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Xbox 360 and Netflix Team Up

Jul. 14, 2008 Paul Thurrott | Paul Thurrott's Supersite for Windows

Looks like Netflix customers are going to have another avenue for enjoying movie content this fall:

An exciting new home theater experience is coming to living rooms this holiday season. At E3, Microsoft and Netflix, the world's largest online movie rental service, today unveiled an exclusive partnership to offer the ability to instantly stream movies and TV episodes from Netflix to your television via Xbox 360.

Xbox 360 will be the only game system that lets you instantly watch movies and TV episodes streamed from Netflix. This movie-watching innovation will be available to Xbox LIVE Gold members who are also Netflix subscribers, and will let those users enjoy streaming movies from Netflix on Xbox LIVE at no additional cost.

A growing library of more than 10,000 movies and TV episodes will be available from Netflix when it launches on Xbox LIVE in late fall, with more choices added over time. Through this agreement, along with the existing Video Store, Xbox 360 will be home to more movies and TV shows on demand than any other device connected to the TV. Xbox LIVE quickly and easily connects you and your friends to the entertainment you want—with no PC required for viewing.

Interact, Play, and Enjoy
Netflix on Xbox 360 is an important component of the new Xbox experience, a new generation of games and entertainment experiences that will be available on Xbox 360 this fall. The new Xbox experience represents the first time in history that a mass-market consumer electronics device has been re-invented through free software, giving people more fun and intuitive ways to interact, play, and enjoy entertainment content.

"Watching movies at home will never be the same. Netflix on Xbox 360 is an entertainment first, and we are bringing friends together with the best in entertainment content like no other device in the living room, " said John Schappert, corporate vice president of Interactive Entertainment LIVE, Software and Services Business at Microsoft . "We are creating a completely new social entertainment experience, and Xbox 360 will be the only video game system where you can access your library of instantly streamable movies from Netflix and turn any room into a virtual movie theater."

Highly Personalized Experience
From the Netflix Web site, simply add movies and TV episodes to your individual instant Queues. Those choices will be automatically displayed on the TV screen via Xbox 360 and available to watch instantly. Once selected, movies will begin playing in 30 seconds or less. In addition to instantly streaming movies to the TV, Gold members can fast-forward, pause, and rewind—all using either the Xbox 360 Controller or Media Remote. In all, the user interface creates a highly personalized experience that puts viewers in control.

"Netflix and Xbox 360 are a perfect combination, the leading online movie rental service and the leading games and entertainment system joining forces to create an all-in-one entertainment experience with content for everyone," said Reed Hastings, chairman and CEO of Netflix. "For Netflix, it represents an important step forward in making instantly streaming movies on the TV more broadly available to our members."

The library of movies and TV episodes that will be available for instant streaming from Netflix via Xbox 360 includes scores of Academy Award winners and nominees, episodes from a number of popular, currently running and classic TV shows, and 24 of the movies rated by the American Film Institute as the greatest ever.

Very interesting.

