My only real problem with the format war is the fact that it does indeed seem Blu-ray is gaining ground and that really scares me. Let's look at history of what sony brought to the table:
Beta-max
UMD
Mini-discs
Super Audio Cd
And the list goes on I just can only remember those few. Point being is Sony is notorious for making crappy products. They always have been. People want to point and laugh at the microsoft RROD (Red Ring of Death for you little people) but lets get serious here folks who had a playstation 2 (Gen 1 -3) that for no apparent reason whatsoever just stopped working. MILLIONS upon MILLIONS. Sony admitted to the problem and it was fixed 4 generations later BUT whereas microsoft just increased the warranty Sony basically told you to jog on and deal with it.
I am not saying I am a fanboy for one thing or another but I do tend to know when I see superior products and that's usually ANYTHING that is not sony. And it not just their game systems either but look at their record of other stuff. Sony speakers blow, Sony Tv's are a joke, Sony headphones are awesome for a period of no more than 30 days, (Note personal Experience coming:) Playstation 1 breaks and Sony fails to honor warranty, Sony fails to honor almost all of its warranties unless you pay them. Oh, and lets not forget the travesty that is/was the sony walkmans. Dear god! You remember those things right? You just bought that brand new Metallica Black album and you were so excited, only to have that damned thing eat your tape after only a few plays. The discmans were even worse. Twice as expensive as any other cheap cd player on the market and made with worse parts that would not even play flawless cds sometimes.
Bottom line is in the long run Sony has become synonymous with cheap crappy products that break way faster than they should. They are known to make less than superior toys. Although I must admit that the mini-discs were innovative and a really good idea, just got destroyed due to the ipod/digital music players era. The only thing sony has successfully accomplished was a gaming system. And personally I really think that was a fluke. They happened to be in the right place at the right time. Sony had no competition. When PS1 hit the market they were up against the aged SNES, and the ridiculous hard to program for Saturn by sega and people were losing confidence in sega after the BS that was the 32X / Sega CD addons (Both of which were cool, but not what they promised to be). Sure Nintendo finally release the N64 to our shelves two years after the PS1 already had a foothold in a stagnate market. It simply couldn't complete with the FMV and bigger gaming experience that was the PS1. The PS2 was the same thing really. PS2 was fighting against the aging N64 (Cause let's face it, even though it was a good system most of the games showed their age and were not "Next-Gen" and it was Cartridge based) and the Exalted Dreamcast (The best gaming system in recent memory had it not been for the fact it simply had no third party support, consumer confidence had dropped significantly, and couldn't compete financially with the Juggernaut that is Sony) So since the inception of the Playstation idea sony has always banked on one idea: We have no competition.
The current gaming war is really not even a war. It's a fanboy marathon, and for good reason. This time around Sony really has competition. They have the powerhouse that is Microsoft. With their money and resources they can't be bullied out of the scene like poor Sega, and for the first time since the SNES Nintendo has really done something extraordinary. This time around they really have to show what they are made of, and at this time Sony has nothing going for it except for being the cheapest Blu-ray player on the market. The games at this point are a joke. (Just like almost all 1st gen sony games that have come out over the years.)
With these new companies coming over to Blu-ray no doubt sony is excited, but it just saddens me that companies are choosing a company with a track record of making bad products that just get replaced by better products. Some people might flame me for being a fanboy against sony, but everything I have just told you has come directly from news sources, wikipedia (Not reliable as a source I know but it works), and personal experiences with Sony products. So while I think that this format war is not over just yet, it seems that HD-DVD is indeed losing the battle. Which should bother you, because it could set a trend for further horrible products from Sony.
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Topic: New Line Follows Warner Bros. and Goes Blu (Read 744 times)