Sony said Thursday that baseball fans now have the option to stream Major League Baseball games to U.S. PlayStation 3 consoles, thanks to a partnership with the league's MLB.TV, a subscription-based video service.
To watch MLB.TV on PS3, baseball fans will have to sign up for a subscription that costs $25 per month or $120 per year.
"This transaction represents another important distribution point for our fans to enjoy live baseball games via the internet," said Kenny Gersh, SVP of business development at MLB Advanced Media.
Console makers Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo have been progressively ramping up their respective game machines' media functionality. Xbox 360 and PS3 in particular, with their hard drives and high-definition capabilities, are directly butting heads in the living room entertainment media wars.
MLB.TV, which is already available on computers and smartphones, lets users scroll through live streaming or archived games. Users that already subscribe to MLB.TV on other platforms will not have to pay additional fees to use the service on PS3.
Users can pause, fast-forward and rewind games DVR-style. Reuters notes that black out rules still apply, so fans will not be able to watch live games of teams playing in their local market.
Baseball fans will also be able to choose to watch either home or away broadcast feeds, scroll through a league-wide scoreboard and scroll through the entire game schedule in calendar format.
That's a little pricey, but totally awesome. I'm not so big on baseball, but I like to see stuff like this happening. Hopefully they do something similar with the NHL! :)
