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Yay, maybe there’s a higher chance of seeing Kotomi in HD now.

The entertainment and tech industries and consumers have all been wondering about the Blu-ray/HD DVD war and the winner in the end. The HD DVD camp took major blows with Warner’s announcement of Blu-ray exclusivity, Netflix supporting Blu-ray, Best Buy’s support of Blu-ray, and Wal-Mart’s plans to discontinue HD DVD sales by June. Well now there’s even worse news for HD DVD adopters: your format is officially dead.

Rumors have been rumbling, all of them saying that Toshiba plans to drop the HD DVD format. Indeed, that happened today. Toshiba has ceased the development, manufacturing, and marketing of HD DVD players and recorders. I’m sure the early adopters are angry and the Blu-ray camp and its early adopters are all cheering. Of course, this announcement does not axe HD DVD altogether, but since Toshiba was the main support and the backbone of HD DVD, the press released today was the final nail in the coffin.

This also means the Xbox 360 HD DVD addon is pointless and the PS3 actually did a good job of supporting Blu-ray (which will be a major selling factor if Sony decides to push it).

I won’t go into much detail about this, beyond that the anime industry also has a clear path to take for its HD content: Blu-ray. Although some HD DVD anime discs have been released, they can probably be re-released under the Blu-ray format. I am concerned, however, as great as it would be to see that Kotomi in HD, this might mean even higher prices, maybe possibly reaching $50 for a 1-2 episode disc. If that happens… I hope the anime industry dies.

This post is tagged Anime & Manga, Anime Industry, Blu-ray, CLANNAD, HD, HD DVD, HDTV, High definition, Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 3, Technology, Toshiba

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