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Originally posted by Meridialien:
Maybe one day they'll even get 'Batman Begins' working and out
Exclusives or not, I agree the BDA need to sort that Profile 1.1 issue out in order to get certain Warner titles onto Bluray. The mandate to ensure all players ship with that compatibility has slipped from June to October now so the longer a neutral studio like Warner is left to unofficially favour HD DVD by releasing high profile titles like Batman, The Matrix, Harry Potter with their 'in movie experience' picture in picture features, the more chance there is of people dilly dallying between one format and the other, which only contributes to prolonging the life of both formats, which nobody should want.

Since some of Warner's bigger dual format releases are selling more on Bluray I would imagine the pressure is certainly heavy to get this sorted out. I would hope for a strong beta testing period between studios, their content, and manufacturers to ensure what I imagine will end up to be 3rd gen hardware is fully compliant with titles they'd like to get out in November and December.


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Some of the 'exclusive' content will appear elsewhere on Hd-Dvd ( eg. The Prestige and The Island in U.K. )
Absolutely, but that's not as big a thing as the HD DVD camp tries to make out. The majority of huge movies, particularly the big franchises, are still typically bound to the one distributor in all territories. It's not like Pixar films are handled by someone else overseas…etc. You have to also factor in how aware the general public is of the importing scene, and the reality is they're not very aware at all, plus the cost of importing software will likely render them uninterested.

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I think the 'more studios onboard' card would be a bigger ace if people were starting to replace their existing collections but it doesn't seem to be the case.
I think it comes down to favourites really. Who has the movies you want? My personal answer is that they all do which is why the whole dual format mess annoys me so much, and I think "they all do" is probably a common answer for most people which is what will ultimately frustrate and confuse everyone because one format might have The Sting, and the other might have Lawrence of Arabia (or for want of more mainstream comparisons, one might have King Kong, the other Pirates of the Caribbean).


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People are cherrypicking in both formats ; Batman Begins ,The Departed on HD and Casino royale and Xmen on BD.
Sure, though it's worth pointing out Departed sold about 20,000 more copies on Bluray in first week sales to compared to the HD DVD. You've got to admit things like that, plus over 100,000 copies of Casino Royale sold is likely to get the attention of studios on both sides of the fence. Whether Bluray can maintain and exceed numbers like that is the big question though. 22nd of May is a bit of a format franchise face off with The Matrix hitting HD DVD, and Pirates fo the Caribbean 1 & 2 hitting Bluray. I'd be very interested to see the sales figures for those releases.

I've said for a long time though that cheap HD DVD hardware, plus a "large enough" catalogue is still enough to potentially make the format take the long term lead since most people probably aren't even aware of studio allegiances and a lot of people bought into DVD when it only had three studios supporting it. The majority just assume the content they love will arrive eventually, so Bluray's big priority is to create a greater sense of public awareness of they content they offer over its competitor because if the consumer is made aware, I'd think they might contemplate their decision a bit more. Since there's a bias of big summer films this year toward Bluray exclusivity, we might see this come Christmas.

Everything is really bound in "wait and see" really... hence my personal frustration in my decision to keep on waiting. smile Of course, without any of you bold enough to buy into one of these formats, or both, we'd be getting nowhere, so that's a great thing.