Josh Z

It's no coincidence that the rumors of Warner going exclusive to one format started circulating just before the holiday shopping season. It seems to me to be a pretty blatant attempt to affect their sales and push them towards making such a decision that they otherwise would have no interest in doing.

wewantflair

All of this started with that buffoon from Lionsgate. Various Blu insiders have been floating this rumor since as far back as September. Some HD DVD fanboy goons have been spreading similar junk, but the "professionals" in the Blu Ray camp have been really instigating this lately.

Deftones

I hope they get out of HD completely. That will really get people talking.

Adam Tyner

Ha. That'd push me towards getting out of HD completely. Whenever I'm making my "to buy" lists, there are about as many Warner titles as there are from every other studio on both formats combined.

Jericho

Warner Brothers has already abandoned combos. Your wish is granted.

souvenir

Actually, The Assassination of Jesse James will be a combo disc, in February.

Cosmic Bus

Yup, it's disappointing to see that Warner's gone back on their original statement of discontinuing combo discs post-Harry Potter 5. Looking at their release listings, there are a number of combos upcoming; at least the prices have been brought in line with their single-sided Blu counterparts.

Jericho

You're right. I thought I had read that combos were being dumped, but apparently that's not entirely true.

Granted I'll never understand why people hate combos so much. The two general myths about them are that they cost more (completely untrue) and that they don't work (which is at least somewhat true, but greatly exaggerated. And it's not like other discs haven't had problems in certain players as well. There's problems all around, and they're not specific to combos)

shanester

I think they will remain neutral.

What they should be be doing and hopefully are is release more classic titles in 2008. They have a shitload of great films in their vaults. Bonnie & Clyde is a nice start

wewantflair

There was no original statement.

Maxflier

Where do you shop that combos don't cost more? They cost more everywhere I look.

As for what Warner is going to do, I don't see them changing their stance at all. If anything, I would see them siding with HD DVD.

darkside

Actually, now that combos are the same price as the Blu-ray counterpart on new releases I have no issues with them. My recent combos have all played fine. The fact HP5 was a combo for the same price as the BD disc was a factor in going with HD DVD though the in movie stuff also helped.

I'm tempted by The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward John Ford, but the title of the movie just always seemed rather pretentious. Is the movie really good enough to pull off a title that long?

ScottsDvds

HD DVD exclusive, but I could care less.

BJacks

Yes, it is. My second favorite film of the year after "Old Men."

rdclark

The more players there are in the field, the bigger the market gets. The bigger the market gets, the harder it will be for one side or the other to continue to buy off the studios to remain exclusive.

Is there enough money in the BD camp's coffers to offset the sales that would be lost by discontinuing HD-DVD.

Is there enough money to offset the sales lost by the other studios after their exclusivity agreements expire?

As long as the players are selling in significant, ever-increasing numbers, the likelihood of a format winner, or of continued exclusivity, dwindles.

If the market can sustain dual formats -- and the indications are increasing that it can -- neither side will quit. Universal players will be the future. Competition will be based on price, features, and content.

bunkaroo

Well my friend, it's not greatly exaggerated for me when I have had in my time at least 5 faulty combos, all pristine, all on up-to-date players.

I've used the recent Amazon Blu-Ray BOGO's to replace every WB HD DVD combo I've had with the exception of Superman Returns, which I'm waiting on the TrueHD version in Blu.

I will never understand why people don't want to believe combos are as bad as they are. Sure there are going to be knuckleheads out there that want to blow problems out of proportion due to format loyalties, but that ain't me.

I own over 100 HD DVD's and two players. I am very vocal about my hate for combos precisely because I support the format, and I want my movies to work when I get them.

It's funny how quickly one's perspective will change once a combo fails for them. Hell, until my first combo faulted on me, I didn't think it was a problem.

There have been no other HDM problems that come close to the scale of combo issues. The closest you might come is the BD+ and BD-Java issues with Samsung and LG players, but those were not manufacturing issues.

And please don't mention Th Prestige like it's even on the same level of an issue as combos. The Prestige had a contamination problem with a small percentage of its run. It was fixed long ago. People are still having problems with combos to this day.

It also sucks that I feel like I have to watch every combo I buy right away, lest I find out 3 months down the road, outside of a return window, that my disc is crap. Then I have to deal with replacing it through the studio, and we all know how much fun that can be.

There have even been reports from users who thought a combo was fine after playing it once only to find out later on it's problematic after all. It's DVD-18 all over again. Dual-sided dual layer discs = shit.

As far as price, yes, they are the same price as Paramount/DW day and date titles and Fox titles. But I'll tell you this, I will take a bare bones Fox catalog disc for $40 list over a potentially faulty combo any day.

