Blu-Ray Spending up 91% in 2009

In today’s tough economic crisis everything is taking a hit, but Blu-ray is seeing great numbers. In the first half of 2009 Blu-ray spending went up 91% to $407 million according to today’s mid-year report by DEG (Digital Entertainment Group).

Compare this to the overall market for packaged media, which was down 3.9% and an astounding 13.5% drop in the sellout category alone. Those numbers would have been even worse had Blu-ray not seen a 62% increase in rental sales. Also helping out the cause was a 21% increase in digital distribution. What does this all mean though? Where is this taking us and how will it make video games and movies better?

The first Blu-ray disc was released on June 20th, 2006 that day marked the change from DVD to Blu-ray. Was the transition instant? Not at all and still isn’t fully complete yet. I expect soon though that DVD’s will slowly die off. They’ll be around for easily another 10 years, but Blu-ray will do the same thing to DVD’s as DVD’s did to VHS. You can find Blu-ray movies at major retailers now for $10-$15.

That’s cheaper than some DVD’s the price for Blu-ray continues to drop while the demand for DVD also continues to drop. In fact by 2012 I predict that DVD players will almost be non-existent and they will have Blu-ray players instead. Blu-ray is the future of home entertainment, but where does that really take us?

With Blu-ray becoming the new entertainment mainstream things are changing and were going in new directions. First off were going to see much more detailed and developed movies. Couple this with more behind the scenes footage that Blu-ray already supplies and you have much more entertainment for your dollar. Instead of having multiple discs for TV seasons you’ll see 1 or 2 Blu-ray discs.

Remember this too; Blu-ray is going to get cheaper. As more and more people buy Blu-ray the demand becomes greater. Thus more are made and companies are able to sell them cheaper, but at larger volumes. That and with more research being done and it becoming cheaper to create the discs themselves they’ll soon be priced as DVD’s are priced today. The home entertainment industry is going to grow and continue to prosper, because of Blu-ray.

As Blu-ray progresses we’ll most likely see it being used for video games. What does this mean? Simply put video games are going to get bigger, better, and cooler. If you have more space to put the game on to the disc why not use it.

With Blu-ray, video games developers can create more visually intense games with better and more in depth story lines. However if you’re going to have more visually intense games they’ll need more processing power. Which is a good thing, because it will give companies the incentive to create more powerful gaming systems to keep up with the curve. Blu-ray brings a lot to the table for video games and I hope the industry realizes that.

So is Blu-ray going to change the face of the entertainment industry? Over time yes, however the one threat to it is the digital distribution market. This market could definitely compete with Blu-ray, because of their ease of availability right in your home and there’s no physical storage. As for now at least Blu-ray is the future of the entertainment industry.