Which one, PS3 or XBox 360

Interestingly enough Sony is suffering (comparatively) in console sales.

Overall, PlayStation products finished dead last in their respective categories with the Nintendo DS selling 1.57 million units to the PSPs 421,000 and the Nintendo Wii selling over 2 million units and the Xbox 360 selling over 800,000 units compared to the PS3s 378,000 units.

Now the Wii is a run away but for FPS Sports Driving Games, all your graphics will be on the Xbox and PS3.

I would say aside from the built in blu ray both systems are comparable. Aside from us home theater buffs, blu ray is really not taking off. Don't get me wrong I love it and have two blu ray players in my house but the format is nowhere near taking over from DVD as the large portions of consumer are relatively blah about it.

Why over all sales should concern you as a gamer is pretty simple, less consoles sold means less game buyers and while there are some good titles that are exclusive to PS3 there are also some that are good and exclusive to Xbox so in my opinion that is a wash unless one of those games is a must have for you.

As for online clearly the Xbox 360 has this market dominated (so far anyway things can change) and again I would say that more users means more content etc.

If the gap in console sales continues it will be difficult for Sony to continue to keep its exclusivity on games as developers forego a chunk of the market by going exclusive.

There is also the fact that the Xbox has been out a full year longer than the PS3, this is a lifetime in game development and there significantly more titles available for the Xbox.

From a development perspective while the PS3 may have more technical horsepower on paper taking advantage of that from a game development perspective is more difficult and in testing most of the cross platform games are graphically superior on the Xbox. There are some exclusive titles that take full advantage of the PS3s capabilities but this is not across all games in the platform.

Go with what you want you will here differing opinions from both sides.

On a price basis you the Xbox is almost half the cost, and Sony has come out recently and said it will not be lowering its prices on its consoles. This I think is a mistake as clearly the money to be made from the gaming industry is in the games not the hardware. Microsoft (lovem or hatem) understands this and wants there consoles in your house, Sony seems to forever fall on its we are Sony and that is all we need. Again don't get me wrong I love Sony products in general they make great stuff, but they stumble on there own arrogance from a business perspective.

My choice as should be obvious from the slant above is Xbox 360.

The red ring of death as many like to say is a non issue as far as new consoles so don't let that scare you.

Either way I am sure you will be happy

[JE3146]

Originally Posted by SilverFox

I would say aside from the built in blu ray both systems are comparable. Aside from us home theater buffs, blu ray is really not taking off. Don't get me wrong I love it and have two blu ray players in my house but the format is nowhere near taking over from DVD as the large portions of consumer are relatively blah about it.

I'd just like to add to this that Blu-ray standalone have shipped over 2.2 million units for the year and The Dark Knight sold, not shipped, sold 600k units day 1. 147,000 Standalone units were sold Black Friday alone. I don't have the total statistic for how many have sold for the year, but they wouldn't be shipping them if they weren't selling.

This obviously doesn't include the PS3's statistics, which is the #1 selling player on the market.

Blu-ray is taking off in the US market

When Walmart is showing Blu-ray ads twice an hour. That has to say something.

[VirtualSmitty]

Originally Posted by JE3146

I'd just like to add to this that Blu-ray standalone have shipped over 2.2 million units for the year and The Dark Knight sold, not shipped, sold 600k units day 1. 147,000 Standalone units were sold Black Friday alone. I don't have the total statistic for how many have sold for the year, but they wouldn't be shipping them if they weren't selling.

This obviously doesn't include the PS3's statistics, which is the #1 selling player on the market.

Blu-ray is taking off in the US market

When Walmart is showing Blu-ray ads twice an hour. That has to say something.

Do you have the total DVD/DVD players sales to compare that too? Seems like an awfully small number to me.

[JE3146]

Originally Posted by VirtualSmitty

Do you have the total DVD/DVD players sales to compare that too? Seems like an awfully small number to me.

It is small, but you're comparing apples to oranges.

10+ year penetration vs 2 and a half year penetration(3/4 of a year without competition of HD DVD)

Not to mention that any TV can benefit from DVD, whereas only HDTV's will benefit from Blu-ray.

Given the limited window of 'possible' market penetration, the format war, and the relatively high price in a troubled economy. I'd say Blu-ray is thriving right now.


I don't have any numbers of DVD players sold, but it's a given that it'll be high.

I do know the market penetration of The Dark Knight was 20% for Blu-ray.

20% Blu-rays / 80% DVD's

That number should be taken as slightly inflated due to the gamer market that it appeals to, so those millions of PS3's would definitely have an impact on those numbers.

Hope that helps clarify what I mean.


EDIT:: I lied... I found the statistic

The statistic for market share of optical disc players this season is:

25% Blu-ray players / 75% DVD players

Also noted that Revenue for Blu-ray optical disc players tripled since last year regardless of nearly 1/3rd the cost per player.

