The Format War: As Epic as it Sounds

By Shaun El-Ters

This just in: the High-Definition format wars are officially over, and HD-DVD is dead. In related news: the world still doesn’t care.

The “Format War” is the name that is being perpetuated by Blu-Ray (Sony) and HD-DVD (Toshiba) to make it seem like their formats are actually battling over something important. This notion is interesting in the fact that people will throw down the word “war” on anything to make it seem more dramatic. Ladies and gentleman, people go to war. Countries go to war. High-definition movie players? Not so much.

If you don’t know the details of Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, the two formats trying to push the limits of high-definition…well, that’s pretty normal, actually. Besides those commercials on TV that advertise these formats by showing “high definition” images that look identical to normal television, there has not been much of an effort to educate people about these new movie players.

Basically, these two formats were competing with each other to establish themselves as the next home movie format. Much like how DVDs replaced video cassettes, these HD formats were trying to become the new standard. However, the reason that DVDs replaced video tapes is because they were technologically superior. The jump from video tapes to DVDs offered a streamlined experience of home movie viewing: enhanced picture, easy scene selection, special features and no more rewinding. The jump from DVD to Blu-Ray and HD-DVD offers marginally better picture quality…and that’s pretty much it. 

It’s not really hard to see why these two platforms have not taken off. However, in this pseudo-epic showdown orchestrated to make consumers spend money on unnecessary film viewing experiences, Blu-Ray has finally emerged victorious.

This victory really does not come as much of a surprise. Blu-Ray basically won the format war once the Playstation 3 was released. This video game system had a Blu-Ray player built into it, and was one of the incentives for purchasing the $600 system in the first place. Because HD-DVD was competing with not just the stand-alone Blu-Ray players, but also the Playstation 3 console’s built in Blu-Ray, HD-DVD’s sales began to decline. Major studios who had previously backed both formats decided to drop their support for HD-DVD.

The final blow came when Warner Bros. pulled out of the HD-DVD camp, and instead decided to support Blu-Ray exclusively. This move caused a chain reaction, with many other studios following suit, and before long HD-DVD found its bandwagon completely empty. Individuals who paid hundreds of dollars for an HD-DVD player suddenly found themselves with an obsolete movie player that was now selling for only $50. Every early adopter of the HD-DVD drive just punched something. Toshiba made an announcement that it would no longer produce HD-DVD players, and thus, the “Format Wars” came to an end.

And not a moment too soon, either. Many people, anticipating a long, drawn out struggle, were figuring that victory would come down to the support by one genre: porn. Many experts believed that whichever medium embraced porn first would be the one to emerge victorious. Personally, I think this is ridiculous; who wants to watch porn in high-definition? Just the thought of crystal clear, zoomed in bodies covered with sweating, magnified pores, legions of pimples, and God knows what kind of afflictions and diseases…it makes my eyes bleed. As vomit-inducing as this may sound, history actually supports the porn theory. Many people don’t realize that when DVDs were first infiltrating the market, they were in competition with Beta-Max. The main reason DVDs sent Beta-Max to the farm so early was because DVDs were backed by major porn studios. Wholesome family movies didn’t stand a chance.

Even though Sony’s medium is currently victorious, the last laugh may be on Blu-Ray. Just because it’s the only HD format does not necessarily mean its going to sell. It’s still up to consumers to upgrade, and early indications show that many consumers are happy with the performance of their DVD players, and do not wish to upgrade their entire library again. Furthermore, in order to actually utilize the Blu-Ray’s HD picture, your TV has to be capable of high-definition. These televisions are hundreds of dollars more expensive than their non-HD counterparts, and between the money for the TV and the actual player (good luck finding a high quality Blu-Ray player under $500), many people are just going to sit tight with their current DVD player and wait out this semi-recession.

Finally, Blu-Ray may become an obsolete film medium before it even gets started. With the ease and accessibility offered by digital distribution (downloading movies online), Blu-Ray still might have a difficult time really catching on. If digital distribution does to movies what the Ipod did to CDs, then Sony might need to dig Blu-Ray an early grave.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go bandage my eyeballs.