PlayStation video download service is live

The long delay until Sony launched its video download service (actually more like a few hours), is over. HD and SD rentals, and SD purchases from an assortment of movie studios is now available in the Playstation Store by selecting the video button at the top left. Need to know what's available in your region but aren't near your PS3? Check out the website for a list of what awaits.

[Via PS3 Fanboy]

[Flashpoint @ Jul 16th 2008 12:38AM]

It just doesn't look as good as 360's marketplace.

[Jagster @ Jul 16th 2008 2:30AM]

Man, that store is fugly. Sony, 1995 is calling and they want their Compuserve page back.

[Gaz @ Jul 16th 2008 5:53AM]

oooo look ...1st comment is a knock the other system chav burp

[neofolklore @ Jul 16th 2008 9:32AM]

looks better than what MS's NEW marketplace is going to look like. *shudders*

[c.Lake @ Jul 18th 2008 7:18PM]

@jagster

I DO like the Sony store, but that was a good burn.

[Rod Munch @ Jul 16th 2008 12:45AM]

Woo! Nothing for the UK!

[gjp303 @ Jul 16th 2008 12:46AM]

this and mgs4. the ps3 is looking better each day.

[Jomolungma @ Jul 16th 2008 12:57AM]

Well, logic dictates that it would. They started from such a low place, each day the system has to get at least a little better.

I don't actually have a PS3, but I have a PSP and I'm pretty psyched that they are allowing PC-to-PSP movies also. So props to them.

[Darth Abe @ Jul 16th 2008 1:00AM]

Is that relative to anything? Cause over the past few days, it sure seems like the PS3 has been looking pretty shoddy compared to the 360.

[IgnorantTechie @ Jul 16th 2008 1:20AM]

While I have to agree that Sony is still playing catch up while Microsoft is playing innovator (and I hate saying that about Microsoft, but they are setting the pace in the console market)...Sony still has my main attention for the two reasons that they don't use ridiculous Point system and allow for actual purchase price purchases (compared to a minimum $5/10/20 ect.) and they allow me to upgrade harddrive for a reasonable price (fair market price of a harddrive).

[Darth Abe @ Jul 16th 2008 12:59AM]

Sony needs to be moving faster than this if it wants to catch up to the xbox offerings.

[Khattab @ Jul 16th 2008 12:59AM]

HD content only for rent. The whole thing is not available here in Germany - of course. As the 360 price cuts and the 60GB model are.

We live in a globalized world, Bitches. Act like that.

[AC @ Jul 16th 2008 1:16AM]

Its not Sony's fault that the TV/Movie Studios won't let them sell the content outside of the USA.

[pete @ Jul 16th 2008 1:34AM]

If only Sony had its own studio that could release titles outside of the USA despite what others were doing. . .

[xcrunk @ Jul 16th 2008 8:33AM]

There is NO 360 PRICE CUT.

It's a CLEARANCE SALE on 20GB models.

Which means, saps who own the 20GB model better wake up, cause 20GB ain't shit.

Between being able to dump a whole game onto your system, XBL content and movies.....the 20GB will not cut it.

[Ravi @ Jul 16th 2008 1:03AM]

Here's a pic gallery of the store

http://digg.com/playstation/Playstation_Network_Video_Store_Launched_TWENTYPICS

[therippa @ Jul 16th 2008 1:07AM]

Pretty weak selection...the only thing that peaked my interested were Requiem for a Dream, The Usual Suspects, WarGames, and It's Always Sunny repeats.

These new services (netflix streaming included) are great, but I really have no interested in renting Soul Plane or We Are the Spartans.

[Funke, Tobias Dr. @ Jul 16th 2008 1:57AM]

I agree. It seems that the store has the movies you'll find advertised in the 2 for $20 deals or whatever in Sunday ads from Best Buy and the like. I don't know what the deal is with the studios, but it's as if they don't ever want to make their best titles available. Personally, I chalk it up to a conflict of interest with the consortium studios (particularly Sony) trying to push their Blu-ray sales.

Overall, I give the store an 8/10 (Great interface, but no previews, and only a fair amount of content.) Hooray for having every episode of Arrested Development, but only in SD.

The addition of The Simpsons, Seinfeld or The Big Lebowski (HD) will finally make me open my wallet for downloadable content.

[adgeman @ Jul 16th 2008 1:11AM]

I love the big razzmatazz announcements of Apple, Sony and Microsoft where they talk about their cool new stuff and then only release the damn thing in the US.

[Paul @ Jul 16th 2008 1:22AM]

Frankly I was hoping for more reasonable prices. $15 for a movie that you DOWNLOAD DIRECTLY is ridiculous. Older ones especially should be at the $6 mark (or lower...).

Plus, why rent for $4 when you can go to McDonald's, Cub, etc and pay a single dollar for an overnight rental of the new hits? And...that's assuming you don't already get your rentals by mail. And definitely with the 360 using Netflix (much cheaper), you'd think Sony would be aiming to be more price competitive.

Ah well. Sony's never really cared about saving its customers money. Ever.

[SpicyHamster @ Jul 16th 2008 2:41AM]

You mean like when they charge their customers a monthly fee just to play online? Oh wait...

[Gaz @ Jul 16th 2008 6:26AM]

an how long does it take to download??? I understand an Apple HD film takes 4hrs

[jared @ Jul 16th 2008 7:16AM]

I thought the point of every business is to get the most money from each customer.

[Joe T. @ Jul 16th 2008 8:57AM]

Sure, you can rent overnight for $1, but the gas to get there adds another $5.