[VirtualSmitty]

Originally Posted by JE3146

It is small, but you're comparing apples to oranges.

10+ year penetration vs 2 and a half year penetration(3/4 of a year without competition of HD DVD)

Not to mention that any TV can benefit from DVD, whereas only HDTV's will benefit from Blu-ray.

Given the limited window of 'possible' market penetration, the format war, and the relatively high price in a troubled economy. I'd say Blu-ray is thriving right now.

I wouldn't say thriving. The numbers posted are actually pretty similar to DVD when it first hit. The only difference is that DVD only had one format to compete with, blu ray has several. I honestly don't think blu ray is going anywhere soon, methinks it will go the way of laser disk.

[JE3146]

Originally Posted by VirtualSmitty

I wouldn't say thriving. The numbers posted are actually pretty similar to DVD when it first hit. The only difference is that DVD only had one format to compete with, blu ray has several. I honestly don't think blu ray is going anywhere soon, methinks it will go the way of laser disk.

I'll save this post for next year


And really... even if it did the same as Laser Disc, I'd have no problem with that. Thousands upon thousands of obscure titles reaching the format over a 10+ year lifespan, not to mention a format dedicated to the Home Theater Enthusiast.

I'll take it.

But honestly.. the sheer fact that you can buy Blu-rays in Walmart, Fred Meyer, Costco. The fact it even has on the air advertisement. The fact it will play all your standard DVD's, and in reality, even make them look better. And has sub 200$ players just over 2 years after hitting the shelves.

For those reasons as well as constantly dropping prices, I see Blu-ray players eventually replacing Upconverting players within the next 2 years. When that happens, it'll become the de facto standard simply because of more features for the same price. Whether software penetration follows suit is anyone's guess.

[VirtualSmitty]

Originally Posted by JE3146

I'll save this post for next year

Please do. If i'm wrong i'll send you a fiver

Originally Posted by JE3146

I'd just like to add to this that Blu-ray standalone have shipped over 2.2 million units for the year and The Dark Knight sold, not shipped, sold 600k units day 1. 147,000 Standalone units were sold Black Friday alone. I don't have the total statistic for how many have sold for the year, but they wouldn't be shipping them if they weren't selling.

This obviously doesn't include the PS3's statistics, which is the #1 selling player on the market.

Blu-ray is taking off in the US market

When Walmart is showing Blu-ray ads twice an hour. That has to say something.

THREAD JACK ALERT

Jordan, I am a blu ray fan and love the format but the numbers speak volumes. Taking off isn't exactly what I would call it, the most recent numbers I see are that compared to sales in excess of 3,200,000 units of Dark Knight only 688,000 are blu ray. I wouldn't say that 21.5% represents adoption at a brisk pace. Couple the economy with the increased cost of blu players and discs (compared to DVD) and you will see that the adoption rate is not going to be as fast as VHS to DVD. With still less than 1,000 titles available on blu ray vs 10s of thousands on DVD consumers will still not jump to the new format. Couple that with an average player cost of $300+ and you won't see that huge of a rise.

DVD sales are only down 2% over this time last year, far from a huge impact to the market.

There is an expectation that blu ray will triple the number of players sold in 2009 to approximately 5.8 million units in North America. I think that blu ray will be the new standard only to be potentially made obsolete by downloading (maybe I am old school but I like to own my movies so this one I have a hard time with).

In summary I am not saying blu ray won't be adopted just not as fast as some may have thought after the format war was won.

[JE3146]

Originally Posted by SilverFox

THREAD JACK ALERT

Jordan, I am a blu ray fan and love the format but the numbers speak volumes. Taking off isn't exactly what I would call it, the most recent numbers I see are that compared to sales in excess of 3,200,000 units of Dark Knight only 688,000 are blu ray. I wouldn't say that 21.5% represents adoption at a brisk pace. Couple the economy with the increased cost of blu players and discs (compared to DVD) and you will see that the adoption rate is not going to be as fast as VHS to DVD. With still less than 1,000 titles available on blu ray vs 10s of thousands on DVD consumers will still not jump to the new format. Couple that with an average player cost of $300+ and you won't see that huge of a rise.

DVD sales are only down 2% over this time last year, far from a huge impact to the market.

There is an expectation that blu ray will triple the number of players sold in 2009 to approximately 5.8 million units in North America. I think that blu ray will be the new standard only to be potentially made obsolete by downloading (maybe I am old school but I like to own my movies so this one I have a hard time with).

In summary I am not saying blu ray won't be adopted just not as fast as some may have thought after the format war was won.

I think it boils down to differing opinions of what is successful.

In my eyes, the format doesn't have to beat DVD to be successful. All that means is the studios make more money. For it to be successful in my eyes, just get me the movies I love on the format and let the accountants sort out the rest.


[/THREADJACK]