Is A Blu-ray Player Coming To The 360? No.
Here’s something I haven’t heard in a while. Blu-ray is coming to the Xbox 360! It’s not like we’ve been hearing this for years or anything. Apparently age does not stop the rumor mill from churning away. Apparently the Xbox 360 Mag Italy has an inside scoop regarding this possibility in its most recent issue. They briefly state that the 360 will be getting an external Blu-ray player. No other useful information was supplied.
Color me skeptical. Not even for the same reasons I was, say, three years ago. No, now I want to know who in their right mind would release a game-changing peripheral like a Blu-ray player six years into its life? I can’t buy that it’s to provide consumers with a feature like watching movies in HD. Microsoft is pushing streaming content entirely too much for that to be the case.
Now I could see there being an argument for simply having a medium with a higher storage capacity. But again, I’m still not buying it. First, why would they go with a format that is owned by one of their biggest competitors in the console market? Second, if they started releasing games exclusively on a new disc format, they would be forcing 360 owners into purchasing new hardware just to play any new game. Then again, they could keep releasing games on DVD as well, but then what would be the point of offering the Blu-ray player at all, if they still had to manufacture both? No, I still don’t think we will ever see a Blu-ray player for the Xbox 360. A future console? Perhaps. But not this generation.
