Playstation Network Jumps Into The Streaming Game
Add Sony’s Playstation Network to the list of companies offering original series via its’ digital streaming service. Other companies on that list include Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon which already offer multiple original series. The competition in the digital streaming market space is heating up. Netflix was the first streaming service to commission its own original shows with shows like “House of Cards” and “Orange is The New Black,” followed by Amazon with political sitcom “Alpha House” in November.
Playstation Network’s inaugural show is adapted from a comic book by Brian Michael Bendis called Powers. According to The Hollywood Reporter, “Following years of development, including a pilot at FX, video game console PlayStation has picked up the superhero drama straight to series.”
Powers combines the genres of superhero fantasy, crime noir and police procedural. The story follows a cop who works in the Powers Division of the police force and investigates crimes involving people with special abilities.
The show will be available to the entire Playstation Network as The Wall Street Journal explains, “The show will be available exclusively in the U.S. on what the company calls its PlayStation Network, which includes some 30 million Internet-connected PlayStation devices. Users will be able to stream the show just as they would watch, say, ‘House of Cards’ on Netflix, which can be accessed through the PlayStation Network.”
Sony’s Playstation Network is making this move, as it does with most decisions, to compete with its main video games console rival Microsoft’s Xbox Live. Xbox has begun to offer TV-style programming and the ability to control your cable box through your Xbox using your voice. According to CNN, “A Sony spokeswoman confirmed the order but was not able to provide any information about a premiere date.” The Playstation Network has ordered ten episodes of the new show.
The Hollywood Reporter reported many of the production positions as already cast, “The Sony-owned gaming console will recast the entire project with writer Charlie Huston stepping in for Charles Eglee. Circle of Confusion will return to executive produce alongside co-creators Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming. Michael Dinner will remain on board as an EP and director. Huston and Falling Skies’ Remi Aubuchon will exec produce, with Bendis and Huston set as showrunners. Circle of Confusion’s David Engel, David Alpert, and Lawrence Mattis will oversee for the company, which also produces AMC’s comics adaptation The Walking Dead.”
It will be interesting to see which network will begin original streaming next.
