The dvd playback in the ps2 i\'ll admit was great, but i\'m thinking that the blu-ray playback in the ps3 wasn\'t worth the potential risk it\'s costing the ps3 in sales(after all the reason why the ps3 is so much is because of the blu-ray tech)...and blu-ray isn\'t taking off as some might\'ve thought...dvd\'s are still seeing comfortable sales and the quality difference isn\'t that dramatic as it was from vhs to dvd\'s.
DVD playback on the PS2 sucked ass. There was quite a big number of movies that refused to play on the PS2, plus it was very bare boned.
DVD and BD playback on PS3 is very very impressive. Still one of the better Blu-Ray players out there and a excellent DVD player with great upscaling qualities (in a test it only lost to the most expensive DVD upscaling player).
Having BD playback was certainly worth the risk, Sony won the format war! Having a PS3 without BD would not have guaranteed higher sales, then the risk would have been loosing the HD format war and still placing 3rd with the PS3. You have to take some risks, and for Sony the risk of losing yet another format war would have been devastating, losing R&D money and a huge blow to the Sony brand.
Also, Blu-Ray was expensive at FIRST, when the production of the blue diodes was very limited. But we really dont know how expensive it is today. A Blu-Ray drive for PC really isnt that much more expensive than a DVD drive these days (talking readers). And outside the drive you wont see much other BD specific hardware as PS3 uses its CELL processor for decoding and all that other magic.
And you are wrong when it comes to BD sales. The sales are increasing while DVD sales are going down. Compare the formats at the same points in their lives and BD is kicking DVDs ass, aka. as a 2 year old format its selling better compared to when DVD was 2 years old.
And its not really like we PS3 owners are suffering. We still get all 3rd party multiplayer games, a huge pile of AAA quality 1st and 2nd party games.
Back in the GameCube era it was a different story. The GC lost out on quite a few 3rd party games, people were crying left and right for support and so on.