Coming Soon: TV and Movies on your 360
by Dustin Burg 
{ Nov 6th 2006 at 11:20PM }
You've been dreaming about it, you've pondered the idea, and come November 22, 2006 it'll be here. Soon you'll have the ability to download HD/SD movies and television shows from the Xbox marketplace for a small fee. Microsoft has partnered with CBS, MTV, TBS, UFC, NASCAR and Warner Bros. to make content available via download off of the XBLM, over 1000 hours of content by the end of the year! Just check out the list below of some of the content you'll have access to this year ... start drooling fellow fanboys!- "Robot Chicken" and "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" from Adult Swim
- "CSI," "Survivor" and "Star Trek" from CBS
- Emmy and Peabody award-winning "South Park" and "Chappelle's Show" from COMEDY CENTRAL
- "The Real World" and "Pimp My Ride" from MTV
- "Avatar: The Last Airbender" and "SpongeBob SquarePants" from Nickelodeon
- "Skyland" and "The Nicktoons Network Animation Festival" from Nicktoons Network
- "M:i:III," Nacho Libre" and "Jackass: The Movie" from Paramount Pictures
- "Carpocalypse" and "Raising the Roofs" from Spike TV
- "Race Rewind" provided by NASCAR.COM
-Select episodes of the original season of "The Ultimate Fighter" reality series and the "UFC: All Access" shows from the UFC
- "Breaking Bonaduce" and "Hogan Knows Best" from VH1
- "The Matrix," "Superman Returns" and "Batman Forever" from Warner Bros. Home Entertainment
[Thanks, everyone who sent this in.]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
syn_gates @ Nov 6th 2006 11:27PM
this would be awesome if fox hopped on board with house and nbc with the office and conan
BigD @ Nov 6th 2006 11:37PM
Can someone please confirm this availability in Canada?
It's safe to say it will be delayed. But is there a plan?
JimJimBinks @ Nov 6th 2006 11:44PM
BATMAN FOREVER?! it would be like trying to shove feces through the network connection on my XBOX 360. I really hope they meant Batman Begins.
Seriously though, Superman Returns was one of the main reasons I was buying the HD-DVD addon. If they were gonna have Superman: The Movie, and Superman 2 on there I'd skip the HD-DVD Player altogether.
Andrew @ Nov 6th 2006 11:46PM
this is really cool news, now all i need is 140 to get my 360 fixed and I'll be in business!
Solid Pancho @ Nov 6th 2006 11:58PM
And that content will be also available in Mexico?
He is that Microsoft discriminates the mexicans and they never put as good things to us as those that put you to them.
Pardon by my capacities with my english.
Greetings
slybri @ Nov 7th 2006 12:27AM
This is great but where am I gonna fit all this on the tiny, overcrowded hard drive?
Tom @ Nov 7th 2006 12:49AM
I can't wait to watch the episode of "Pimp My Ride" where the guy pimps his ride by installing an Xbox 360 in it, then downloads his own episode and watches it from the driver's seat.
Saocom @ Nov 7th 2006 1:11AM
Robot Chicken!! ,give me Family Guy and The Simpsons
xbeagle143 @ Nov 7th 2006 12:55AM
#2
canada is only going to be able to download hockey games
sorry :(
Anthony @ Nov 7th 2006 12:58AM
lol @ Tom
7r1ck13 @ Nov 7th 2006 12:58AM
Ehh.. I can get most this on my HD-DVR box..
Not that great for me, but I do see this being a nice feature for ppl w/o my cable luxuries..
Scoobydiesel @ Nov 7th 2006 1:31AM
we need a cheap and bigger hard drive, then as much movies and tv they can give us....first i need an HDTV 0_0
SomethingGood @ Nov 7th 2006 2:50AM
"This is great but where am I gonna fit all this on the tiny, overcrowded hard drive?"
As with the other content on the XBLM, I'd have thought that once you've purchased a movie you'll be able to delete it and re-download it at your leisure.
Nick James @ Nov 7th 2006 3:45AM
HD movies are going to take forever to download... unless they set up some sort of insane uber-streaming service. I don't know, we'll see.
Batman Forever though? What the fuck?
Foppe @ Nov 7th 2006 3:48AM
Was´nt it confirmed that movies only are for renting? They will probably have an autodelete function after 24h or after being watched 2 times or something like that.
Hmm, does this mean that we will be able to buy new gamer pictures and themes from those shows/movies?
Dan Goodwin @ Nov 7th 2006 8:45AM
The link from this post through to xbox.com is broken btw, looks like the "http://" has been missed off.
Glenn @ Nov 7th 2006 4:39AM
Shows is yours when you download it, you will keep it, and can download it for free afterwords as much as you like, movies expire after 14 days, or after 24 hours after you've watched them
One very very BAD thing about this, IT'S USA ONLY! FUCKERS!
Foppe @ Nov 7th 2006 6:06AM
Well, you CAN create an American account even if you live in Europe ;)
I guess they are worried that German and French can´t understand shows that talks in English...
