Paramount Announces Second Wave of Blu-ray Titles

 

Continuing their earlier mea culpa, Paramount has announced the second wave of new Blu-ray titles since they returned to the format, following the death of the HD DVD format.

The new titles announced today are:

• Beowulf - July 29
• Patriot Games - July 29
• Sum of All Fears - July 29
• Top Gun - July 29
• Transformers (2007) - September 2
• Madagascar - September 16
• Shrek the Third - September 16

But, really, you'd think if they were really sorry they could at least bring out an action title or two instead of all this arthouse stuff.

Seriously, though, good job Paramount... now I only have to listen to 3 more months of "Wens teh Transformers comin!!!!!" questions.  Now, if you really want to make it up to me, bring out the restored Godfather Trilogy and Indiana Jones (the first three, not the latest train wreck) later this year... and I'll consider forgiving you.

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New Blu-ray Players on the Horizon

 

Many current Blu-ray owners consider the PS3 the ultimate Blu-ray playback device, with full BonusView and BD-Live capabilities, and decoding of Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD MA audio formats. 

While the PS3 certainly does make an excellent Blu-ray player (it reportedly plays games, too), there are many people who, for a variety of reasons, would prefer to have a more traditional standalone Blu-ray disc player.  Up until recently, those consumers have had to settle for slower players that lacked the latest features available on the Blu-ray format.

Well, all that has finally changed. Standalone players that are capable of Picture-in-picture capability (BonusView) and even internet connectivity (BD-Live) are starting to hit stores now.  For those looking for Blu-ray standalone players with all the latest bells and whistles take a look below at the recently released, and soon to be released, players that can serve all your playback needs.  For more detailed information on existing and upcoming players check out the player database accessible from the top of this page.

 

Released Players

Panasonic BD30: BonusView (Profile 1.1) capable.  MSRP: $499.  A great all-around player with the ability to bitstream all audio codecs to the latest receivers.

Samsung BD-P1500: BonusView capable, with firmware update for BD-Live (Profile 2.0).  MSRP: $399.  Bitstream audio output and the promise of a future BD-Live update make this a potentially excellent player.

Philips BDP-7200: BonusView (Profile 1.1) capable.  MSRP: $399.  Bitstream audio output and fast load times are impressing users of this just-released model.

Also, available now are excellent higher-end BonusView models from Denon and low-cost "house brand" models manufactured by Funai.

 

Upcoming Players

Panasonic BD50: BD-Live (Profile 2.0) capable.  MSRP: $699.  Due in May.  The higher-end sibling to the existing BD30, the BD50 adds BD-Live capability and internal decoding of all audio formats.

Sharp Aquos BD-HP50U: BonusView (Profile 1.1) capable.  MSRP: Expected at $699.  Due in May.  Not much is yet known about Sharp's second Blu-ray player model, although it is confirmed to bitsream all audio codecs and have BonusView compatibility.

Pioneer BDP-51FD and Pioneer Elite BDP-05FD: BonusView (Profile 1.1) capable.  MSRP: $599 and $799.  Due in June/July.  Pioneer's latest generation players are set to add BonusView capability and internal audio decoding of all the advanced codecs, paired with the outstanding build quality Pioneer's Blu-ray players are known for.

Sony BDP-S350 and BDP-S550: BD-Live (Profile 2.0) capable.  MSRP: Expected at $349 and $449.  Due in July and August.  Sony is surprising late to the game with their latest BD-Live capable players, but they look to be making it up with some great prices.  The S350 model can bitstream all the advanced audio codecs, while the S550 can also decode them internally.

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NPD Group Releases April, 2008 U.S. Console Sales Numbers

 

NPD has released their console sales numbers for the U.S., for April, 2008.  The next-gen console sales for the month were:

XBox 360: 188,000 

PS3: 187,100

Wii: 714,200

The Wii continues to sell at an astounding rate, clobbering both Sony and Microsoft's offerings in system sales.  Nintendo has definitely proven themselves the comeback kid of this generation.

Though Microsoft is "officially" excited as they have now passed the 10 million system sold mark in the U.S., both Sony and Microsoft have to be concerned that they didn't get more system sales out of the release of Grand Theft Auto IV.  Of course, this data only includes the first five days of that games' release, so its very possible that a system sales bump will occur next month, but its still rather disconcerting.

