Post by Armored Core Raven on Dec 13, 2017 10:03:29 GMT
DVDs certainly has a valid place on the market of today, digital is suprisingly expensive and is far from being a library that offers everything and with as good compatibility and availability as DVDs.
DVD has a huge library of old and new and a lot of which has never gotten out on anything else, it's a cheap and well established format that is available for playback on tons of different devices, including endless types that don't have digital [download] only or internet streaming playback as options.
Prices drop quickly on DVDs too even for really new things, so you can get a physical copy of stuff that came out only a short while ago for really cheap while the digital versions are still far more expensive, and you won't have to sign up to online services and keep track of passwords, account names, digital wallets or currency transfers etc..
If your internet goes down for some reason you can still watch DVDs without any problem and of course owning a physical copy is a nice thing in itself, the added bonus that you can sell it some day and maybe even make a profit in some cases is a nice bonus that digital services, despite being far more expensive in a lot of cases, either don't offer at all in any way, shape or form, or have limited internal service bound rules for at most.
So there are definitely many reasons to still buy DVDs in this day and age.
Bluray on the other hand came out too close to when the digital only alternatives started appearing and because of that it never became established enough for it to go down in production cost like DVDs did back in the day when it replaced VHS.
Bluray just can't compete with DVD to the point where it can replace it, it's too expensive and they'd have to expand the library of content available many times over what is currently available, including all the stuff that isn't available as high definition source material, it'd at best be upscaled and sold at a higher price for the exact same thing without being playable on as many compatible devices, it's an instantly worse alternative for many reasons by default.
It lacks that competitive edge against DVD and with those reasons not having any good solutions it probably always will.
As mentioned, far fewer devices play Bluray and digital/online content than there are things that play DVDs, and you can only truly get the full experience out of a Bluray specifically when you have a proper setup for HD video and surround sound, which is something far from everyone has, again much due to pricing being high and it being a bother depending on how your home is designed, some homes are harder to get a good setup in due to space or layout issues.
Bluray is really only for those who are willing to pay more all across the board, pretty much same thing goes for digital/online, and DVD is for those who don't care that much about the additional stuff and can watch stuff just fine without some of those fancy extras.
Personally I buy DVDs as my first way of getting hold of movies and series etc., Bluray is second, and if available for free I can do digital/online as an alternative, like on Youtube there's all kinds of stuff to watch, but only as long as it's free, I wouldn't spend money on something I didn't own afterwards, they'd have to make it into an experience worth paying for (like going to the cinema) before I'd be willing to do so and digital/online isn't anywhere near that level of value yet, and going by the current state of it all it probably never will be.
I'm not into rental stuff, never was, I tried to rent Alien on VHS as a kid but when I had to return it after just a few days I was not happy, I mean I paid for it, I knew it was a rental but I loved it and wanted to keep it, so returning it was awful, I hated it, and I never rented anything ever again.
After that if I wanted something I'd buy it, and I couldn't afford it at the moment I'd save up and buy it when I could, because then it was mine until I decided otherwise, and that's how I've rolled ever since, and if the state of things on the market for movies and such change to the point where they won't make any more physical copies of anything new ever again, I'll simply never buy anything new ever again, I'll stick to the old physical media just like I do with PC games, there's enough old stuff left to explore that I'll never get through all of that anyway, so new stuff is only something i care about as long as it's easily available in ways that appeal to me, if they chose to limit it to limited ways of distribution that I'm not okay with it's their loss, not mine, I'll still have plenty more good stuff to explore and enjoy, so they can have their digital only releases, I'll never ever need them.
DVD has a huge library of old and new and a lot of which has never gotten out on anything else, it's a cheap and well established format that is available for playback on tons of different devices, including endless types that don't have digital [download] only or internet streaming playback as options.
Prices drop quickly on DVDs too even for really new things, so you can get a physical copy of stuff that came out only a short while ago for really cheap while the digital versions are still far more expensive, and you won't have to sign up to online services and keep track of passwords, account names, digital wallets or currency transfers etc..
If your internet goes down for some reason you can still watch DVDs without any problem and of course owning a physical copy is a nice thing in itself, the added bonus that you can sell it some day and maybe even make a profit in some cases is a nice bonus that digital services, despite being far more expensive in a lot of cases, either don't offer at all in any way, shape or form, or have limited internal service bound rules for at most.
So there are definitely many reasons to still buy DVDs in this day and age.
Bluray on the other hand came out too close to when the digital only alternatives started appearing and because of that it never became established enough for it to go down in production cost like DVDs did back in the day when it replaced VHS.
Bluray just can't compete with DVD to the point where it can replace it, it's too expensive and they'd have to expand the library of content available many times over what is currently available, including all the stuff that isn't available as high definition source material, it'd at best be upscaled and sold at a higher price for the exact same thing without being playable on as many compatible devices, it's an instantly worse alternative for many reasons by default.
It lacks that competitive edge against DVD and with those reasons not having any good solutions it probably always will.
As mentioned, far fewer devices play Bluray and digital/online content than there are things that play DVDs, and you can only truly get the full experience out of a Bluray specifically when you have a proper setup for HD video and surround sound, which is something far from everyone has, again much due to pricing being high and it being a bother depending on how your home is designed, some homes are harder to get a good setup in due to space or layout issues.
Bluray is really only for those who are willing to pay more all across the board, pretty much same thing goes for digital/online, and DVD is for those who don't care that much about the additional stuff and can watch stuff just fine without some of those fancy extras.
Personally I buy DVDs as my first way of getting hold of movies and series etc., Bluray is second, and if available for free I can do digital/online as an alternative, like on Youtube there's all kinds of stuff to watch, but only as long as it's free, I wouldn't spend money on something I didn't own afterwards, they'd have to make it into an experience worth paying for (like going to the cinema) before I'd be willing to do so and digital/online isn't anywhere near that level of value yet, and going by the current state of it all it probably never will be.
I'm not into rental stuff, never was, I tried to rent Alien on VHS as a kid but when I had to return it after just a few days I was not happy, I mean I paid for it, I knew it was a rental but I loved it and wanted to keep it, so returning it was awful, I hated it, and I never rented anything ever again.
After that if I wanted something I'd buy it, and I couldn't afford it at the moment I'd save up and buy it when I could, because then it was mine until I decided otherwise, and that's how I've rolled ever since, and if the state of things on the market for movies and such change to the point where they won't make any more physical copies of anything new ever again, I'll simply never buy anything new ever again, I'll stick to the old physical media just like I do with PC games, there's enough old stuff left to explore that I'll never get through all of that anyway, so new stuff is only something i care about as long as it's easily available in ways that appeal to me, if they chose to limit it to limited ways of distribution that I'm not okay with it's their loss, not mine, I'll still have plenty more good stuff to explore and enjoy, so they can have their digital only releases, I'll never ever need them.