BOXKUTTA @ Nov 22nd 2006 10:49AM
ALL HAIL THE SET TOP BOX!!!
(another sign of the apocolypse)
KineticOnline @ Nov 7th 2006 6:38AM
Datel Xsata all the way baby!!
asurroca @ Nov 7th 2006 7:04PM
When the Video Marketplace section popped up with the Oct. 31 Dashboard update, I thought TV and movies were headed to the Xbox 360, but November 22? That's a lot quicker than I'd expected. I wonder what's going on with the DirecTV deal they'd talked about some time ago.
Re: content
Spike TV needs to add MXC. NBC needs to get on board ASAP. And I doubt Fox will want a part of it, since they're focused on pimping their shows on Myspace.
Re: storage
"Battlestar Galactica: The Story So Far" was a ~45 minute special and I had no problem downloading it. Even when I record TV episodes, I delete them after I watch them; and I'm sure the movies will be rentals.
Price
I think the price point is really going to make or break the service, though. I'm really not willing to pay for TV episodes when I can TiVo or torrent them instead.
Now, TV series auto subscription. That's something I can get behind. They charge some kind of fee, and every new episode of a series you choose is automatically downloaded the next time you connect to XBL. Nice.
Ogden2k @ Nov 7th 2006 8:05AM
No thanks, I'll stick to buying or renting the media discs.
Nazgul @ Nov 7th 2006 8:25AM
I don't understand why everyone is complaining about not being able to fit it all on the HDD. The movies are time based right... so you have to watch them within a couple of days then they are deleted, how many are you going to want to download at once? two max? so thats a maximum of 14GB you're going to need at any one time assuming they are all around the 7GB mark. The movies are stored on microsofts servers, you temporarily borrow them, in theory the 20GB hard drive is enough.
Andy @ Nov 7th 2006 8:54AM
Obviously it's just speculation, but I think the standard 20gb will be fine.
I don't imagine for a second that MS will make their tv/ movie downloads the same filesize as it's HD-DVD equivelent. It's my best guess that they'll be using WM9 or whatever HD codec Windows Media uses. Does anyone know what format the HD trailers and such on Marketplace are in today?
Pixelantes Anonymous @ Nov 7th 2006 10:43AM
Wow, hundreds of new downloads added, and the XBL Marketplace user interface is still designed for about a dozen downloads.
Good luck navigating through all that content when they start adding it in.
Manny Fleurmond @ Nov 7th 2006 10:53AM
Lets do the math.
The lates DOAX2 Trailer on XBL is 8 mins at 475MB. So about 59MB/min. Average movie is around 80mins. 80mins x 59MN/min = 4750MB = 4.7GB. each movie is gonna take about a quarter of the drive.
Also, TV shows are 22 mins(half hour) to 44min(full hour), which is about 1.3GB to 2.6GB.
Now thats HD quality. SD quality, looking at the GoW commerical, is about 11MB/min. So:
80min movie: 880MB
22 min TV show: 242MB
44 min TV show: 484MB
So Sd is fine, but once you try going HD, space is gonna fill up quickly
DA360 @ Nov 7th 2006 10:59AM
Nice to see MS is expanding the media capabilities of the Xbox 360. I also noticed and what really perked up to me is in a video at GameTrailers.com they said their doing a SECOND fall dash update on November 22nd, the one year anniversary of the 360 launch, which will add more options for this. I wonder if it will do any more updates, such as fix the issues people were having with VGA 1080p on some HDTVs and I REALLY hope they add more resolutions for those who own widescreen LCDs (like myself).
Despite I won't care much for the TV content since I never really watch TV, I would like to see what the movies are like. This can also be a good alternative for those who want a more "On demand" like service or don't want to buy a HD-DVD drive.
WFOphill @ Nov 7th 2006 11:35AM
I didn't buy a 360 for tv or movies...I want to play amazing games and create the story myself.
Movies and tv are for lazy people
Cripple87 @ Nov 7th 2006 12:01PM
"so thats a maximum of 14GB you're going to need at any one time..."
And how will that work seing as how we only get to use a maximum of 13GB of the HDD, with game saves, arcade, map packs, and music i dont see that happening.
MS, If this 60GB HDD rumor isn't real than you are screwing yourself, this plan will backfire for lack of storage.
DA360 @ Nov 7th 2006 1:31PM
VC-1 based videos shouldn't be too big, though they could eat up HDD space rather quickly if you get many of them, just like the demos do. I am sure, just like 1080p, MS is trying to deny it so they can unveil it as a sort of a "all of a sudden" announcement. With all the media stuff, I think a bigger HDD is really needed.
But two things that are still rumored are two things people are demanding, which are the bigger HDD, and potential HDMI (since MS announced the 360 is capable of digtal output, which includes HDMI and DVI). If the Xbox 360 gets those two, the only thing the PS3 will have is Blu-Ray...
I still think if they make a bigger HDD, that they should put the bigger HDD in the platinum system and the 20GB HDD in the core system, to make it more comparable to Sony's offering and to make it more "fair" to people wanting a Core system.