Damn, no love for Australasia?

J-Fro

Speaking as a sales guy who sells at a Canadian big box store, (rhymes with West Guy), there isn't a lot that you can do about the differences in pricing. You can buy in the US, but bare in mind you aren't buy an FCC certified product. That means, in the unlikely event of a fire caused by said purchased US product, and they will discover the source mind you, that means no insurance will cover the damages so if your house burns down, you are paying for a new house out of pocket. Also be aware that you are getting an american warranty not international. Sony/Panasonic etc, will not honor any warranty outside of the country that the product was purchased.

Ironhide-Delta

One question remains. Why are we still missing the "Inside Xbox" button?

bluecell

The Canadians are right about the dollar issue, but please don't rub it in! (Although I've heard the jokes and I know paybacks are a bitch.) I've never been patriotic, but at least I always thought america had a decent economy. We know if the current jackasses keep up what their doing, the US dollar won't be worth more than monopoly money. But I don't see what matters about this story, cuz M$ was so late to the punch on this one, that they practically told people to use bittorrent. End of my stupid comment.

RonJeremy4Pres

@Okenny: considering our lowest sales tax is quite a bit lower than 47% (14% in Ontario, down to 6% in Alberta), I think it's safe to say that paying that much over and above the purchase price was you screwing something up.

Step5555

Canada likes taxes... I'm sure it applies here in some way. I remember having the bright idea of ordering something from BestBuy.ca so I can have it delivered to my sister locally and I ended up paying $160 more on something that was $340 to begin with. They love taxes!

okenny :)

Why would I pay more for movies, especially when my Dollar is stronger than the US one? I can rent DVDs, which may accidentally fall into my DVD burner and get copied, for less! Jeez, I was looking forward to the video store, not the corn-hole pillaging that MS has wrought upon us.

chenry

Being from Canada, and after just recently taking a look at the video marketplace, I fail to understand how this service is "good." Why am I paying more for a download that lasts only 24 hours than I would for a physical rental? It's works out to something like $8 for an HD title. And at 4.5 gigs the movie is going to take far longer to download than it would for me to walk to my local Blockbuster. TV shows on the other hand, that's a different story. If they can keep the price reasonable... otherwise I see no reason to stop torrenting episodes of my favourite shows.

mrghost

Only thing I've been waiting for is TV shows. I have a HD-DVD player and a subscription to a movie rental site, with TV stuff coming I can pretty much use my 360 for everything.

The movie selection is pretty sub-par aswell, which doesn't help.

Burguois

Too bad they havent launched the service here in Spain. Oh well, I would waste too much HDD space.

DiskoDanyo

*waves from Australia* :-(

elevenoverzero

@ToastedSoul: I saw four versions of 300 on the Canadian Marketplace; two of them are SD and HD with an English track. The other two are also SD and HD, but with French tracks, so the answer to your question is yes. As for subtitles; I know its supported, but I haven't yet seen any movies that have the option.

By the way, I know it was said on Xbox.ca that HD versions of new releases would be 610 points, but I saw that 300 in HD actually costs 580 points. I know that's not too far off from 610 points, but its still lower than expected.

josh924

@ToastedSoul:

I don't think so :\

ssjmichael

We already pay more for points here in Canada when compared to the US... then this added inflation to the movies, double price increases that are simply not warranted. Lower prices or no sale for me.

FyroniK

Most things in Canada are the same price here as they are in the US thanks to our high dollar. But of course Micro$oft is going to completely ignore it and charge us 20% more.

You can take your video marketplace and cram it up your ass!

argh

A more general question about XBLVM: do those movies support multiple languages and subtitles, can I choose which language version to download?

ToastedSoul

@Crooked:

Maybe complain to brick and mortar retailers while you're at it. Many stores there still charge higher prices despite the different rate. Thus making purchases from America better than buying in Canada still.

ssjmichael

It's insane how expensive it is to get the content in Canada. Our currency is 1:1 and at most times, greater than the American dollar at the current exchange for the past while and foreseeable future, but we're paying significantly more for everything. Digital content of all things, would've been one thing corporations could've taken the initiative to match or at least competitively sell at similar rates.

I won't be using this service much regardless of its price, but nonetheless, I still have to say the prices are quite a bit spiked up. I don't want to go into the argument of people work to get this content up, and royalties and what not..

Just saying on a comparison scale to the United States, it's quite great.

mr_dimsum

@crooked (why the hell is it not allowing me to see the little reply arrows?!) There is a good chance TV shows are going to be alot harder to find. If I recall, there is a law in canada that all canadian content providers (now microsoft counts as one) must deliver a certain percentage of their content as canadian, hence all the weird Henry movies on there, and canadian content. So not only can MS not just dump the entire marketplace tv shows, but they gotta find enough canadian tv shows (and pay for them) to cover the US shows.

Then another problem arises. Content is delivered to canada by different rights holders as they have in the US. So for example, a tv show in the US might be owned by FOX, but in canada, it might be owned by a different company. in that case MS would have to pay again to get the content on the service, and theres a good chance they are gonna have to jack the price up.

But this will get better overtime as more content is released and MS can deal/bid on shows/movies as they are released and can possibly get them direct from the original US provider.

As for taxes, yea there are quite a few taxes that must be paid, not just the taxes our consumers put pay, but licensing fees for technology, and distribution, etc.

Scazza

I think some people just cant understand that parity means "Stop fucking marking up shit for Canada by 10 bucks whenever you can". I should really get around to sending that memo to MS but I keep forgetting.

You can always make an American XBL account if you REALLY want to buy videos on live, I guess @_@

seiryuu

@Scazza: Stupid taxes, I bet there's a bear tax too!! lol!

The line-up of movies I saw so far was pretty bad, but the only thing I will pay attention to is the TV shows.

Crooked

Sweet! I already re-purchased my entire movie library for my big ass table, now I can do it all over again AND I get a brand new asshole on the side!

wicko

@Crooked, not to defend them, but they STILL got to pay for taxes on all items, and licensing fees are much higher in canada on average.

However, I will copy and paste what I typed on Major Nelsons blog:

"Saw the "Download Movies" sign at the bottom of the marketplace blade and decided to click on the movies. Scrolled down the list, pressed B and prolly wont look back for awhile. Apart from 300, its a pretty garbage list... "

Scazza

Why not Switzerland? Is it that complicated to put in content in four different languages?

MasterOfPastures

Canada has been getting the short end lately with our dollar finally doing better we saw the same prices on PSN and Live still Higher then America's prices, I mean its all digital there's no export fees for online download only products. They need to re-evaluate the entire price thing on video marketplace and fast or else I won't be touching the thing.

Crooked

@dynendal: thats not ms`s fault thats segas.ms doesnt charge you to play mmos on live.

also i know its easy to blame ms but its the content providers that are setting these prices for ms.so blame the studios and if you want lower prices do what i do...DONT BUY VIDEOS!

Truepatriot

Only stuff I've ever downloaded on the Video Marketplace has been the free stuff they give away every so often. With their highway robbery policy for our Canadian neighbors, I can't see this changing.

Archaotic

Fuck you, Microsoft. If you feel justified in bumping up the Phantasy Star Universe monthly cost by $10 extra a month for Canadians and refuse to lower it, who knows what kind of ass raping you'll perform on my wallet just so I can download a video?

dynendal

i find it a waste too...

katorok

I don't use the service. It was going to waste just sitting there on my Xbox. Good thing other people aren't as ungrateful as I am and will get some use out of it across the pond.

InsidiousTuna (ChickenOfTheSea to some)