• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

What comes after Blu-Ray?

Happosai

Hold onto your panties
3kDcNIU.jpg


We all know where this is headed
Wish it was. HD-DVD was competition in format wars. There is no physical format war going on now that DVD is pretty much extinct. HD-DVD wasn't a strong contender given that limited data storage capacity. But, it was a risk they took.
 

Dream-Knife

Banned
Physical media is dead really.

If physical does have to exist, anymore you just get a USB drive with whatever on it.

Physical lossless comes like this now. Of course you can also just download it.
 

TGO

Hype Train conductor. Works harder than it steams.
The PS3 got blu ray drive in 2006, which is why it was so expensive at launch
The production cost of the PS3 actually revealed the Blu-ray was included at a lost.
The cost of the components was more then the asking price and that was excluding the BD drive.
Guess they really wanted to push it to extent of giving it away.
 

TGO

Hype Train conductor. Works harder than it steams.
Last edited:

Loxus

Member
I feel like they should drop the disk drive altogether and use maybe USB4 and up.
WEC6T9I.jpg


Unformattable and readable only by the console via special software stack.

Comes in different storage capacity options for big and small games.

USB port means an external disk drive can be used for backwards compatibility.
 
Last edited:

LostDonkey

Member
Super fiber optic from the cabinet to the home all games stored on a server in a box at the end of your street and fired to your device under your garden and into you bloodstream at the speed of 74,000 Richard Bransons Per Second.
 
Last edited:

KellyNole

Member
If you are serious about movies and have a proper home theatre setup, you would know that Blu-Ray media is the only way to get uncompressed lossless Dolby TrueHD and DTS HD Master Audio. It makes a huge difference to the quality and experience in high end systems. I have a mate who invested over $30K into a home theatre setup and it is way better than going to the cinema. He has every movie ever released on physical disc media apart from some obscure foreign films. He has a room that looks like an old DVD store. It's literally his life.

The problem is this is rare. Disc are going to be for the hobbyist. General population does not care about lossless audio. They don't care about compression artifacts that may happen from time to time when streaming. They want convenience to watch on any device easily. After getting an Apple TV I can say that picture quality is getting very close to 4k blu rays. Yes the audio is not as good, but for me these days, I have to watch movies at night when the family is asleep, which means headphones. The best part is, the movies I have bought through Apple have been upgraded from HD to 4K or 4K to 4K HDR when the new versions come out. No more buying Lord of the Rings for the 100th time.

With that said, if you have a great set up, yes discs are the best at the moment.
 

Mr.Phoenix

Member
I feel like they should drop the disk drive altogether and use maybe USB4 and up.
WEC6T9I.jpg


Unformattable and readable only by the console via special software stack.

Comes in different storage capacity options for big and small games.

USB port means an external disk drive can be used for backwards compatibility.
Bingo. I came here to say this.

This is what replaces the disc drive.
716RHDBFzXL._AC_SL1000_.jpg


It's a trend that's already happening in the PC space, and would naturally happen with consoles. And I also believe that next-gen, the only way to get a physical copy of your game, would be in a collectors edition box set.

If Samsung can sell that USB drive for $13, then I am sure Sony can get them in bulk for under $5.

Physical media is not going to ver really go completely, it's just going to change. Next-gen, in your collector's/limited edition you will get a read-only USB drive with your game on it.
 
But the video quality is significantly worse than blu-ray..
I know that, you know that, but Joe Public don't give a toss unfortunately. Same with audio. I'm of the age where I remember in the early 80s my parents having a great audio system with several decks and audio quality far superior to what people settle for now.
 

manzo

Member
Physical discs do not really have a place anymore in the world of fast transfer speeds.

Games used discs as a delivery container. Now you can download your games and back them up to your USB drive of choice.

Movies used discs for superior bitstreams. Not relevant anymore for downloadable movies (not streamable, downloadable). Back them up to any USB drive of choice.

The only thing physical media brought us was nice cover art (mostly Japanese games) and instruction booklets that smelled nice when new (not even these exist anymore).

It’s just clutter. I had a +600 physical game collection for 13 consoles that I have been selling little by little, replacing them with ODE emulators for the consoles with cd drives and flash carts for cartridge consoles. Never been more happy to remove myself from physical media.

“Butbutbut what if presevation”

Games these days are so fucking mass-produced throwaway shit that it’s like keeping your McD BigMac boxes as prizes on your cupboard.
 

Ev1L AuRoN

Member
I think 100Gb will be enough for a while, what they will need to improve is the players to support AV1. They might call it another name, but fundamentally it will still be a Blu-ray.
 
will 8k be a thing for movies ? do anyone really need to watch a 8k movies at home ? i think 4k is enough

8K is pointless in home systems, unless you are rocking a 300" screen then maybe, but for the other 99.999% 4K is more than enough, I wish the whole 8K movement would die off right now
 

TheUsual

Gold Member
will 8k be a thing for movies ? do anyone really need to watch a 8k movies at home ? i think 4k is enough
I wouldn't put it pass the industry to try to push it at some point. We all remember 3D TVs, right?

We could be a point of diminishing returns with 4k as well and if there's an 8k push, it'll probably be a fart in the wind.
 

lh032

I cry about Xbox and hate PlayStation.
hmmm a next gen mini bluray would be cool, especially small enough to fit into a handheld console if you know what i mean
 
Hopefully something that lets me see not only every string and blood hose in Evil Dead but now also every spec of dust, screw in the exterior light mounts and camera cables until every single ounce of mystery is zapped out of every old Horror flick reissue.

