This story actually made me chuckle. In a recent interview over at Xbox Achievements UK Xbox head Stephen McGill says “Blu-ray is going to be passed by as a format. People have moved through from DVDs to digital downloads and digital streaming, so we offer full HD 1080p Blu-ray quality streaming instantly, no download, no delay. So, who needs Blu-Ray?” Pretty bold statement from someone that failed with their HD-DVD. You wonder if he would be saying something different if the tables were turned and Blu-Ray had failed and HD-DVD took off.
McGill also goes on to state that the decision to exclude a Blu-Ray drive from the 360 was to help keep costs low for the customers, “I think people now recognize what a smart decision it was to keep the pricing low,” which again could be debated as the only console that is cheaper than the PlayStation 3 is the Arcade Xbox 360 which does not come with a significant hard drive(4gig).
I’m not going to completely say that McGill is wrong with his assumptions that digital download is the wave of the future but at the same time nothing beats having that game or movie in hand when/if your system crashes. Xbox 360 is notorious for having the infamous Red Ring of Death (RROD) so I wouldn’t could Blu-Ray out so soon.
