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ESPN Debuts On Xbox Live Next Week
Sports fans will have a new destination to watch their favorite teams come next week.
Microsoft says ESPN for Xbox Live will feature "over 3,500 live and on-demand sporting events per year," but we're still not sure if that includes the big daddy of sports, the NFL. It should, however, provide blanket coverage for college sports, as well as include the MLB, NBA, MLS, WNBA, and international soccer matches that run regularly on the ESPN cable channels. Though the channel won't feature SportsCenter, ESPN will be providing highlight packages for you to keep up to date with your favorite teams.
If you're planning to ditch your cable package and exclusively use ESPN for Xbox Live to keep up with your local sports teams, think twice. Locally televised games are still subject to blackouts, which means you have to watch those games on the television station that holds the regional rights.
The addition of the ESPN programming should be another big step in the migration of viewers from cable to consoles. According to Knowledge Networks research, 21 percent of American consumers already use game consoles to watch movies and television, and in last year alone there was a 157-percent increase in the time users spent watching programming on the Xbox 360.
The ESPN channel is free to Xbox Live Gold members, provided their internet service provider has a pre-existing partnership with ESPN for digital content.
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