"Unprecedented" Sky Player Demand On Xbox 360 Caused Problems

Microsoft and Sky have had to issue a statement to explain why the Sky Player for the Xbox 360 console had to be pulled abruptly from Xbox Live, hours after it was launched.

In a statement issued earlier today, both companies explain that "many tens of thousands of customers" tried to sign up within the first hour of launch and because Microsoft and Sky did not expect to see such a high level of demand, the system crashed, leaving them with no other choice than to suspend all access to the service.

Instead, Sky player is likely to be rolled out in stages (Microsoft, on the Xbox update page, says that they have implemented a "revised roll out") to avoid a repeat of the cock-up. The Sky Player option, which was first announced back in May 2009, will see Xbox Live Gold members get access to Sky content on demand.

24 channels will be available at launch and the service will also be available for Windows 7 users on all three retail versions of the Microsoft operating system. The teething troubles, as some called it, were initially attributed to some bugs and it now seems unlikely that it was the case.