The above graph shows how well each of the three next-gen systems sold by month following release.  We're now at the one and a half year mark for both the PS3 and the Wii and we can definitely see some trends emerging.

First of all, all those who predicted that the novelty of the Wii would quickly fade, were shown to be very, very wrong.  The system has sold at an insane rate, trampling the trend lines for both other systems.  The PS3 continues to trail the XBox 360's U.S. trendline slightly, though it has been making a slight comeback lately.

Obviously, the XBox 360 has been out a year longer than the other consoles, so in the interests of fairness, here is a chart that shows the total sales of the consoles over their lifetimes.

As I mentioned before, the Xbox 360 has now passed 10 million units sold in the U.S., but with the Wii literally right behind it, that bulletpoint won't mean much by next month.  The PS3, meanwhile, has passed the 4 million system mark in the U.S., but has a long way to go to catch up with the other two.

While having 4 million PS3s in the U.S. is GREAT for the Blu-ray format, as a gaming machine Sony still has some work to do convincing U.S. gamers that the PS3 is as great a gaming machine as it is a media player.  With the first AAA title of the year for the PS3 just released (GTA IV), sales should be picking up in upcoming months, with the release of platform-exclusive titles such as Haze, Metal Gear Solid 4, and Final Fantasy XII.

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Criterion and Other Small Distributors Embrace Blu-ray

 

While all six major Hollywood studios have officially thrown their weight behind the Blu-ray format, the situation with smaller studios has been a bit more troubling. It's no secret that the entry price to put a title on Blu is higher than for DVD, while the potential revenue is currently lower.  However, as many consumers, especially home theatre afficionados, have started buying their titles on Blu-ray disc exclusively, there is still a good amount of additional revenue to be earned from a Blu-ray transfer.

This, of course, leaves smaller distributors in a fairly awkward position.  They want to make the move into Blu-ray, in order to start building a customer base among those who have already made the transition, but they don't want to pay the mastering costs for a title that will not sell.

With the format war over, though, many of the smaller distributors are starting to make the plunge. Over the last week, both Kino International (an independent and foreign film distributor) and Genius Products (distributor of Weinstien Co films on video) have announced their intentions to support the Blu-ray format.  Kino intends to bring "Fallen Angels" out as their inaugural title, while Genius has oddly decided to launch into the Blu-ray format with "Lonesome Dove."  Some may remember that initially Genius/Weinstien Co. were HD DVD backers though they haven't released any titles on that format in close to a year.

Perhaps even more exciting, at least for those who enjoy classic and avant garde films, The Criterion Collection has also announced their plans for the Blu-ray format.  Criterion first made a name for themselves by essentially creating the "special edition" laserdisc... and is often credited with the "invention" of director's commentaries, director/D.P.-approved transfers, and many other features that became commonplace on DVD years later.

While Criterion was able to release a number of high profile titles as Special Edition laserdiscs, their access to major films has deteriorated somewhat over the years as studios saw more revenue potential in releasing special edition DVDs themselves.  While Criterion does still have agreements to release selected major studio fare, the majority of their releases now are special editions of mainly smaller films that they deem important.  While Criterion's DVD releases almost always have an MSRP of at least $39.99 due to the extreme amount of bonus materials and costs involved in the remastering process, Criterion has surprised everyone by stating that their upcoming Blu-ray releases will be released at identical prices to their DVD counterparts!

The initial slate of Criterion Blu-ray discs is due to hit stores in October.  The scheduled titles are:

• The Third Man
• Bottle Rocket
• Chungking Express
• The Man Who Fell to Earth
• The Last Emperor
• El Norte
• The 400 Blows
• Gimme Shelter
• The Complete Monterey Pop
• Contempt
• Walkabout
• For All Mankind
• The Wages of Fear

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Site News: I'm Back

 

Just a head's up to those who've noticed and sent messages about the fact that I've been gone for awhile.  With the format war coming to an end, the Blu-ray news has been considerably slower than it was before, and with my school schedule being more hectic I definitely let the site slide a bit.

Although the title, player, and drive lists (accessed from the top menu) have all been kept up to date), I really haven't been posting news.  I just finished finals, and am looking at updating the design of the site.  If you have any ideas for new types of content, etc, to report on, please send me an email or add a comment to this post. 

As for now, I'm back and will be trying to get a lot of news up in the next few days.  Stay tuned!

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