales only reach 25-30% of the population. Couple this with the fact that one in five HDTV owners can’t tell the difference between standard definition and high definition content and you’ve got roughly 20% of the population utilizing HD. Looking at the number of gaming consoles out there and the rate of uptake, it’s clear that a large majority of gamers are not using HD resolutions for their gaming needs. (loot-ninja)

We’d like to think 1080p looks much different than 480p but some people don’t seem to notice because, honestly, they just don’t care. We’d also like to think a PlayStation 3 buyer would be aware of the HD content and already have equipment at home to take advantage of the system. Although there are no solid facts to state otherwise, there must be a group of individuals that have purchased a PlayStation 3 and are rolling with SDTV (ghetto).

High definition graphics matter to people who want a true HD experience. Wii gamers don’t care about high definition because they’re focused on the game play environment or are just following the wave of hype and desire to own the infamous white box. The Xbox 360 gamers may go either way, a gamer wants to own the system because they can get a lot of cool new games for it secondary to the HD experience. The hot games just don’t get designed on the Xbox classic or PS2 anymore. We’d presume a PS3 gamer really wants to play a high definition game because the cost of the console is more and you’re getting a Blu-ray player all bundled into one.

HD graphics matter to us, we see the difference, respect the detail and use the HD portion of the console as an excuse for paying so much for the technology. The United States, as a whole, isn’t fully ready or equipped (mentally) for a full HD experience. When will they be prepared to experience high definition at its fullest?

My guess, five years after Nintendo makes the transition to 1080p. Nintendo is capitalizing on the “average Joe” and the average consumer is still catching up on the high definition. Hell, many gamers are still playing the dial-up game!

Maybe we need to start a new government funded orgnization: The No HD Left Behind Act. Everyone should be in HD.

TD Gaming Podcast 105: The Sound of MusicTD Gaming Podcast 105: The Sound of Music

January 13, 2009| schommer| 0 Comment| 11:10 pm

This week we had a huge gaming podcast but we managed to get it all down to 60 minutes of content but it wasn’t easy. We’re digging through some old history, Yoshi’s Story is our gaming flashback and we covered gaming history on The Biography of Yoshi. This weeks news includes:

No new Rock Band in 2009
FTC looking for consumer response to DRM
Microsoft says there won’t be an Xbox 360 equipped with a Blue Ray player
Nintendo filing a patent to make game certain games easier

This weeks soap box segment, we’re looking at game audio and which music made the game experience, what game music we best remember. What’s the theme music you remember best?

Also, checkout the TFC information for DRM technologies and comment.

Interview at Casual Gamer Chick with SomaTone.

Here are some reminders!

Microsoft Says Blu-ray Holds No 360 ValueMicrosoft Says Blu-ray Holds No 360 Value

January 12, 2009| schommer| 0 Comment| 4:05 pm

Rumors float around the Internet questioning when Microsoft will ship a Blu-ray enabled Xbox 360 or add-on device like they did with the, now failed, HD-DVD. At CES 09 Robbie Bach, president of Microsoft’s Entertainment & Devices division, says this request is “way down the list.”

Mr. Bach had some great selling points as to why a Blu-ray player has little value in the world of Xbox 360. The primary reason, of course, being the Xbox 360 developers cannot take advantage of Blu-ray as a development platform for games. This was the price Sony, or the consumer, paid to own a PlayStation 3 since all games are printed on the media and are, in effect, Blu-ray “capable.”

We say capable because not all (any?) PlayStation 3 games currently make full use of the Blu-ray media. Many games will reprint the game on the media for optimization purposes, fill the game with international voice overs for all countries or, otherwise, stuff the media with something that will serve a useful purpose. Sony has near-future-proofed their device by giving game developers years of growth in terms of utilizing the Blu-ray capacity.

Microsoft chose to take the smaller old-style DVD format for games and media. Adding the HD-DVD didn’t add a large deal of risk because, as we saw, they can discontinue the model and not change their core gaming demographic. We still laughed a bit at them, but that was where it ended. Bach also said that it’s not really a great economic time to push a new 360 SKU on potential customers with additional cost just for Blu-ray movies playback.