[Paul @ Jul 16th 2008 1:22AM]

Ha, well, Versus XIII and MGS4 are still two amazing exclusives. The 360 does have a really nice selection, but a lot of it is generic EA crap. At least with the dev costs the PS3 only suffers from the movie tie ins really, and the games that really do end up sucking.

[ijyt @ Jul 16th 2008 9:18AM]

FF XIII isn't an exlusive.

[Dan Davis @ Jul 16th 2008 10:29AM]

@ ijyt

No, he said FF XIII VERSUS

FAIL.

[Carl M @ Jul 16th 2008 1:41AM]

Screen 9/35? "Juno" on the same page as "3:10 to Yuma" and "Stargate"?

I smell an awful user interface already. If you've got 700+ videos, you need a MUCH better way to browse them than just scrolling a huge list. How do they expect this to scale?

At the very freaking least, they should have categories by genre. Better yet, have lots of different ways to categorize & search. Sort by rating, search by director, by where it was made, by Oscar nominations, etc.

[hiko36 @ Jul 16th 2008 2:16AM]

They do...

[hiko36 @ Jul 16th 2008 2:18AM]

Let me clarify... They do have browsing by genre... I think the store is an amazing addition. Just got done renting Wristcutters and was pretty impressed. Played without a single hiccup and had good quality for an SD rental... They have a good selection considering this is DAY 1. All Seasons of Family Guy, some Robot Chicken, Aqua Teen, Arrested Development, Criss Angel... Good Job Sony

[Funke, Tobias Dr. @ Jul 16th 2008 3:20AM]

It's actually movie 9/35 on that particular page. If you count from left to right and top to bottom you'll see this. It appears they are looking at the "New Arrivals" page that lists a combination of movies and television shows.

[sts @ Jul 16th 2008 1:51AM]

Europe didnt get it... how obvious. Sony could really start also consentrating on EU customers, we pay almost double for the ps3 as the US do, and we get basically only half of what us ppl get in the playstation store.

[kevin @ Jul 16th 2008 3:33AM]

The reason that Europe didn't get it is because it is not unified under the same laws and regulations despite the efforts of some in the European Union. I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on European affairs, but take a look at this older Engadget article about iTunes facing the same hurdles as Sony would face if they were to try to bring about a Europe-wide video download service.

http://www.engadget.com/2008/01/21/itunes-movie-rentals-in-europe-on-a-slow-boat-to-china/

[Fozzy Bear @ Jul 16th 2008 8:32AM]

i mean... i guess it's kinda hard and the EU is till getting used to intracontinental cooperation after being front and center for two world wars in the past century... i wouldn't expect unified laws either... though, if there was a reason to do it... it would probably be for a silly reason like this.

MOVIES TO UNITE THE WORLD!!!

[hiko36 @ Jul 16th 2008 2:19AM]

2 Girls 1 PS3?

[hiko36 @ Jul 16th 2008 9:06AM]

NO FREAKING WAY... they deleted the comment my reply was to and now it just looks stupid sitting there all by itself...

[Alex @ Jul 16th 2008 3:12AM]

I dont really understand the hate for PS3 ... Sony has been talking about video service for a long time now.. so i dont understand why that is "chasing microsoft's footstep" ... if we are gonna talking about duplicating.. lets talk about xbox's version of Singstar aka Lips... . and what is PS3 actually failing on? nobody has really pin point that .. all i read are just a bunch of hates ..i.e. " ps3 sucks compare to xbox .. just because".. lets look at the issue in a non bias opinion everyone .. the fact of the matter is .. xbox's netflix and ps3's video service are essentially the same .. kinda reminds me of AppleTV

[Jakob Henner @ Jul 16th 2008 3:42AM]

You're so right but Engadget's comment section is turning into YouTune's

[Mike @ Jul 16th 2008 8:12AM]

Xbox's Netflix feature and Sony's video store are nothing alike. Not even a little bit.

What IS alike, however, is Xbox Live Marketplace video downloads and Sony's video store.

[xcrunk @ Jul 16th 2008 8:40AM]

People are talking as if the Netflix deal is available to everyone. It's not.

Netflix will only be available to people who have a GOLD XBL accounts and have a rental subscription with Netflix.

XBL is $50 a year. And at a minimum, Netflix is $60 a year.

That's $110 dollars to watch a limited(old sucky flicks) selection of movies.

[andres @ Jul 16th 2008 4:13AM]

you must really suck at fishing

[andres @ Jul 16th 2008 11:43PM]

ahh, this was a funny comment and now its ruined

[andres @ Jul 16th 2008 4:37AM]

@hiko
ohh god dont even joke about that

[hiko36 @ Jul 16th 2008 9:08AM]

haha.. I saw it for the first time last night... I told myself I wouldnt but I couldnt resist anymore, and now I wish I had....

[Crzypdilly @ Jul 16th 2008 5:48AM]

Just a theory, but Sony may have lagged on the video download service due to the format war. If I were king, that is what I would have done .

[Mike @ Jul 16th 2008 8:10AM]

I'm sure I already know the answer to this, but, do the videos downloaded from Sony's video store have any subtitles?

[hiko36 @ Jul 18th 2008 8:47PM]

The movie I rented didn't, which was lame. They dont have porn either, go fgure...

[Ryan @ Jul 16th 2008 8:16AM]

It's not available to Canadians yet.

[LinuxMacWindows Fanboy @ Jul 16th 2008 8:32AM]

I wish there was a way to buy a whole season of a show for cheaper. At 2 dollars an episode.. and lets say 22 episodes in that season.. thats $44. You can buy it on DVD for alot cheaper...

[primetime4 @ Jul 16th 2008 9:33AM]

Why yes you can... in fact... I bet the movie studios would like you to do just that. You see what they did there?