Yet, people will jump up and down and happily pay $50 for import HD-DVD's of BD titles that have zero or less extras than the BD versions, and have crap transfers to boot? I don't get it.

Who is jumping up and down and happily paying $50 for anything? I will cop to paying $33 for the import of Total Recall on HD DVD, since to me, the A/V of the BD version isn't up to snuff.

I hear ya, but Total Recall is most excellent. That's the only import HD-DVD of a current BD title that I know of to date.

You can find anyone willing to do anything if you look hard enough, but the number of people importing seems to be pretty tiny. I haven't seen any of the discs with my own eyes, but the comments I've read about the '76 version of King Kong and The Elephant Man seem to be positive enough. I've seen negative comments about a couple of the other titles on AVS, but it's kind of hard to gauge quality from those write-ups there since half the people who post there are...y'know, nuts.

Like someone else mentioned, though, other than Total Recall, what overseas HD DVD of a currently available BD-exclusive title has no extras and a lousy transfer?

Well, I'm just mentioning those no extras imports like The Fog, Rambo's etc with crappy reviews (let's see if the BD's will get a fair shake, or if it gets blamed on the format). Since this thread is about extras and all these imports don't have any, I'm just questioning the importance of extras to everyone, as the subject seems to be brought up very often here and there never seems to be a shortage of people willing to buy them. The $50 Reign of Fire is another example, where the HD-DVD import has no extras and the upcoming BD will have all the DVD extras.

I guess I just don't understand the deflection. If someone's asking why certain Blu-ray titles don't have extras, what's prompting the "well, some of these HD DVD imports don't have extras either!"? No one was playing an "HD DVD is better" card.

While I do agree that the $50 (or $44 is what I paid for it) is a little steep, how do you know what is on the HD DVD of Reign of Fire? Is it through reading something in one of the forums or is it first hand knowledge? I own the HD DVD and it does have all 3 of the featurettes that are on the DVD version and will be on the Blu-ray version. As for the Studio Canal releases of movies not having extras I will agree with you that they should have added them all. Please do a little more research if you are going to make statements that are false (Reign of Fire w/no extras comment). Otherwise I agree with you point.

Here is to hoping that Casino Royale gets an amazing BD50 release!

I'll drink to that!

Well, there's someone on the AVS boards pushing the Japanese HD-DVD imports and he was asked and if there were any extras on it and he said only a Japanese trailer, so he must have been lying and I can't read Japanese.

I'm not arguing that extras aren't important to a lot of people, but I wanted to point out that many people buy discs regardless of extras. And it always seems to be mentioned that BD's have NO extras as if it's across the board. I just watched a Lion's Gate release of The Descent and you know what..it was damn loaded.

Thus far, according to reviews I've read here and elsewhere, HD-DVDs have been consistently better than Blu-Ray discs in both picture and sound, and have more often than not included most if not all of the special features from their standard definition counterparts. Why 50G Blu-Ray discs, with their 15 additional gigs of space (to the typical dual-layered HD-DVD), can't do the same is not only mind-boggling but reprehensible. This stinks to high heaven of the inevitable double-dipping! In fact, which studios are more infamous for the old double-dip back-stab-a-rooney than Sony, Fox, Disney, and Lionsgate? From Superbits to double disc, extended, limited, platinum, collector's edition, 5 star director's cuts, the studios backing Blu-Ray want our money, and they're only concern for our happiness with their product is whether or not we're happy enough to keep buying it. And keep buying it . . .

Now, the studios behind HD-DVD -- I'm sure they're all as pure as the driven snow . . .

Well, take the reviews from the last few months of titles from some place like hidefdigest and see which actually has the better reviews in PQ and AQ. Dual layer HD-DVD's are 30gb not 35gb. However, I will agree about the inevitability of double-dipping, certainly nothing noble about that, but that's only for people that want to.

Or he couldn't navigate the disc's Japanese menus.

Oops -- 30G. I knew that. Just imagine all the goodness they'll be able to cram into 45 and 60 gig discs down the road . . .

Thanks for the list and the resource!

Clearly, with DVD becoming "double-dip central," extras are important to a lot of people.

Just because the Descent is loaded doesn't mean it includes ALL extras from the SD DVD release.

And although people buy discs regardless of extras, they're not going to pay the premium that HD DVD and (DEFINITELY) BD are to watch extra-less HD.

You've got to give them what they're used to and MORE.

Personally, I think it's got to be "Look! You get all the movies and all the special features that you love from regular dvd PLUS the movie is in HD with great sound! Plus all these other extras on some titles too!"

Honestly, I don't think the HD upgrade is enough on it's own. Then if you start dropping special features it becomes a "who gives a fuck" situation.