They could add Blu-ray game development support as well but that would just alienate the “28 million Xboxes” they have already shipped.

“OK, let me get this straight: I’m going to add something to the product that’s going to raise the cost, which means the price goes up, consumers aren’t asking for it, and by the way, my game developers can’t use it.” (gamespot)

Of course, the first thing that came to our mind was “well, you did it for HD-DVD, how is Blu-ray different?” The key areas we can think of really come down to Blu-ray is a Sony technology and they are a direct competitor and, to top it off, HD-DVD allowed them to fight against the PS3 at the media level of the industry. They minimized the risk by making the product a secondary add-on device and, if HD-DVD had won, they’d have the winning format already under production (still not for games).

It seems Microsoft has changed their battle plans a little. They started out talking up the media aspects of the 360, using Media Center, renting movies and TV shows and had the HD-DVD as a subproduct. Today, they’re investing in Netflix for media and everything else favors the games.

Which is fine, we like games.

Blu-ray Doesn’t Validate Your Console, SonyBlu-ray Doesn’t Validate Your Console, Sony

November 2, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 10:05 pm

Is Blu-ray dead? Tech Sites around the Net are calling it a “death spiral” and we’re now looking at the downfall of the winning high definition format. Many non-PS3 Blu-ray players are still in the USD $200.00 range, a bit high for mass market adopters, and people aren’t planning to run out and buy a Blu-Ray player in our economic slump.

What’s the market share of the Blu-ray product? Four Percent. Blu-ray and the PlayStation 3 have a lot of battle scares after the fight with HD-DVD to “win” the format war. In the end, Sony won the battle but the war was not with the HD-DVD format, it’s with the average Joe consumer.

Does this effect the PlayStation 3? One of the up sells of the PlayStation 3 was the Blu-ray capabilities, it games and it’s an entertainment device all-in-one. It’s a great deal right?

“The advent of low cost up-sampling DVD players dramatically cut the video quality advantage of Blu-ray DVDs. Suddenly, for $100, your average consumer can put good video on their HDTV using standard DVDs. When Blu-ray got started no one dreamed this would happen.” (zdnet)

The obstacles against the Blu-ray format are huge, especially with NetFlix coming to the Xbox 360, high definition download options and licensing costs on the Blu-ray to movie creators. Blu-ray won’t die in this generation of PlayStation 3 consoles but many folks, including Apple, are pausing to see if it has any chance at all to break into the industry.

Four percent just isn’t enough to inpsire confidence.

Screw Blu-Ray, We’ve Got DigitialScrew Blu-Ray, We’ve Got Digitial

July 19, 2008| schommer| 0 Comment| 8:46 am

Since the last breath of HD-DVD rumors have been flying about Microsoft’s need (desire?) to get into the Blu-Ray hardware for their 360. The rumor was feasible because Microsoft already spent time working the HD-DVD angle for their “home entertainment” Xbox 360 console.

Although Microsoft’s Shane Kim told Forbe’s, “I can categorically say that we’re not working on a Blu-Ray player for Xbox 360,” there is further proof in Microsoft’s direction: Netflix. From a profit standpoint, Microsoft’s got more to work with in a downloadable digital format with Netflix than they do sending another specification off to manufacturing.

The effort that went into the HD-DVD addon was significant but with risk comes reward, but risk also comes with the chance of failure. Microsoft had to write it off as a failure, do they really need to go through it all again when digital downloads are the future of media? Probably not.

The Xbox 360 is going to be three years old this year, positioning another addon hardware storage player seems like the wrong idea for many reasons:

Spend your R&D efforts on the next-generation console, not more fluff addons to compete against Sony.
Blu-Ray for movies is still risky, considering the cost of movies in the market (and their slight increase when HD-DVD died).
Global adoption of Blu-Ray is still years off

Undoubtedly, Blu-Ray would be a great storage medium for their next-generation console because it could be established as the core storage platform for developers. If the intent is just to play Blu-Ray movies, you’re going to work hard, today, when adoption rates are so low.

Until you can use a Blu-Ray player for both games and movies, stick with digital downloads of movies and retail purchases for games. Maybe next-generation.