N'Gai talks with Midway about Stranglehold and Hard Boiled

As we've mentioned before, the Collector's Edition of Stranglehold on the PS3 will ship with a remastered 1080p version of Hard Boiled on the same disc. While having the first ever HD version of Hard Boiled is a fantastic addition to an already hot looking game, it's easy to overlook the real significance of this addition. No game has ever come packaged with the movie it was based on, let alone putting them both on the same disk. To find out Midway's reasoning behind this precedent setting move - Newsweek's videogame guru N'Gai sat down to chat with Midway's vice-president of marketing, Steve Allison.

During the interview, Steve said that the Weinstein Brothers (one of the few HD-DVD exclusive companies) were willing to agree to let the movie come out for the PS3 because they're not currently releasing an HD version of it and the movie can only be played on the PS3 -- not a standalone Blu-ray player. This helps protect the Weinstein Brothers from cannibalizing their own normal DVD release that just came out last week (which is also why the X360 version will not come with a DVD version of the movie). Midway and the Weinsteins are also doing cross promotions for the DVD on the X360 version, and for Strangehold on the just released DVD of Hard Boiled, creating a business deal that allows them to offer a full HD version of the movie on the PS3 for only 10 dollars more. It's a win-win-win all around.

Also, during the interview he really emphasized the freedom that Blu-ray gives to developers and publishers when it comes to including additional content. He explained that, "It's really the storage capacity of Blu-Ray that makes this pairing possible, and it's still a compelling product." Hopefully more companies will follow Midway's example of really utilizing the storage of Blu-ray discs, since right now it's rare for people to even use 50% of the available capacity. Bring on more HD-movie packins!