Format War ’06: Blu-Ray, out of the gate, is ‘inconsistent’

Most people will have to wait until tomorrow, but High-Def DVD Digest has a trio of the first reviews of Blu-Ray movies up now. They take a look at launch titles The Fifth Element , 50 First Dates , and xXx .

The reviews are mainly mixed, with, surprisingly, 50 First Dates taking home the crown for best looking of the three, according to the reviewer. The Fifth Element seemed to be on middle ground, with xXx being somewhat less impressive.

While ‘xXx’ does look pretty good on Blu-ray, it still suffers from some noticeable image quality problems that, quite frankly, I just didn’t expect from a format that has been has highly touted as this one.

Overall, “inconsistent” seems to be the watchword for Blu-Ray titles. The reviewer wonders if this might be a result of Sony’s choice to use MPEG2 (the same compression algorithm in use on DVDs) as opposed to the new VC-1 compression used on HD DVDs.

Stil, the format is brand new, and we’re sure there will be plenty of reviews in the next few days, each no doubt with something different to add. As for me, until this war is over, I’ll be sticking with my traditional DVD player.

[via Slashdot ]