Sony PlayStation 3 getting DirecTV's NFL Sunday Ticket, no dish necessary

Sony announced a collaboration with DirecTV to bring the NFL Sunday Ticket to PlayStation 3 owners. Access to the programming doesn’t require an installed satellite dish or DirecTV’s service. PS3 owners will be able to view live streaming video of up to 14 out-of-market games per weekend. The games will be displayed in high definition and users will also have access to the Red Zone Channel. This channel shows highlights of every scoring drive of every single game without the burden of commercials.

The price, however, is hefty. While it’s only $5 more than what DirecTV charges for the package, the entire season will run $339.95 for non-subscribers. If a PlayStation 3 owner is already a DirecTV Sunday Ticket subscriber, there’s a $50 charge to enable access on the gaming machine, thus creating another HD receiver in the home. These prices are charged per season similar to the Major League Baseball package. However, the MLB.TV package is considerable lower at $120 per season. The PlayStation 3 also offers NHL GameCenter for a $9.99 app cost and $169 cost for yearly access to games and other highlights.

One negative to the service is that it’s limited to out-of-market games. If the PlayStation 3 is hooked up on the same television used for watching local games, users will have to switch back and forth between inputs rather than on the DirecTV service. With the recent price drop of the PlayStation 3 to $249 for the 160GB model, a die-hard NFL fanatic that doesn’t have DirecTV service is looking at nearly $600 to outfit a home with NFL Sunday Ticket access before the season officially kicks off on September 8.

In addition to NFL Sunday Ticket access on the PlayStation 3, DirecTV also announced a collaboration with the NFL.com to bring Fantasy Football functionality to the television screen. Using connected set-top boxes, users can assign icons to specific players and jump to those games to check up on stats and overall progress.