I’m all for buying physical media as it’s the last bastion of freedom in terms of media ownership (sometimes at least, I’m pretty sure stuff like ps5 games need to contact sony servers to boot so in a decade or two they might all be worthless). I post a lot about media piracy and I do a lot of it but I buy a lot of physical media too, I have a lot of blu rays, I have like 1200 records, I have a ton of books and manga, I have a lot of games (although the aforementioned point makes this one the least likely nowadays)
But I don’t care for special editions. Frankly I don’t care for most editions. I’ve often found that piracy can get me the superior version of the release. That’s what I will get. If it’s the physical release then I will buy it. But if the bluray is just an upscale and I can get a pirated remux that’s the raw 2k non upscaled I will go with that. If I can get a pirated version that’s the physical release remuxed with the Dolby vision/hdr10+ layer from a web release for much better image quality I will go with that because apparently they can’t be bothered to release that on physical. If I can get an anime that uses superior video from an Italian bluray release, superior audio from the Japanese bluray, and fan subs that have vastly improved sync and translation (and sometimes even animation, background signs, and the songs with karaoke styling) then I will go with that. Groups that release an oop release with better color grading because you decided your movie needed to be regraded in that weird blue and orange tone that all movies are graded in now. Etc
When your product pales in comparison to what piracy groups provide don’t be shocked when I am not swayed by stickers and a goofy box that fucks up the aesthetic of my shelf of discs. Take pride in your work and master your film with the same quality that some group releasing for e-cred does and I’ll give you my money (assuming your movie isn’t shit and is priced reasonably, $30-60+ for a bluray is insane)
Your comment about PS5 games isn’t correct, except for obvious ones like online games. And certain studios (like Ubisoft) are more paranoid than others. Super easy to test yourself: just disconnect your PS5 from WiFi and put in the game in question.
More broadly, PS5 and Xbox Series (not hybrid) games come with the entire game on the disc with a relatively small number of exceptions. Switch is even better about it, and in those unusual cases where it does need to download content, it’s called out on the case. Xbox dual releases (Xbox One and Series) come with the Xbox One release on disc and the other version must be downloaded.
The problem is that nearly all games need huge patches after launch, and so it makes physical collecting a bit pointless these days.
In terms of Switch games, several publishers have deliberately being using smaller carts (to save money) and you have to download the rest of the game when you get home with your purchase. I remember the guys who ported Diablo III were proud of the fact the entire games was on the cartridge upon launch.
Most (not all) console games run fine without downloads or patches. It’s not very common for a game to ship with game breaking bugs to the extent that Cyberpunk 2077 did.
Anyway, it doesn’t really matter, because if the Internet disappears due to some disaster, we’ll all have much bigger problems than playing video games. And if one of these giant MNCs pulls out of gaming or goes out of business, well, I guess we’ll figure it out.
I don’t consider publicity stills printed onto postcards as something worth paying extra money for. “Art cards” indeed!
There seems to be a trend of charging an extra £10 or so because they’ve filled the box with extra items which are just paper related.
Where I just ran into trouble is that I’ve been buying the Arrow Video Shaw Scope collections of Shaw Brothers films, 3 sets so far, 4O films total, which would be a lot if we were talking about ANY OTHER studio.
Today I find out Shout Factory has their own line of sets, the 5th of which is out in January. 57 MORE movies.
So I correlated the two, I didn’t want to re-buy multiple movies…
Nope. Between the 40 Arrow releases and the 57 Shout Factory, there is ZERO overlap. 🤯
The thing that gets me is that for films I’m really invested in, I’m always paranoid that the initial limited release with all the paper filler and the 2x, 3x, sometimes 4x (!) price point will contain a film cut not present in the subsequent releases.
For example, let’s say I prefer the theatrical cut of a film and the extended/director’s/some other cut is the only thing that seems to be able to get a release. The 4K limited edition comes out and it has both cuts on 4K. What are the chances subsequent releases aren’t just the revised cut?
Or take it the other way, preferring an extended cut you saw long ago but you can only get the theatrical now.
There’s only a handful of movies where this makes a difference for me, but I confess that I’ve paid the premium for the peace of mind of not having to wait for a follow-up release that may never come (and sometimes doesn’t).
For me it’s this but with bonus features. That’s one of the real benefits of physical media. But then you get shitty situations like recently with Leon where the regular 4k edition comes with a special anniversary documentary but the ultra steelbook edition doesn’t… It’s just not right. If you plump for the best of the best edition you should absolutely rightly expect it to come with all the content and bells and whistles or at the very least match that of the regular edition.
I think it’s safe to say the majority of the time, it will be the same disc with cheaper packaging. With 4K being niche, I can’t imagine that the studios would want to spend the money pressing a new version of the film.
