Roku and Playstation get Showtime's standalone service

Showtime will launch in July, to coincide with the debuts of Ray Donovan and Masters of Sex

Last week Showtime, following in the footsteps of its biggest rival, HBO, became the latest channel to offer its own stand-alone streaming service. That means one where, unlike previous iterations, users would not actually have to have signed up for Showtime through their cable provider to get access to it.

When Showtime announced Apple as its first partner for the service, there must have been some speculation, and fear, that it would be doing what HBO did: making them an exclusive partner, while other over the top boxes would have to wait.

Those fears were unfounded, though, as Showtime revealed on Monday that it has now added two more partners: Roku and Playstation.

The service, simply called Showtime, will be available on Roku players and Roku TV models and Sony's PlayStation Vue when it launchs in early July, which will coincide with the new seasons of two of the channel's most popular shows: Ray Donovan and Masters of Sex.

Getting these two services on board "is fundamental to Showtime’s strategy of putting the choice in the hands of the consumers regarding how, when and on what unique devices they watch our programming," Matthew Blank, Chairman and CEO of Showtime Networks, said in a statement.

“Both platforms have distinct and loyal audiences and together they will build on our service and greatly expand the number of homes that will have access to the SHOWTIME service over the internet."

Showtime and Roku had previously partnered, launching Showtime Anytime on the service in early 2014. In that case, though, those users needed to have a subcription to Showtime in order to access it. 

The stand-alone streaming service will be $10.99 for customers on Apple, Roku and Playstation, making it lower priced than HBO Now's $15 a month, though there has already been some talk of dropping that price, something that seems more likely to happen if Showtime is able to take a piece of the pie away.

Showtime is also differentiating itself from HBO in another way. In addition to giving its users access to its original series and movies, the channel will also be giving its users the ability to watch live broadcasts of its channels on both the east coast and west coast feeds. That means that users who want to watch their shows, and be a part of the conversation as they happen, will be able to do that, rather than having to wait for Showtime to add them later on.

Showtime is offering a 30-day free trial to new customers who sign up through Apple and Roku in July, but it does not appear to be offering the same to Playstation users. 

If HBO is the example to follow, and it certainly seems to be for Showtime, that will likely mean that it will be signing up multiple partners for its service in the coming weeks. HBO entered into a deal with Cablevision in March, making it the the first Pay TV provider to offer HBO Now; in April it signed with Sling TV, a Web-TV service from Dish, which allows subscribers to watch certain cable networks on their computers for less money per month. 

(Image source: sho.com)