Microsoft just announced Universal, and NBC Universal programming is coming to Xbox Live, delivering The Office, Monk, Battlestar Galactica, The Mummy, Bourne Supremacy and others to the service. Xbox Live Video Marketplace now claims over 10,000 movies and TV shows on the marketplace, which it says puts it as the number one HD provider. MGM and Constantin are pushing things forward in Europe, adding 700 new titles to the library starting today. Check out more details from the E3 keynote in the live blog.

Xbox Live Marketplace has been busy adding videos all year and it looks like March will be the same way, with Afro Samurai hitting the service in HD only next month. More South Park is coming too, starting March 10, along with a free episode of Lewis Black's new show and Robot: Chicken: Star Wars. No word on if the latter two are available in HD, but check after the break for some of the movies showing up for rent next month.

As promised, those MGM flicks have hit Xbox Live Marketplace, satisfying our deep seated need for downloadable HD Rocky and James Bond flicks. Disney's releases popped up on the service last week, however since High School Musical 2 was a TV movie, its available only for purchase, at a cost of 1920 MS points ($23.99), the same as the Blu-ray version on Amazon. Its hard to make the argument the Xbox 360 doesn't need a Blu-ray add-on if HD movies cost the same amount for a lower quality (and more restrictively DRM'd) edition, not that we were really looking forward to downloading all 720p's of Zac Efron or n e thing.

[Via Gamerscore Blog]

We'll admit it, we had an idea Microsoft's just-announced Xbox 360 Arcade was coming. What we didn't expect was that it would be accompanied by a flood of family-friendly content headed to the Xbox Live Video Marketplace. Along with standard-def content from Nickelodeon, Warner Bros. will make 50 high definition episodes of Looney Tunes available for download. Of course, owners of the new Arcade unit won't be able to download the shows without a HDD, but why sweat the details (like pricing, which wasn't mentioned)? The new content hits "starting today", but doesn't appear to be up just yet, so keep an eye out for Acme-brand items landing on your HDTV.

The already nicely priced Xbox 360 HD DVD player just got slashed to $179. The new US-only, retail pricing also includes 5 free HD DVD flicks when purchasing the player between August 1st and September 30th -- you know, the same time period 300 and Heroes goes on sale in HD DVD format. Unfortunately, the free titles must be made from a selection of just 15 pre-selected films which Toshiba considers "popular." Nevertheless, the $20 price cut makes the Xbox 360 HD DVD player all the more enticing as an easily hacked, USB-player for HD flicks on your PC.

Update: Xbox 360 owners will be getting downloadable treats to promote the add-on, Microsoft announced that the movie 300 will be available on Xbox Live Video Marketplace in HD starting August 14th. In a repeat of the South Park promotion earlier this year, the first episode of Heroes will be made available for free prior to the release of the boxed set on HD DVD for a limited time.

[Thanks, Andrew and PacoDG]

Microsoft's E3 conference is still ongoing, but they were more than happy to note that Xbox Live Video Marketplace has already raked in more than $125 million in revenue, and is bigger than any cable providers' VOD offerings. As if that wasn't enough, for everyone who thought Blu-ray would be their only option for Disney films in HD, Microsoft announced that it is bringing both catalog and new releases to Xbox Live, in high definition, starting tonight. Our friends outside the U.S. have something to look forward to as well, because it plans to bring the video marketplace to Canada & Europe by the end of this year. Check out the live blog for more details.

Update 1: Check out the official details after the break.

Update 2: More info from Reuters indicates 35 titles from Disney are available now, including Bridge to Terabithia, The Queen and Deja Vu, but no Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (currently available on iTunes in theaters) on the way yet.

The Xbox Live Video Marketplace is getting some of the truly compelling content we've been waiting for, as Wired is reporting that the first high definition episode of South Park will be available for download tomorrow. At the incredibly great price of free -- for the first two weeks -- all Xbox Live members can download the "Good times with Weapons" episode. If you for some reason don't have a 360, or don't have the internet and are reading this via teletype, Best Buy will also be making the episode available on HD DVD discs free with the purchase of an Xbox 360 or the HD DVD add-on between March 20th and April 3rd. Animated TV shows have been missing in HD for too long, hopefully we'll see more of those and more HD content on XBLM -- like HD Battlestar Galactica episodes we don't have to wait 6 months to see, as suggested by our friends at Joystiq.

[Via Joystiq]

We were wondering how long it would take to get a high definition blockbuster movie onto Xbox Live Video Marketplace, and it looks like Microsoft and Major Nelson just got in under the wire for 2006, adding Superman Returns yesterday. Weighing in at 7 GB for the 720p HD version (2 GB in 480p SD... for the masochists out there) for the 154 minute movie, it's finally time to clear off some of the Xbox 360 demos we downloaded and see if digital distribution works better in 2007 than it did last year. We'll be back with our impressions of the service, now that they've posted something we want to watch on our HDTVs.

Surprise, surprise, it's November 22nd (happy birthday Xbox 360!), and Microsoft has taken its new Xbox Live Video Marketplace live. The biggest mystery at this point was price, which turns out to be $2 for SD TV shows, $3 for HD, while movie rentals will run you $3 for SD and $6 for HD. This is all converted from the various, confusing MS Points involved in each purchase (80 Points = $1), which we're sure we'll all be well sick of after a couple months of using the Marketplace -- if not already. The current word on selection is 48 movies and 50 TV shows available for download, and we're sure that'll be growing -- though V for Vendetta is already available as a HD rental... what more could you want?

[Thanks, TexRob]

UPDATE: Joystiq has some more info and pics galore of the service. They clarified the pricing scheme as well: movies are divided into "New" and "Classic" releases, and priced at $6/$4 for the former, $4.50/$3 for the latter.