52 replies to this topic

[Mendon]

From an article on Go Nintendo:

"Nintendo of America’s Vice President of Corporate Affairs Cindy Gordon did confirm that the Nintendo Wii U won’t be able to play DVDs or Blurays."

If true, i'm not sure how to feel about this report. On one hand, I can see Nintendo trying to keep down the costs of its building its new console so that the shelf price is acceptable to consumers. On the other hand, with the Wii- U coming into the HD-era of gaming, being able to play a DVD or Blu-ray would seem to be a natural feature. (NOTE: no mention of CD playback in the article)

Is having Blu-ray or DVD playback an important feature of your console experience or is having access to Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, etc enough for you?


Mendon

[Metal Ghost]

If I were to purchase a Wii U, do I need it to play back DVDs? Probably not.....certainly not if it's in our living room. But honestly, is it a feature that I would appreciate, yes, definitely. We have a second 360 in our bedroom, and my wife used it last night to play a workout DVD. In there, it negates having to have a standalone DVD player, so it is most defiitely useful.

I'm not surprised, necessarily, hearing that the Wii U won't have Blu Ray, but I am awfully surprised about no DVD functionality.

[Emehr]

I think I'm in the minority where I don't care that video game consoles don't play movie discs. I'd rather my console's wear and tear be spent on games. Dedicated DVD and BluRay drives are a dime a dozen.

[FujiSkunk]

Odds are the Wii U will offer Hulu and/or Netflix and/or some other network-based video player. As Emehr implied, there are more than enough alternatives for playing movie discs that one console's lack of support is hardly going to matter. The original Wii doesn't play movie discs, and neither does the Game Cube for that matter, and it didn't affect their success any.

Edited by FujiSkunk, Tue Jan 31, 2012 9:51 AM.

[godslabrat]

Disappointing? Yes. I've grown to like the idea of having a console double as a movie player, especially for guest rooms and other secondary setups.

Unexpected? Hardly. Nintendo has shot down movie disc playback since the Gamecube days, it's not reasonable to expect them to be different this time around.

[Austin]

DVD functionality surely can't be that difficult to implement, can it? I guess it's a moot point in this day and age, but still, it's a nice bonus, if only for convenience's sake.

[HammR25]

I don't care since I have other devices that will play them.

[Lord Helmet]

Mendon, on Tue Jan 31, 2012 9:00 AM, said:

Is having Blu-ray or DVD playback an important feature of your console experience or is having access to Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, etc enough for you?

Back in the days of the PS2 I thought it was important for a video game console to play DVD's. Now I could care less. I want it to play games. The online video is nice, but I already have 4 different boxes in the house that do that so I guess I don't care about that either.

[OldSchoolRetroGamer]

Aw geez honestly? I could care less about playing movies on a console, really I applaud Nintendo for concentrating on the GAMING experience! Between digital downloads, DVD, Blu-ray and as bunch of consoles already capable of movie playback that is the last feature I care about in another gaming console. I buy consoles for GAMING not to watch movies streaming or otherwise, enough devices to do that no use wearing out a consoles lifespan playing more media or movies.

[Rex Dart]

I wouldn't mind paying an optional DVD playback license fee to enable it, similar to the original xbox's method.

[onlysublime]

yeah, DVD and BluRay playback are not big deals to me. All my DVD's (that have not been replaced by HD equivalents) have been ripped and encoded to MKV, MP4, or WMV containers with h.264 encoding. I use a dedicated BR player but have basically stopped buying BR movies (weaning off my hoarding tendencies).

[FireStar]

Nintendo consoles have never even played CD's back when every console played CD's, so I'm not surprised about the WiiU not playing movies back either. Nintendo just refuses to put any media that is standard in their consoles. (Not for a bad reason, though, they'd be paying sony to play Blu-rays even)

Edited by FireStar, Tue Jan 31, 2012 5:21 PM.

[Nuclear Pacman]

This seems pretty normal behavior for Nintendo, they've always done their own thing with a pretty big disregard for their competitors. I don't look for DVD/BD/CD playback out of my newer consoles. It was a neat feature before the market was saturated with dedicated players though.

It was more useful when TVs commonly had only a couple of A/V hookups to them, maybe 1 component hookup and 1 HDMI for high end sets. An all-in-one game console like a PS3 could be very efficient for someone with an older setup, but now it seems like most TVs have plenty of A/V setups, so there's less restrictions for people looking to expand their home entertainment.

[madmax2069]

If i am traveling i don't want to have to lug around two units (one to play games, and one to watch movies), i usually take my 360 with me if i plan to be gone for a while and use it for playing games and watching DVD's. and when and if i get a PS3 i will probably take that instead of the 360 seeing that has the ability to play games, DVD and Bluray. yes its a big deal too me for a system to have these features. Sad as i was going to look into buying a Wii U, if it lacks this i will probably pass on it.

[Rex Dart]

madmax2069, on Tue Jan 31, 2012 6:20 PM, said:

If i am traveling i don't want to have to lug around two units (one to play games, and one to watch movies), i usually take my 360 with me if i plan to be gone for a while and use it for playing games and watching DVD's. and when and if i get a PS3 i will probably take that instead of the 360 seeing that has the ability to play games, DVD and Bluray. yes its a big deal too me for a system to have these features. Sad as i was going to look into buying a Wii U, if it lacks this i will probably pass on it.

