Ready... Set.... Go!
Queue the "My PS3 is better than your XBox", "My dad is bigger than your dad" comments. *sigh*
Blu-ray Discs holding both games and movies will be launched for the PlayStation 3 this year, a Sony executive has said. John Koller, Director of Hardware Marketing for the PS3, said that Sony envisages a future when a movie and a game are placed on the same disc, according to a report by website Video Business. “There are a …
"PS3 sales have taken a bashing in of late, with figures revealing that Microsoft’s Xbox 360 is now the sales leader. According to the latest manufacturer-supplied - but not independently verified - figures, some 28m Xbox 360s have been sold globally, compared to around 16.8m PS3s. Koller added that movies can help to sell hardware."
No the 360 is now AHEAD of the ps3, it is not the sales leader by a long shot, the wii is the sales leader.
Some of the worse games are those with movie tie-ins, but the real stinkers are the ones that are developed by 4th grade developers using a game engine they developed 5 years ago and rushed out to cash in on a movie release. And how much will we be charged for these abominations I wonder?
This is not the way to sell blu-ray movies. Once again Sony is playing to marketing guys and not consumers. Will they ever learn? Methinks not.
Clearly there is one. You have massively underquoted the Official PS3 sales numbers. From Sony's official numbers. It's actually 21.3m PS3's sold (and unlike Microsofts numbers, these don't include instore demo units and RROD replacements).
http://www.scei.co.jp/corporate/data/bizdataps3_sale_e.html
Why the constant FUD? What's the agenda?
With rare exception, computer games based on movies are all absolutely bland mediocre affairs cobbled together to mop up any revenue which may still be there on account of a small number of fanboys with residual enthusiasm for the movie.
Such games usually have no value stand-alone and I doubt that the majority of BD buyers will be willing to pay anything extra for the pleasure of a worthless game being bundled with the movie. That's just MHO and I may be wrong and perhaps there are millions of potential BD customers who are only stopped from buying into that format by the current lack of budled gaming experience on offer...
Also, to release a BD should not be a time consuming process (for a movie studio) as it is just a matter of rendering audio/video in BD-compliant formats, commissioning some artwork for menues and packaging, authoring, mastering and off it goes to the replicators. On the opposite, it takes years to make a good game, so, automatically, any game completely produced within the period between the release of the movie and the disc master cannot be good.
"According to the latest manufacturer-supplied - but not independently verified - figures, some 28m Xbox 360s have been sold globally, compared to around 16.8m PS3s."
That doesn't take into account the amount of time the products have been on the market.
How many XBOX360s were sold in November/December 2008 compared to PS3s and Wii. That'll show the current market trend.
Movies and games - it assumes total dominance of the PS3. I can see Quantum of Solace etc. and other similar movies taking advantage of this... I can't see much of an advantage over a sales bundle (the media doesn't cost that much).
No doubt this idea will be as successful as the dual CD/DVDs, 17gb DVDs, dual HD-DVD/Bluray discs, dual DVD/HD-DVD Bluray discs and other such genius optical ideas that never actually succeded in reality.
RE: "Whats the hidden agenda?"
I laugh at you. The Reg was since the PS3's release so horribly biased towards the PS3. Now that even The Register has realised the PS3 has lost the fight there are still people like you hanging on? Sucks for you. The PS3 is dead, live with it.
Regarding those mentioning the Wii, yes it's way ahead, but I think the Reg was just comparing the two comparable consoles. Most people I know with either a 360 or a PS3 have a Wii as well so I think it's just taken for granted nowadays that yes, the Wii is hands down the winner this round and the only real battle that remains is between the 360 and the PS3 but even that's clear cut in favour of the 360 now that it's 8million units ahead and still increasing it's lead further whilst simultaneously selling more games and profiting off XBox live subscriptions too!!
Really, really awful idea.
As others have mentioned most movie franchise games are awful anyway.
