Blu-Ray Should Have Been Optional on PS3?

Ars Technica has a piece looking at reasons why Sony may have wanted to make the Blu-Ray player optional in their next-gen console. From the article: "By tying what is essentially a gaming device to a new optical disc format, Sony is hoping to kill two birds with one stone, but they're expecting consumers to pay for the stone as if it were a diamond. That is, in hoping that consumers will see the Blu-ray player as a good investment in the future, they're risking the fallout that comes when consumers realize that diamonds aren't investments at all. They're for show. And the way the PS3 is priced right now, bling appears to be the operative word. But bling sells, and when manufacturing costs come down, we can all look forward to this edition of Sony Style... at least so long as we're not satiated by a competing product."

1080p Games?

[eldavojohn]

I don't think this article is relevant.

I was under the impression that Sony chose blu-ray because of the amount of data it can pack into a disc. The games are subsequently written and read by blu-ray technology making them capable of storing much more data on a disc. It was my understanding that having games that play in insane resolution (1080p) requires not only high processing but also high storage.

So if they sell "blu-ray disabled" PS3s, how would it play the high quality games? If you have the drive be incapable of playing movie discs, then your cost per console unit production is the same. How on earth would they make blu-ray optional? Just have PS2-technology drives on lower priced ones? You would have to have games for each version ... and possibly compiled differently to take advantage of the quality.

It just doesn't make sense, you would have a great technology on a console yet lack the ability to use it for the device's main purpose--playing fscking video games.

That is what the PS3 is for, right? Playing video games. I don't really care if it can play vinyl records, for Christ's sake, I just want a game console that works and works well. We all remember how well the original PS2s played DVDs, right? Let's hope the blu-ray discs actually work in the first gen PS3 consoles.

Re:What about the PS2 and DVD movies?

[hattig]

Yeah, but DVD was the sole digital video disc platform of the era, and it had been available for 3 years when the PS2 launched as well, so it wasn't extremely expensive first generation stuff, it was merely a nice worthwhile bonus on a console that didn't really add any cost to the console hardware costs.

BluRay is still not available, and Sony are practically launching BluRay with the PS3 given the delays in other players and media. They're hoping a first generation of a technology will not have problems (although I'm sure they've tested it enough) and that vast manufacturing runs will cut costs to far lower than typical first generation prices. Yet the benefit will only come in year 3 or 4 of the PS3's lifespan, when games start requiring the capacity, and BluRay has reached market acceptance, there's 1000s of movies available and people are desiring HD media to go with their new HDTV. It's an upfront risk that significantly reduces the attractiveness of the PS3 to the PS3's core market.

Oh, and Zonk in anti-Sony-PS3 post shocker.

Re:1080p Games?

[Simon Donkers]

Microsoft seems to be able to handle making games with a DVD player. While more space is useful for designers I expect that most big games will come out for both the 360 and the PS3. This means that you have a game which needs to be optimized for DVD format for the 360. So they either remake the game for Blu ray as well essentially redoing all video, gfx, sfx with far higher quality or just leave most of the disk empty.

I very much doubt that most cross console games will fully use all the space. True, Xbox 360 will probably get games which need 2 or even 3 disks but I don't mind switching DVD every once in a while if that means the PS3 goes from $600 to $400.

Re:1080p Games?

[hal2814]

"It was my understanding that having games that play in insane resolution (1080p) requires not only high processing but also high storage."

Insane? I've been playing similar resolution games on my PC for quite some time now and we've managed to get by on DVD-ROM and CD-ROM discs. Only recently am I starting to see titles that span more than one DVD. Sure, having a lot of potential room for the games to grow is a good idea but this resolution argument is hogwash.

Re:1080p Games?

[BenjyD]

I would hope that with the increased power of the PS3, Playstation developers finally stop relying on FMV and start using the in-game engine.

PC Games and disk space

[tjwhaynes]

Yes, but PC games have been able to do these sorts of resolutions for years and they barely fill up a single DVD.

Okay - lets pick a game which did come on DVD - say UT2k4 Special Edition. Right now on my hard disk with a few extra mods, the UT2k4 install is soaking up:

user@machine:/usr/local/games$ du -ks ut2004/
13563444 ut2004/

and then with the user files and extra levels:

user@machine:~$ du -ks .ut2004
9185792 .ut2004

So thats 22Gb of data for an older game, albeit with extra mods and levels.

UT2k4 has some fancy shaders but it does not have bump mapping or gloss maps. The models have lower polygon counts than, say, Quake 4. The next gen engines will all be packing larger textures, more polygons and more shaders. That all requires more data space. In the lifetime of the PS3 (lets say five years) using 25-50Gb of disk space looks like it will be business as usual. Right now it's probably overkill - a 9Gb disk would hold pretty much anything but I suspect that within 18 months of the PS3 launch that there will be games packing 25Gb of data.