Rip those movies to files beforehand...

[MagitekAngel]

Nintendo said for years that the Wii could not be software-updated to play DVD's, then people hacked it and voila, the Wii plays DVDs!
I think Nintendo's reason for avoiding media playback in their devices is to thwart piracy. Nintendo knew the Wii could read DVDs and presumably kept the functionality disabled for fear that it would make it easier for people to play burned Wii games.
I use my PS3 for movies because it's the only Blu-Ray player in my home, but I don't think I've ever put a DVD in my Xbox 360 - I just load movies and shows up from a USB drive.

[Gregory DG]

Phbtt... I have a Blu-Ray player and I hardly ever use it. I watch most stuff on my DVR or Netflix or YouTube. So it might not have been a wise decision to eliminate DVD playback on the original Wii, but on the Wii U, it's even less important.

[iswitt]

I use my 360 as a DVD player all the time. In fact, I do not own a DVD player because of this. I like when consoles come with this option. Nintendo probably wasn't getting my money anyway, so I guess for me it doesn't matter. But hypothetically if I were to consider buying a Nintendo console from this or the next generation, it better be able to play my CDs, DVDs and other formats as well. Get with the times!

[Reaperman]

It's gotten so that serious movie collectors are probably the only folks who regularly bother with discs, thanks to the complete abuse of those formats by the movie industry, and the rise of alternatives. I'm willing to bet that people who are these 'serious collectors' generally have a much better deck to play their discs with than a Nintendo anyway.

For me the only time this will be an issue is at gift-giving time, when somebody checks me off their list by selecting one of these little nuisances wonders and expects me to play it on the spot. I won't be able to jam it in the nearest slot and have it work (taking a *great* leap that not only am I a Nintendo customer again, but that their system is my primary gaming device). At that one moment, I would want the experience of watching whatever wretched misery they are subjecting me to to be over as quickly as possible so that I can get on with the business of storing it away forever at my own expense.

I'm much more worried that Nintendo will put out yet another system I have zero respect for, than I am about something as trivial as dvd playback.

Edited by Reaperman, Wed Feb 1, 2012 8:14 AM.

[bomberpunk]

i could care less about movie playback. bring on the new gaming console, big N.

[godslabrat]

Reaperman, on Wed Feb 1, 2012 8:09 AM, said:

It's gotten so that serious movie collectors are probably the only folks who regularly bother with discs, thanks to the complete abuse of those formats by the movie industry, and the rise of alternatives. I'm willing to bet that people who are these 'serious collectors' generally have a much better deck to play their discs with than a Nintendo anyway.

For me the only time this will be an issue is at gift-giving time, when somebody checks me off their list by selecting one of these little nuisances wonders and expects me to play it on the spot. I won't be able to jam it in the nearest slot and have it work (taking a *great* leap that not only am I a Nintendo customer again, but that their system is my primary gaming device). At that one moment, I would want the experience of watching whatever wretched misery they are subjecting me to to be over as quickly as possible so that I can get on with the business of storing it away forever at my own expense.

I'm much more worried that Nintendo will put out yet another system I have zero respect for, than I am about something as trivial as dvd playback.

[Rex Dart]

iswitt, on Tue Jan 31, 2012 9:25 PM, said:

I use my 360 as a DVD player all the time. In fact, I do not own a DVD player because of this. I like when consoles come with this option. Nintendo probably wasn't getting my money anyway, so I guess for me it doesn't matter. But hypothetically if I were to consider buying a Nintendo console from this or the next generation, it better be able to play my CDs, DVDs and other formats as well. Get with the times!

You keep CDs around and you're telling Nintendo to get with the times

[Metal Ghost]

Having video playback functionality isn't going to be the deciding factor on whether or not I purchase a game console, but I appreciate when the option is there. I don't always utilize that option, but I do on occasion and continue to do so. As far as not having that option being proof that Nintentdo is conentrating on gaming, I cannot in my wildest imagination believe that inclusion of DVD playback would require time enough such that said functionality would come at the expense of some game related option. IMO at least.

[iswitt]

Rex Dart, on Wed Feb 1, 2012 11:07 AM, said:

You keep CDs around and you're telling Nintendo to get with the times

Well, CDs still outnumber digital as far as sales go at this point, so I'd say it's wise to have your console play CDs.

[onlysublime]

iswitt, on Wed Feb 1, 2012 1:25 PM, said:

Rex Dart, on Wed Feb 1, 2012 11:07 AM, said:

You keep CDs around and you're telling Nintendo to get with the times

Well, CDs still outnumber digital as far as sales go at this point, so I'd say it's wise to have your console play CDs.

http://www.pastemaga...urpass-cds.html

"...according to Neilsen SoundScan, digital outsold physical music for the first time ever in 2011."

"Combined, these statistics revealed that the digital market surpassed physical media by the narrow margin of 50.3 percent to 49.7 percent."