I'm still mad that I watched Suspiria in 4K UHD or whatever it was.
 
Last edited:

RoadHazard

Gold Member
hmmm a next gen mini bluray would be cool, especially small enough to fit into a handheld console if you know what i mean

Spinning media and portable devices are not a good combination. Yeah, Sony did it with the UMD (and MD), but nah.
 

Audiophile

Gold Member
Hopefully next gen (on the playstation side at least) retains the add-on disc drive thing we're hearing about. It allows everyone the option of a disc drive both now or in the future, it gives Sony an extra ~15 bucks to sink into the rest of the console's tech and the profit incentive for them is a small mark up on the add-on drive. It's about the best middleground we can hope for going forward in games. It's worth noting Sony has lots of support in areas of the world where internet connections still remain very poor, unreliable and even non-existent; something they've alluded to multiple times.

As for the discs themselves, the BD-XL 128GB standard would probs be the most viable option. Adds a little more space; and seeing as everything is just run off the internal storage anyway, they could do multiple discs if need be and the only inconvenience to the end user is the switching during installation. I wouldn't be surprised if discs eventually end up being a more limited run though.

What would make sense is that once a game goes gold it releases on digital as soon as possible, whereas for the disc based version you'll have to wait for the manufacture/shipping. And digital should be cheaper.

Also, Sony still sell 80% disc-based consoles and 35% disc-based games. I don't see that going away entirely this or next gen.

Nintendo also sell ~50% physical.

Rather than this either/or mindset, physical media should be something that settles into a sustainable slightly-premium niche that remains an option for those who want it and see it's benefits; while digital offers it's own obvious, but every different benefits in the mainstream.
 
Last edited:
I'm kinda curious how big games will be by the end of this generation. Will games jump to 300 gigs for next gen?
Ark Survival Evolved with all expansions and official DLC is over 400 gigs already. Modern Warfare 2 is over 200 gigs.

I wouldn't be surprised if games hit 500 GB or more come next gen unless there is some crazy compression tech.
 

Drew1440

Member
Could cassette tapes make a comeback? like the ones used for server backups. Those come in capacities upto 1.5TB

You'd lose the benefits of optical discs like jumping to chapter but imagine the bitrate with that capacity.
 

rofif

Can’t Git Gud
I hope we still have physical media. Hopefully non mechanical one like usb sticks or something
 
Folio has a disc that can store 1TB of Data and say it can go up to 10TB
Sony did have a disc format that had a read speed higher then SSD back in 2017 but I guess they scrapped it.
The tech is there but no one is investing because everyone is streaming.
You do realize though you need their special OOD drive right to use them? The cost starts at $3,000 to $5,000. You want PS6/Next Xbox to cost in the thousands?

"Folio Photonics optical disc drive (ODD) will unfortunately command a steep premium in the range of $3,000 to $5,000 at least initially. Like CD, then DVD and Blu-ray writers, cost efficiencies through economies of scale - as Folio’s technology gains adoption - and reusing existing supply chains are likely to slash that by at least one order of magnitude if things go to plan."

Source - https://www.techradar.com/news/excl...isc-but-youll-need-a-dollar3000-drive-as-well
 
Last edited:

TGO

Hype Train conductor. Works harder than it steams.
You do realize though you need their special OOD drive right to use them? The cost starts at $3,000 to $5,000. You want PS6/Next Xbox to cost in the thousands?

"Folio Photonics optical disc drive (ODD) will unfortunately command a steep premium in the range of $3,000 to $5,000 at least initially. Like CD, then DVD and Blu-ray writers, cost efficiencies through economies of scale - as Folio’s technology gains adoption - and reusing existing supply chains are likely to slash that by at least one order of magnitude if things go to plan."

Source - https://www.techradar.com/news/excl...isc-but-youll-need-a-dollar3000-drive-as-well
I'm just saying the technology is there and others will be produced as there will always be a need for a hardcopy that stores more data
 

Demigod Mac

Member
One possibility is that 4K UHD Blu-Ray is indeed the "last" physical disc, but that it lasts on for decades for the enthusiast collectors market - for movies at least.
Regular Blu-Ray is probably going to be cannibalized the fastest as casuals continue buying DVDs and film enthusiasts migrate their collections to 4K.
The need for an 8K Blu-Ray isn't there largely due to diminishing returns in image quality - and the vast majority of existing films won't benefit much (if at all) from the resolution bump over 4K.

The use case for video games is different. Once you pop in a movie disc and hit play, there isn't a need to quickly load and access data on-demand since it streams the movie in slow linear fashion from a disc.
Video games, on the other hand, now require the speed of an SSD hard drive for acceptable loading times, so discs are merely used as a data delivery mechanism for installation purposes and as a physical key to verify ownership.
So I would argue that console games are closer to PC games in terms of data transfer and ownership compared to movies, making their transition to digital-only more smooth.

The biggest impact to physical media movies if consoles stop including a disc drive means that a standalone 4K Blu-Ray player (or previous gen console) would be necessary.

Anyway, if you are interested in the topic of collecting movies on physical media, check out Cereal at Midnight's channel.

 

Killer8

Member
Two or more Blu-ray discs for games. Everything is installed anyway and discs are merely used for authentication nowadays. Nothing is actually run off the disc, particularly when the consoles have NVme drives.

In terms of movies, I'd not be surprised if the next format beyond UHD ie. 8K flops. With 4K we've already stretched the limits of people being able to see the difference on home displays. Diminishing returns.
 
Top Bottom