Blu-Ray over HD DVD in Aug

Sales of Blu-Ray movies almost completely eclipsed those of HD DVD in August, says a new report from Home Media Research. Of the top 10 HD movies sold as of August 5th, all ten relied on the Blu-Ray format -- including titles that were considered cross-platform launches, such as the chart's first-place movie 300. While the figures counted sales of the multi-format movies towards the overall figure, some titles would have been excluded from the list altogether without their Blu-Ray statistics, such as Babel. Most instances in which viewers had the choice of either format gave Blu-Ray the greater share of sales.

The study was conducted just weeks before Paramount announced a sudden reversal of its policy of supporting multiple formats, declaring that it would support HD DVD alone for future releases. The company's alterior motivations were later exposed as it was discovered that an HD DVD promotional group had paid $150 million to the studio to prevent the majority of its titles from releasing via Blu-Ray.

HD DVD's supporters have tried to counter already disappointing sales through bundling free movies and reducing the costs of playback devices, particularly Toshiba's $300 HD-A3 series of dedicated movie players. [via Blu-Ray]

By Electronista Staff