Straight from the horse’s mouth:
“As we’ve said before, Microsoft has no plans to introduce an Xbox 360 Blu-ray add-on,” the firm told Edge. “Games are what drive consumers to purchase game consoles, and we remain focused on providing the largest library of blockbuster games available.”
Major Nelson sat down with Aaron Greenberg and the Xbox 360 group product manager had some strong words about this rumor too.
“We have no plans to integrate Blu-ray into the Xbox experience,” Greenberg told Major Nelson, cementing the corporate response given earlier.
“We believe that we shouldn’t force consumers to pay for things they don’t want. We also believe that the future’s digital, and that’s why we’ve invested in a massive library of entertainment content.”
“No one knows,” he said, “no one knows what Blu-ray will be. It’s pretty clear it is not the next DVD, right? The days of one physical format being the standard are gone.”
“Let’s say right now we’re not sure if it’s the next UMD or the next DVD,” added Greenberg, suggesting “it got Blu-rayed” will be the expression for future products in this perceived grey area.
“I went to Sony’s [TGS] booth, and their Blu-ray presence…It used to be like their whole booth was Blu-ray. It just keeps shrinking down. Now it’s just this little corner and there’s no one there,” he said. We can think of a couple of counterpoints, but we’re not touching this one with a bargepole.
They’ve said this enough times. I’m starting to believe them.
I really don’t see much point in them releasing another add on for the 360. They already lost once with HD-DVD. If all the Blue Ray add on would do is play movies, what’s the point?
Heck, I don’t know that Blue Ray is, truly, going to catch on anyway. Personally, I’m pretty happy with DVD, and have a decent sized collection that I’m not interested in replacing. I know I’m not alone in this line of thinking.
I commend Microsoft for staying out of this one.
Being a HD DVD supporter and one that bought the add-on for the 360, I wouldnt mind seeing another cheap (1-150) blu-ray addon being released. Why not? I think they are underestimating the amount of people using the 360 as a media device vs as a pure gaming console. Hell, I haven’t played a xbox 360 game in almost a year probably, and I still use it every day.