Update 28/10/09 2.15pm GMT: We have reports that Sky is now back online and working as it should. Lets hope it stays that way!
Update: 5.30pm GMT: Microsoft have released a statement on the official support section of their website. It says:
“The Sky Player on Xbox 360 service did successfully launch early this morning, it has subsequently been suspended due to an unforeseen technical issue.
With so much excitement and interest in the service, we’d much prefer to ensure that our customers enjoy the highest possible quality of service.
We would like to take this opportunity to apologise to our customers who have attempted to access the service today.
Sky Player engineers are hard at work to resolve the problem – we expect to have the full service available tomorrow.”
I think some more Beta testing before-hand wouldn’t have gone amiss.
Update 1.20pm GMT: The service has being pulled due to high demand. We’ll keep you posted when it returns.
Microsoft has finally revealed the price of access to the Sky Player which has launched today on the Xbox 360 in the UK.
Most importantly you’ll be needing a Gold membership (£39.99 a year). The basic Sky pack called ‘Entertainment’ begins at £15 including G.O.L.D, Sky Real Lives, Sky Arts 1, Sky News and MTV One.
Alongside that for boffins is National Geographic, Nat Geo Wild, History and Eden (not the garden). If you are into sport you can grab Sky Sports News, British Eurosport and ESPN Classics.
And for the kiddies is Cartoon Network, Boomerang, Nickelodeon, Disney Channel and Nick Jr.
If you want to fork out more, you can do with prices as listed below:
- £25 – Sky Sports 1 OR Sky Sports 2 + Sky Sports Xtra
- £34 – Sky Sports 1, 2, 3 + Sky Sports Xtra
- £24 – Sky Movies Screen 1 OR Screen 2
- £32 – Sky Movies Screen 1 + Screen 2
- £33 – One movie channel + one sports channel + Sky Sports Xtra
- £38 – One movie channel + all sports channels, OR vice versa, + Sky Sports Xtra
- £41 – All sports and movie channels
- From £9 per month extra – ESPN
The on-demand content will include both ‘paid-for’ and free episodes of programming, with pricing starting from £1.
For those lucky enough to afford Sky already, the on-demand content will be available for those who already subscribe to the channels. And if you have Sky Multiroom or Sky Unlimited Broadband, you can get live channels as well.
That bundle pack we revealed the other week, is priced at £29.99 with a three-month Gold sub, a one month subscription to Sky Player and a Media remote.
Youc an find out more on Sky.com and we’ll hopefully bring you a hands on soon.
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Rob Rymond
Currently residing between Solihull and Stoke, Rob is training to be a professional journalist at Staffordshire University. He has a wealth of experience under his belt and has been writing for 7 years despite only being 19. He thrives on news and reporting it but also dabbles with reviews as well from time to time. Outside of video games he is also a radio broadcaster (or DJ to me and you) and spends time with his girlfriend.