Discuss this Article 17

Ocean
on Jul 14, 2008
Selection is limited.
tayme
on Jul 14, 2008
Limited, yes...but it will expand. This is still a good thing, don't you think? Oh yeah...you hate the 360. If it was announced for the Wii, you would be lauding it as another thing that makes Wii better than the 360. Before you jump on me, I have both in my house...I like the Wii better for gaming, my teenaged daugher likes the 360, but the 360 is a great Media Center Extender...and this adds to that role. I do have to agree, though that the 360 is pretty noisy for the living room. We have had ours for a couple of years now...no RROD at all. I gets used quite a bit, too. --tayme
yert
on Jul 14, 2008
This is great news to hear. Sony and Nintendo better have big news, because Microsoft has this in addition to a whole range of other stuff (Lips, FFXIII, and more).
johnbaxter
on Jul 14, 2008
So Bill G took Microsoft's knowledge of the word antitrust and the phrases Department of Justice and (perhaps) European Community with him?
Ocean
on Jul 14, 2008
>>Limited, yes...but it will expand. This is still a good thing, don't you think? Oh yeah...you hate the 360. If it was announced for the Wii, you would be lauding it as another thing that makes Wii better than the 360.<< No I wouldn't. Limited is limited. I'm a netflix customer, and I never use the streaming stuff because it's limited. Hulu on the other hand, is pretty nice.
Snakedoctor1
on Jul 14, 2008
Just like PC access and that new Roku box that came out last month for Netflix, the selection SUCKS. Its not new movies its old stuff. Wake me when someone, Xbox Live, Apple TV, Amazon...anyone has the same library in a online service that Blockbuster and Netflix have via the postal service. I think iTunes has the best selection when it comes to new and HD stuff right now.
weedmonk
on Jul 15, 2008
It's gonna be funny today when Sony's presentation will be all about BRD and Movies while 360 is poaching slowly but surely their franchise exclusives titles and destroying them online and in media Content. I look forward to being surprised because I'm just itching for a reason to take the PS3 plunge.
whiplash55
on Jul 15, 2008
I'd like to see something for Media Center now. Like all online media services I think selection will slowly get better.
johnpapola
on Jul 15, 2008
This is a very good partnership. All they need to do now is redesign the Xbox 360 so that it's not so freaking loud. The noise factor has kept me from using it's movie service. That and the insulting, carnival-style points system. This may change that though (the point system issue, not the noise). I can't wait to check it out.
joe-dokes
on Jul 15, 2008
Still to little too late to save the dying Xbox franchise. Joe Dokes
bennish
on Jul 15, 2008
Am I correct in assuming this will be, once again, US only?
RaaJ
on Jul 16, 2008
Joe-Dokes... put down that bong. Right now!!
Snakedoctor1
on Jul 16, 2008
PS3 fired back with its own online video service, which looks just at good if not better than the 360 setup. Probably easier for Sony, since they are one of the studios. The PS3, is just a better media center. Its DVD, BR, Online content now, and has a user replaceable hard drive. Oh and its silent. Throw a 320gig in a PS3 and RIP your DVD collection to it.
RaaJ
on Jul 16, 2008
Inasmuch as the PS3 has better media capabilities (I know, I have one), the 360 ultimately has it beat in terms of games (I know, I have one too). Ultimately, BR and Media Center capabilities are a nice extra - not the ultimate key to success.
weedmonk
on Jul 16, 2008
"The PS3, is just a better media center. Its DVD, BR, Online content now, and has a user replaceable hard drive. Oh and its silent. Throw a 320gig in a PS3 and RIP your DVD collection to it." The 360 is all AND a Windows Media Center extender...i.e DVR. An iBoi like you should be soiling yourself silly over an Apple TV and Front Row. ROFLMAO.
joe-dokes
on Jul 16, 2008
Sorry, weedmonk but as usual you're full of garbage. Since MS decided to go with proprietary drives that cost TWICE what they should they have seriously limited the potential for the 360 to be an extender. Thus, the PS3 that uses nearly plug and play for any standard drive is a much better system. You could load that thing with 2 1Tb drives and go to town. Is that even possible for the 360? Didn't think so. Further, since all versions o3 f the 360 don't come with wireless, it further dampens the need. By the way besides you and your singe friend that both live in your mothers basement, who actually uses the media center features? As for Apple TV. I don't own one, for two reasons, first it requires and HDTV so the menus won't look like garbage. And second since the largest hard drive is 160 Gb, in my opinion it won't hold enough media. That being said, for serving audio and video it is still the best media system going. The iTunes store proves that by selling more video downloads for movies and tV than all the other services combined. Something in the order of 80%. So Apple TV and the iTunes/iTunes Store ecosystem are beating the crap out of MS and their various stores. Regards Joe Dokes
subzerohitman721
on Jul 17, 2008
Microsoft is in big trouble with the 360 and I am seriously not happy about the Avatar announcement. Recent Xbox 360 games aren't really doing it for me. I don't mind a strategy shift, but copying the Wii is idiotic and shows a lack of cajones. Netflix and 360 sounds like a good idea on the surface, but the limited content makes it a dealbreaker for now. Netflix shouldn't have launched the streaming service until it had a much stronger lineup. I also have to agree with Joe that the 360's proprietary drives was idiotic at best. Cheap and quick upgradeability should have been obvious. Games and movies today are made in the gigabytes. Any significant music and movie collection will eat the 360's 120 GB drive easily. This is part of the reason why Sony is coming up fast and will overtake the 360 in relatively short amount of time. Microsoft's boneheaded decisions are making me reconsider keeping it. I'm really pissed at MS for not leaning harder on LucasArts to get KOTOR 3 done. That game should have been a nobrainer. I'm strongly mulling over a swap at Gamestop to a PS3. As is said on the WinInfo site, this "Me Too" obsession that Microsoft has is dangerous. They should be forging their own unique path. Or yet, perhaps its time to start working on the Xbox 3, Xbox 720, or whatever they're gonna call it. Take all the lessons of the 360's shortcomings and do the next console right. Quiet as hell hardware, the best dual or quad GPU possible, Blu-Ray, cheap and upgradeable SATA drives, Intel processors (possibly borrowing the Mac Pro's dual quad design), built in wireless with a manual ethernet port, and then go from there. Perhaps a smaller physical design to better fit the living room standard. Standards support for both video and audio, including AAC and H.264. Full DVR capabilties with a cablecard built in. Keep the media extender capabilities and expand on them.

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