Cheers,
Toby Haynes

Your hate for sony overwhelms your common sense

[Anonymous Coward]

People keep yammering about Sony FORCING YOU TO BUY THIS MOVIE PLAYER. Well, no, they're not. They're forcing you to buy a disc drive, because the video game system won't work without it. Video game systems need disc drives. You don't have to use it as a movie player. I'm certainly not going to, even if I get a PS3 someday I still won't have an HDTV.

The thing is, the blu-ray drive is needed for games. Games are outgrowing DVDs already and the HD generation hasn't even started yet. A lot of people on message boards and slashdot are pretending that 640k is all anyone will ever need and DVDs are enough, but they are just sticking their heads in the sand because they hate the idea Sony could be right about anything. If there is one inescapable trend about video game systems, it's that space needs never stop exploding.

And the other thing is, if you make the blu-ray drive optional then you might as well not have it exist in the first place. If you make the blu-ray drive a peripheral, then it becomes nothing but a movie player. Bluray can't be used to hold games if not everyone with a PS3 has a bluray drive; if you get the choice of whether or not to buy the bluray drive, then I lose the ability to use that bluray drive for anything except movies. People say "yeah well at least the XBox 360 gives me the choice of whether to buy an HD disc movie player" but they gloss over the fact that the XBox 360 doesn't give you the option of buying an HD disc game player.

Nintendo of course doesn't need high density disc media, both because of the "less is more" philosophy that permeates the Wii and because Nintendo decided to go without HDTV support. But Microsoft is going to have a really big problem in about two or three years once the games that fill up a whole bluray disc start first appearing.

Meanwhile in the minds of Slashdotters... it's quite funny, really. Everyone "knows" that one of the big the reasons why the N64 failed was because Nintendo stuck with cartridges while everyone else moved on to CDs. And Everyone "knows" that one of the big reasons the PS3 is going to "fail" is because the PS3 moved on to high density dvds while everyone else stuck with DVDs.

Re:Blu-Ray is about Market Control, Not Gaming

[p7]

If there is going to be a need for Blu-Ray, it has to be standard. Addon hardware can't be relied on by game developers so, it is often ignored. I agree that Blu-Ray likely won't be fully utilized at launch, but it won't be long before we see games that won't fit on a DVD. As installed lots of the games I am playing, will not fit on a single layer of a DVD. We may not be filling Blu-Ray discs anytime soon, but the need for higher capacity comes when exceed the capacity of the DVD. An earlier reply to this story, says some Xbox360 titles are already hitting that limit.

I don't like the price of the PS3, but I am wondering if the hardware is the reason for the higher price. With the release of the Xbox360, we saw that the market was willing to pay a large premium for the hardware, due to limited supplies. I actually think the PS3 pricing is to keep demand more in line with supply and reap the extra revenue that MS missed out to the E-Bay sellers.

Re:Why is that?

[p7]

A few ideas... Most install disks ship with assets compressed. Console games likely would more closely reflect the size of an installed game. My WoW install, with the additional patched in content was in the 3-4 GB range. My EQ2 install from awhile back was 4-5 GB. Oblivion I think is around 4 GB. So it isn't a far stretch to see DVDs being filled. Especially since I am sure PC game designers probably are actually trying to keep installed size down. On the Console side of things, you know exactly how much storage capacity you can use.

Come on, reality check please?

[Tranvisor]

If you can't spend 700-800 dollars on electronics then you need to get a better job.

This is a tech site, we all are overpayed pro's. If this was a site for factory workers and cleaners I could understand but not software engineers and other techies. This ain't a place for minimum wage workers.

Are you serious? I won't be getting a PS3 because I can't afford one, I would just have to save up for it. I won't be getting one because the competition is much cheaper and I can get much more bang for my buck.

That isn't even my big problem with your statement. Slashdot isn't all about overpaid engineers, many of us are not at that stage of our careers and/or are in different lines of work. One can be a geek and only make 30-40k a year. To most people 700-800 bucks is alot of money. To most slashdotters 700-800 bucks is alot of money.

Some of us are poor college CS students, some of us are people struggling to find a job out of college, some of us are at help desk jobs looking for better opportunities, and some of us are high school math teachers who enjoy what we do but aren't paid all that well. Not to mention having a good job but saving for college funds every month because you have 2 little rugrats who are going to need an education someday.

In a way I'm kinda glad Sony has gone the way they have. A year ago I thought I might end up buying 2 systems at near the same time. Now I can just be excited about spending $300 at the end of the year for a game system instead of still wondering what I am going to buy and how much it will end up costing.