lotsofdvds

Studio hopes Children, Smokin' will promote format
By Susanne Ault 3/16/2007

MARCH 16 | Universal Studios Home Entertainment is making advances in HD DVD extras with new features on Children of Men and Smokin’ Aces, out March 27 and April 17, respectively.

These HD DVD/standard-definition DVD combos are more advanced than the studio’s September 2006 release Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift, said Kevin Collins, Microsoft director of HD DVD evangelism.

Smokin’ Aces integrates Google Earth to identify specific locations of assassins during the film.

On Children of Men, viewers get a chance to see the film’s featured video billboard advertisements in their entirety. Viewers only see clips during the film, but on the HD DVD, they can click on each of the approximately 10 billboards and watch the complete ads. Although neither title uses Web connectivity, Collins said three HD DVD titles with such connectivity will street this year.

Nevertheless, Collins said he hopes that the Children of Men and Smokin’ Aces HD DVDs will help promote the format, which has been selling fewer units than rival Blu-ray Disc over the last couple of months. To date, Blu-ray titles have featured relatively little interactivity, as its BD-Java technology is still being fine-tuned.

“We are still scratching the surface of what we are capable of doing, but Universal is leading the format in terms of exploring all the different aspects that are out there now,” said Collins. “By the holidays, there will be a lot more features.”

Earlier in the week, 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment executive VP Danny Kaye said that a Web-enabled X-Men trivia game would soon be available.

The Bus

The answer is not more extras. It's more extras and more titles. There should be 1 or 2 HD DVD exclusives coming out every week. But that's not happening.

slop101

I loved Children of Men, and will be buying the HD version just because it's 1080, but am I supposed to care about bilboard ads? CoM needs one of those features where they have a picture-in-picture behind-the-scenes making-of for the intricate tracking-shot scenes it has - this movie was made for a feature like that.

bunkaroo

I couldn't care less about this online crap. I don't even maintain a permanent connection to my HD-A1. I just hook it up when the firmware update are ready.

Just give us some damn movies already.

Mr. Cinema

I'm sure some of these interactive features will be cool, but winning the war will come from cheap players and a boatload of content. BD is making sure they flood the market with software. HD DVD is going at a much slower pace, although they should be offering up the cheaper hardware this Fall.

Josh Z

The billboard ads in the movie were pretty cool, and as I was watching it in the theater I kept wishing I could pause and view them in more detail. So yeah, I think this is a neat feature.

Jolard

This is cool, but doesn't replace more content. More releases are needed, March was a disgrace.

FantasticVSDoom

This is a small step in the right direction... Although I agree that cheaper players/titles is what will ulitmately sway this war, this is the type of stuff that answers the question why should I change for SDVD to HD-DVD for a lot of people. Sure this stuff is cool and is little more than filler, but with more and more of this type of interactivity available, it will become a major selling point and a lot more people will begin to take note of it and say, "hey, this is better than my regular old dvd player."

bunkaroo

Personally I think it's folly to assume most people have their player within range of a home network connection.

For those of us with houses or multi-level dwellings, odds are pretty good that the cable or DSL modem and/or hub are nowhere near the entertainment center.

My HT is in my basement, and my computer room is on my second floor.

Now if Toshiba wants to market a relatively inexpensive wireless adapter a la the Xbox360, maybe more people would care about online content. I'm guessing that it will be a technical headache for most users who are not tech-savvy.

tonyc3742

I'd have to agree, I have never really been interested in online content for DVD or HDDVD. Depending on the billboards, this could be an interesting feature (futuristic, funny, interesting billboard ads that help flesh out the movie world. If it's just another two-minute Coke commercial, no thanks).
I'll admit I haven't been following theatrical releases much in the past year or so, but I haven't bought an HDDVD title since Christmas. Part of that is due to a general slowdown of purchasing, but another part is due to the fact that I don't see any 'must have' titles, especially given the price increase for some titles over the SDVD. Features/extras, esp. exclusive like this one, or extras in HD, will help that price become less unsurmountable, but they have to be on a title I'm interested in.
More releases, better releases, with more; not just releases with more.