And in the Blu corner... we have a winner!

The war between next-gen DVD formats Blu-ray and HD has been going on for quite some time now, with the PS3 fully backing the Blu-ray format with a built in Blu-ray player and Microsoft backing the other horse with its own Xbox 360 HD-DVD player add-on.

For months the war was waged with third parties such as Universal Studios, Paramount and Warner Bros taking sides with the HD-DVD format, and Sony Pictures, Disney and Twentieth Century Fox throwing in their lot with Blu-ray. Even retailer giant JB Hi-Fi with chain stores Australia-wide took its chances with Blu-ray by solely stocking Blu-ray DVDs on their shelves and leaving HD-DVD out in the cold.

The final blow however comes as Warner Bros. neglects the HD-DVD format and switches allegiances to support Blu-ray. This latest news essentially seals the fate of HD-DVD leaving billions of dollars worth of now useless hardware and DVDs.

In line with the HD-DVD redundancy, this can only mean bad things for the Xbox 360 HD-DVD add-on. Indeed, Microsoft have announced on a blog that they are discontinuing the add-on following the news of HD-DVD death. Which leaves Sony sitting pretty and primed to reap in the dollars with their next-gen console, the PS3 being the cheapest Blu-ray player currently on the market.