PopcornTreeCt

And that's why I have it pre-ordered on blu-ray.

Mr. Cinema

I think they will pick a side in '08. It may not be in January, but I think it will happen sometime. If they truly believed in both formats succeeding, wouldn't they have released TotalHD? I know the excuses they gave for not releasing those, but I think that's a hint that they don't want both formats long term. Do studios really want double costs on everything long term?

tonymontana313

You bring up a great point. I think Warner was waiting for other studios to jump on with them on TotalHD but since no one else stepped up to the plate, they just discarded that idea.

Truly there are some dealings going on that we have no idea about but to expect something right now or at CES is quite jumping the gun.

mzupeman2

I'm with HD but would love to get into Blu-Ray eventually but can't really afford a player at their prices right now. Also considering since most of them get a bad rep for having issues, and then the issues with what's going to be profile compliant in the future, yadda yadda yadda. I do think if HD lost a studio like Warner, then Blu-Ray is going to be on top. Even as an HD fanboy, I can't help but resist the many titles Blu-Ray has that I'd love to see in high definition. So whatever, I doubt anything will change in the near future. But if it does, it'll definitely sway people to one side or the other.

Robert George

It's easy to understand. I have over 30 combo discs in my collection and every one of them plays normally.

That is not to say I don't believe there have been some problems. I know there have been some sporadic production issues that have shown up to a greater degree on certain players. This problem is known. It has been an issue of the bonding process resulting in some discs being out of spec for thickness. This causes some players to have errors due to not being able to apply enough error correction in the drive focus mechanism. Firmware updates have solved the majority of the problems, but there are still a few discs that are simply too far out of spec to be played. These are defective and a simple exchange would take care of the problem. I feel the problem has become overblown due to some people either not being able to return a defective disc or are unwilling to go through the hassle that returning to an online vendor entails. It is easier to just bitch about it on Internet forums.

While I acknowledge that there are some small issues, I am absolutely certain that if the problem was anywhere near as bad as some would have us believe that Warner and Universal would have dumped combos by now. The fact that neither studio shows any sign of dissatisfaction with combo discs tells me it isn't a problem.

bunkaroo

How do we know the studios haven't showed any signs of dissatisfaction?

In fact, doesn't the release of multiple catalog titles that were previously combos as non-combos show the studios are reacting to something regarding combos? Why go through that trouble? To lower the list price? Spend less on manufacturing? If so, why not do that to begin with?

Again, you've had no problems so far. I wish I was in your shoes on that. I didn't want defective combos. They found their way to me. I sincerely hope you don't go back to play one of those discs in the future, especially on a different player, and find you have problems after all. Especially since it seems like many 3rd-gen owners are reporting more combo issues these days than 1st- and 2nd-gen owners.

Mercifully I have not had a problem *knock on wood* with Universal combos since the firmware update in May for the 2nd-gen machines. Since then I am able to play my Children Of Men disc that previously would not load. Any other problems discs I had I just returned for credit. I'm not going to play the "keep buying until I get a good one" game. Thankfully I had the option of getting a non-combo Matrix boxset.

After hearing how often people report problems with WB combos, 300 being the biggest example due to volume sold, I have been happily avoiding WB day-and-date combos by buying the Blu-Ray version instead. I've avoided over a dozen day-and-date WB combos by going Blu. I know I am not alone in doing that. Apparently WB is OK with that loss of sales on the HD DVD side, or they don't realize it. Either way I don't really care as long as I get a disc that will work. There is nothing I hate more than loading up a combo and spending the whole movie wondering when it's going to fail.

And keep in mind even if the defect rate on combos was say 5%, 5% of 200K discs sold is manageable. 5% of 2 million discs sold would be a colossal failure. If WB continues with HD DVD day-and-date combos, and HD DVD gets wildly successful, we'll be looking at WB trying to make more combos in the same amount of time. Faster production equals more defective discs unless they greatly expand their capacity to make them. IMO it would be a hell of lot easier to just shitcan them and go with HD-30 on everything, which are made far more easily (and are far more reliable).

dsa_shea

Combos suck and are a step backwards when we are talking about HD media.

pricdews

Combos were great in theory. And that theory is tough to let go (HDM still has a huge struggle against DVD pending). The idea that people were going to pick up new releases for $30 to future proof their collection didn't work out IMO. I'd guess most buying combos have a HD DVD player. While those who like portability might enjoy combos, studios might should have considered packing in 2 separate discs as a way of selling combos (though I'll admit I have no idea how much that really would hurt DVD sales through HD owners Ebaying the extra disc).

Mr. Cinema

Paramount has released 0 combo discs. So not every HD DVD studio believes in them. And no, the Season 1 Star Trek set doesn't count. That was handled by CBS Home Entertainment.