Remember when Mr. Phil Harrison said this last year: “The HD era really only starts when we are on the market”? It was a very bold statement, and one that came across to many as a very arrogant statement too. Everyone already knew by that point the 360 was on shelves around the globe pushing both 720p and 1080i hi-definition standards. Sony also knew this as they where obviously referring to their trump card, 1080p, smug in the knowledge that the PS3 will be the only next-gen console to support this standard for either game or movie playback.
But does this standard really define the beginning of the HD era? I’m sure that it will offer the best image quality available of all the HD standards, but I’m beginning to doubt whether many games on the PS3 will actually ever support it? So far, no titles have officially announced support for 1080p. Dark Kingdom was originally thought to do so, but the official website states to the contrary, and thus far only Gran Turismo HD has yet to be shown in 1080p, a PS2 game, hardly something to boast about.
Microsoft was quick to pounce on this with Andre Vrignaud (Director of Technical Strategy for Xbox Live) making numerous comments on his blog about how 1080p will be meaningless for this generation of consoles, and predicting “that you won’t see any 1080′x’ games for the PS3 this year”. Now I’m sure there were will be 1080i games available from day one, but the chances of a 1080p game this year I agree are very slim.
Mr. Harrison, the HD era has already started, and you’re late to the party…
[…] The big question though, is will the PS3 come with any HD capable cable as standard? As sony did promise that “The HD era really only starts when we are on the market” (as discussed in a previous article here at InnerBits) and not delivering this functionality out of the box would be a sin of the largest proportions. Having said that I am extremely confident that Sony will have a component cable packaged in with every console which is more than adequate as an HD cable, but Sony need to get this message across to its potential customers and stop leaving them in the dark. […]
Left by Inner Bits » Blog Archive » Two HDMI, one HDMI, no HDMI? -- Changing the Games Industry, One Bit at a Time. on September 6th, 2006