Quite apart from that, the target market would be pretty small. It relies on people wanting both the movie and the game at the same time and even then the only real way to get this to fly would be to make it a lot cheaper than buying them seperately.
When I buy a film I generally only get one that I want to keep and watch over and over, whereas when I buy a game I play it through and then either lend it to my mates or trade it in. So if it was a film I wanted to keep I would be stuck with a game I had completed and didnt want any more and if it wasnt why would I pay extra for my game to get it?
The costs of producing these special versions for the incredibly small number they would sell would simply not be worth the effort.
Someone at Sony needs their head examined.
In theory this is a pretty good idea, BUT how much is it going to cost?
If the movie is on the same disc as the game and only costs a few quid more then fair enough (maybe they could sell them as special editions) but if it's going to be the same as buying the game and movie separately then I'd give it a miss myself.
I presume that they wouldn't be generous and give the game away free with the film (but I guess they could put exclusive PS3 specific game demos and content on the disc anyway).
Rob
'The PS3 is dead, live with it'
I think you may be jumping the gun a little there mate. However when I see Sony come out with rubbish like this I do wonder how much time it has left.
It is a real shame as it is the technically superior console by far. They just didn't count on MS and their botomless pockets. They pushed the X Box out before it was properly tested (same old microsoft) and just bit the bullet when half of the first generation died on it's arse and replaced them. By doing so they reached the market well ahead of Sony and got the foothold.
They outright bribed developers where possible to develop exclusively for their machine and the limitations of the X-Box actually worked in their favour too- As they had the bigger market share from the start not many developers would want to develop exclusively for the PS3 (even if MS werent offerring them truckloads of cash), which means that very few of them have been pushing the envelope on what it can do. This means that the code library available to make future developments better doesnt grow much either. It is more profitable to develop a game on the X-Box and port it to the PS3, selling to both platforms, then develop a game that pushes the PS3 and not be able to port that to the X-Box.
Add to that Sony's total loss of the plot when it comes to marketing and it does start to look like it's days are numbered.
Is the PS3 the 21st century Betamax? By far the superior standard but out-marketed and destined for oblivion...
£40 to £50 RRP for most games, £20 to £30 RRP for a Blu-Ray movie
Looking at £60 to £80 for a combi!!!
And remember, games don't come anywhere near as cheap as movies when they hit the sales (unless they're crap).
Oh, and the bonus is the game will only work on a PS3. That's the hidden agenda. A disc where half the content is purely locked to Sony ;) (remembering they take a nice healthy cut from everything Blu-Ray also).
Why not chuck in DRM'd portable copy-once only to a PSP. Add another £10 to £20 on the price for that ;)
£100 a movie? Yeah.
another great idea from the sort of retards who brought us dvd special features.
step 1. develop disc capable of storing enough data to present the film in pristine quality.
step 2, fill all this space with shit,
step 3, compress the film's quality right down so it will fit in any left over space.
are usually crap. Goldeneye for the N64 was an exception. It was better than the film. It was even better than PC first-person shooting games at the time as well, when previous console FPS were rubbish.
It also allowed four people to play on one machine... I like the PS3, but a few too many of its games are only multiplayer over a network.
is like ford comparing its ford Ka sales with bmw and merc arguing over who sold the most high powered roadsters
360 and ps3 are heavy competitors
wii does not compare and is in a league of its own, has no direct competitors and is cheap.
I think this movie/game thing might yield a few good'uns, wait and see
What a bunch of naysayers! Even if one in one hundred games is any good or a keeper, so what? That still means you get ahead, a great game with a great movie. That's still better than if no game was ever offered. Then the developers will be encouraged to make an even better game with the next movie, so it will sell better and make him even more money next time. Can't you people accept that? Why so negative?
Or would you actually like me, as someone who doesn't own a PS3, to buy your Blu-ray film releases? Because I'm not paying a fortune for content I can't use. I'm not even paying the same I previously did if the quality of the film transfer has to go down to make room for that unusable content.