Sony will start to grapple more directly with TV-connected streaming devices from the likes of Apple, Amazon and Roku when it launches the PlayStation TV in North America on October 14.
Sony announced the North American launch date on Twitter and also revealed other new details about the coming device this week at the Gamescom show in Germany, where it also noted that the product will debut in the Europe on November 14.
Announcements of the launch dates follow Sony’s revelation at the E3 conference in June that it expected to start selling the miniaturized gaming console/media player in Canada and the U.S. sometime this fall for $99.
The PlayStation TV, which arrived in Japan last year as the PlayStation Vita TV, will be capable of paring with the new PlayStation 4 console, allowing users to play PS4 games remotely on a secondary TV in the home, and will let users play “hundreds” of older PS3 titles via the PlayStation Now service while also supporting most PlayStation Vita titles and “classics” from Sony’s older-generation PS1 and PS2 consoles.
Sony will also use the pint-sized PlayStation TV to sell movies and TV shows via the PlayStation Store and as a conduit for other types of media streaming services and apps.
The PlayStation TV and Sony’s gaming consoles and other TV-connected devices are expected to work with the company’s anticipated OTT pay-TV service that was announced in January at the International CES in Las Vegas.
In June, Shawn Layden, president and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment America, told Re/code that Sony is in talks with programmers and on track to offer that service “in some capacity” by the end of 2014.
http://recode.net/2014/06/10/its-complicated-but-sonys-pay-tv-service-is-still-on-track/
