I live in Baltimore Co., MD. Recently my Comcast service has added a nymber of duplicate HD channels (like 811 as well as 211 for the NBC affiliate). Why?

Is there a way to send a skip longer than 30 seconds? I was used to a 15 minute skip on Tivo. Motorola DCH 3416 HDVR Comcast On Demand HD Remote (silver)

Has anyone subscribed to Game Plan through Comcast? Is it even available (Baltimore County), and if so is it in SD (as I suspect) or HD? I've had it for years through DIRECTV but have subscribed to Comcast HD late this year. If it's available and is acceptable quality I'll drop DIRECTV next season.