PS3 - The Trojan Horse For Blu-Ray's Success?

All games are now formatted in Blu-ray technology which was developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association. Blu-ray is a group of 170 entertainment and technology companies that came together to develop Blu-ray technology (some of the big guys include: Disney, Fox, Sony, Samsung, Warner Brothers, HP, Dell & Apple.)

Supposedly, gamers love the PS3's new high-def graphics and capacity, but are annoyed that the console costs over $500, roughly $100 to $200 more than the XBox 360. The perception is that the console is more expensive because Sony included the Blu-ray player.

Was it necessary?

Sony is dangerously trying to give Blu-ray a boost as it battles the Toshiba-supported HD-DVD format in the new high-def disc category.

The biggest complaint among gamers is the price. A lot of people don't have HDTV's yet, and haven't any need for Blu-ray, and wireless internet is only a marginal deal. Until Blu-ray becomes mainstream, Blu-ray technology in gaming is meaningless, in the future they won't be.

When the PlayStation 2 and Xbox launched in the '90s, analysts speculated that the consoles might be in home gaming Trojan horses for DVD players and home computers. While this helped build awareness for the DVD format, the takeover predictions didn't develop. Sales of PCs and standalone DVD players continued to attract consumers.

“PS3 will live and die by the games it plays. The fact it's a DVD player is a bonus, but not why people bought it," says John Davison, editorial director of IUp Network, a gaming network.

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Movie Theater Offer Interactive Video Games To Fight Declining Ticket Sales?

Edited by Danielle Shriver

Let’s face it. Movie theaters aren’t as appealing now that prices are so unreasonably high. Combined with low quality films the reasons to attend a movie theater have hit an all-time low. Movie theaters have made subtle changes to theaters in an effort to entice audiences. Such as larger screens, comfortable chairs, and surround sound. There is also dining available in the lobby of some theaters. But the cons outweigh the pros and patrons walk away feeling like the experience was unsatisfactory. What else could they offer people to increase attendance?

Video games! CineGames in Spain has created a new concept of pre-movie entertainment by bringing gaming into theaters with black lights, flashing green lasers, vibrating seats, and 17- inch screens attached to individual chairs. There is a hybrid theater in Madrid, Spain has all the excitement of an arcade and the classic feel of the true cinema experience. Enrique Martinez of CineGames developed the idea as part of an executive MBA program at the Instituto de Empresa in Madrid. "We see the future with multiplexes with five screens, one for the traditional Hollywood spectaculars and the others for screens for video halls and 3-D. That’s the next step." The Yelmo Cineplex aims to expand the concept throughout Europe and into North America by allowing other theater companies to use the system. CinemaxX, one of the top movie exhibition chains in Germany, carried out a four-month trial with this innovative idea on one of its screens in Essen last year with success.

Time Play Entertainment in Toronto, Canada is also developing theater technology that would allow moviegoers to play up to twenty minutes of interactive, ad-sponsored games before the start of movies. They will offer packages that allow movie theaters to retrofit their screens so patrons can bide their time before a movie starts. With the new video game system, moviegoers can play on small individual touch-screen devices that will allow audience members to interact with one another, or individually. Ultimately, Time Play Entertainment wants to develop a system that opens up screens for a wide variety of uses, from popular games as basic as bingo to online computer role-playing games in a virtual world. We can only wait in anticipation for the day when it is available at our local Cineplex’s in the States.

Yelmo Cineplex is now trying to develop an educational arm that would rent out the hall to schools that could use the system for learning and testing. In addition to pre movie entertainment the theater is busily organizing game tournaments for Manga video games and Pro Evolution Soccer, a popular soccer game produced by Electronic Arts. This should not only help boost ticket sales, but also make us, the moviegoers, and a happy bunch.

If movie executives and shareholders want to return customers they need to pick up a similar technique, and fast. Especially since ticket prices have continued rising while movie quality has been going down. Remember Snakes On a Plane? Video games could be incorporated into the movie experience to entice audiences to come back for the whopping fourteen-dollar entrance price. American movie theaters should upgrade the movie experience with more than leather seats and cup holders. It’s only a matter of time until we see theaters remodeling their spots with snazzy pre-movie entertainment like Spain and Canada.

Be proactive - take responsibility for your own success

Three Best Video Games In A Movie Plotlines

Long before it became standard practice to turn every video game into a movie, the video game’s place in a film was more of an object of curiosity then a mere marketing tie-in. In film, the ability to control the GUI (Graphical User Interface) tapped into fears of a machine-dominated world or fantasies of being whisked away to a far off future to save the universe.

I’ve come up with a list of what I considered the best in-movie video games plotlines. If you can add to it, please do.

Wargames (1983)

A high school student whose gaming addiction caused his grades to suffer and like any good gamer, he hacks into his school system to change his marks. Somehow, changing his grades leads him to a super-secret government program that oversees nuke launches. Thinking it’s just RISK Online, he nearly starts World War III due to a poorly-guarded Firewall / gate keeping program.

The Last Starfighter

One of my all time movie favorites

Alex lives in the boonies with nothing to do but get drunk, have sex and play video games. What else does a good game geek do? The trailer-park teen spends his days battling Space Invaders by means of an arcade game. My kind of guy! Little does our hero know, the game is actually an intergalactic recruiting device used to find the best and brightest starfighters for nothing less than saving the universe.

When Alex hits the intergalactic Top Score, there’s no one around to congratulates him. Soon after, an independent contactor for the intergalactic recruiting video machine arrives to enlist him for the purposes of battling the evil Kur and the Ko-Dan armada.

Tron

Definitely one of my top twenty all time favorite movies

Time hasn’t changed too much. The kids of the parents who were scared of their kids getting too sucked up into games are now the parents of the kids who are sucked into today’s games. Tron took the 80’s fear to the literal extreme. The death of in-game characters brings back memories of frustrations and dry tears over the death of characters developed over weeks of game play and the unnatural bonds we formed with them.

Jeff Bridges, gets sucked into his character’s neon-colored game world where he and a security program (the aptly-named Tron) must race bikes, navigate through mazes, and throw discs at square beasts just so that he can escape but to his own world.

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