The “HD generation” that Microsoft supposedly ushered in with the launch of the Xbox 360 in 2005 is being met with the reality that their consumer base has not followed in kind. Mark Rein of Epic Games recently told Eurogamer that, “Over half the users who played Gears of War 2 so far do not have HDTVs.” The seemingly low adoption rate may have changed Microsoft’s mind about HD gaming.
Kotaku is reporting that Microsoft has now dropped entirely the HD requirement that they had in place for all Xbox 360 games, similar to their policy which requires all games to support Achievements, etc. The news comes way of Black Rock Studio’s David Jefferies who claimed that Microsoft wanted to allow developers a choice in “trade-off between resolution and image quality as we see fit.”
