Were you able to watch UFC 141 on Xbox Live?

No? Same here.

It was too good to be true, I guess. What was meant to be the perfect solution for those without cable that still wanted to witness the big Brock Lesnar vs. Alistair Overeem showdown, via their Xbox 360s, didn’t quite work out as well as promised or expected. Those interested may have to go back to their previous method for seeing UFC: by torrenting the thing.

I myself was not able to get the UFC on XBL app to connect to whatever servers, and according to Twitter, most folks had the same exact problem. In some instances, multiple attempts would eventually work (I personally gave up after trying for an hour straight).

But even then, quality of the stream was spotty (I heard more than a few reports in which it switched back and forth between HD and SD, endlessly), was many minutes behind what was actually happening, and in some instances, would just die and leave the person back to square one like the rest of us.

Once the show was winding down, Microsoft sent an email to members of the press stating that the problem was due to technical issues stemming from the 25,000 folks who got free access. Remember this? So once again, we have yet another instance of Dana White giving away the show for free, blowing up in his face.

But instead of folks flying out to the venue, hoping to score free live passes and not getting them, which thus results in all sorts of PR awkwardness, such superfans have now ruined the fun for those that actually paid for the damn thing. Just great. And given how the 360 is able to service countless Netflix and Hulu customers, and on a far heavier basis, the problem must lie with UFC somehow.

To make up for it, UFC 142 will be free, but given how 25,000 users managed to blow the whole thing up, I can only imagine how well it will perform next time, since I’m pretty sure more than that many of folks were inconvenienced tonight. Also, let’s be honest, is Aldo vs. Mendes as interesting as Lesnar vs. Overeem? God no. And btw, I sorta assumed that things would at least be working for the replay, but that hasn’t turned out to be the case either.

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