OUYA, a true gaming console for indie Thread

Has anyone heard of the Ouya? It's an open source gaming console for TV, it looks like it's very much geared towards indie, Ouya.tv

Check it out and please make some great indie games for it! I pre-ordered mine.

Im not totally sold on the idea. The Android operating system is after all primarily based for handheld devices with more casual games in mind. I can't see many major titles being released for it.

Define 'major title'. The Android platform has had games like Vendetta Online, a whole MMOG originally developed for computers. Granted, VO is only a couple hundred megs, but that's the point. The limitation isn't the operating system (the XBox has a rather limited operating system, yet it runs such things as Battlefield 3, Halo 4, and Crysis). The limitation is the power of the device that the operating system runs. Handheld devices can't handle big things because they don't have the power; having the power would make them bulky, heavy, and unwieldy, defeating the purpose of making a handheld device. Take away the requirement to be handheld, and you can start to bump up the power.

The motherboard for the Ouya, for example, is roughly the size of your palm, at least as big as most phones. The fan attached to it is also rather large, meaning the motherboard can do a LOT more before it starts to heat up.

The major barrier will be the fact that it's largely unheard of and under-the-radar. The low price will help with that.

EDIT: clarification

Edited by: TerranAmbassador

There's an Ouya thread like, 5 down. Not sure how the conversation went as far as it's concerned though.

Escapistmagazine.com
Pcmag.com

Final Fantasy III is going to be on Ouya and it's AAA.

FF3 on OUYA isn't exactly AAA, it's a (3rd party) port of a 7 year old mobile device port/update (by a 3rd party) of the original 13 year old game...

Edited by: ambershee

Pandodaily.com

Here is the article that says that Ouya is being built for AAA, it's even going to have onboard Onlive at launch.

OnLive went bankrupt two weeks after that article was posted.

OUYA is a good idea in theory, but I think it will be short lived. It wont take long for phones/tablets grapics capabilities to pass that of OUYA, because OUYA won't be able to keep up with mature and successful companies like Samsung and HTC. Get something like this: Techland.time.com, and an hdmi cable or hdmi over wifi (when it comes out), and you have a gaming system that gets updated for free each time you renew your contract (if you get a free phone, like me [HTC Vivid]).

Also, all of OUYA's arguments about being open source and for the indie community is all moot imo. Android was already a great platform for indies, and comes with a plethora of open source tools. You can develop a game without paying a dime, and publish/market it on app stores for very low cost.

There are much cooler ideas out there for game system setups which could replace, or at least compete with, the console gaming experience. In fact, I'll make a new post about one such =P.

Edited by: lancer611

ambershee wrote: OnLive went bankrupt two weeks after that article was posted.

No it didn't. Ouya.tv

Onlive.com

arthus1 wrote:
No it didn't. Ouya.tv
Onlive.com

Just google it and you'll get tons of articles, for example: Nerdreactor.com

lancer611 wrote: OUYA is a good idea in theory, but I think it will be short lived. It wont take long for phones/tablets grapics capabilities to pass that of OUYA, because OUYA won't be able to keep up with mature and successful companies like Samsung and HTC. Get something like this: Techland.time.com, and an hdmi cable or hdmi over wifi (when it comes out), and you have a gaming system that gets updated for free each time you renew your contract (if you get a free phone, like me [HTC Vivid]).

Also, all of OUYA's arguments about being open source and for the indie community is all moot imo. Android was already a great platform for indies, and comes with a plethora of open source tools. You can develop a game without paying a dime, and publish/market it on app stores for very low cost.

There are much cooler ideas out there for game system setups which could replace, or at least compete with, the console gaming experience. In fact, I'll make a new post about one such =P.

I have a Nexus 7 tablet for taking my games with me but as far as I'm concerned mobile games will never replace the console, mobile games are nice but I like to come home relax and boot up my PS3, I can't relax when I'm straining to see a tiny screen. Nothing like playing games on my big screen tv.

arthus1 wrote:
I have a Nexus 7 tablet for taking my games with me but as far as I'm concerned mobile games will never replace the console, mobile games are nice but I like to come home relax and boot up my PS3, I can't relax when I'm straining to see a tiny screen. Nothing like playing games on my big screen tv.

You must have missed the part where I mentioned hooking your phone/tablet up to display on your TV.

On a separate, but related topic, check out my other post: Indiedb.com

Edited by: lancer611

OnLive Lives On Under Massive Restructuring Plan Ecommercetimes.com

arthus1 wrote: OnLive Lives On Under Massive Restructuring Plan Ecommercetimes.com

Yes, I saw that. No one disputed whether OnLive would continue to be a service, it was just stated that OnLive went bankrupt.

lancer611 wrote:

arthus1 wrote:
I have a Nexus 7 tablet for taking my games with me but as far as I'm concerned mobile games will never replace the console, mobile games are nice but I like to come home relax and boot up my PS3, I can't relax when I'm straining to see a tiny screen. Nothing like playing games on my big screen tv.

You must have missed the part where I mentioned hooking your phone/tablet up to display on your TV.

On a separate, but related topic, check out my other post: Indiedb.com

I'll never give up my consoles, you'll have to take them from my cold dead hands.

arthus1 wrote: I'll never give up my consoles, you'll have to take them from my cold dead hands.

Haha! I'm not saying you should. I'm just saying that there are other options out there for people not satisfied with the standard console experience.

lancer611 wrote:

arthus1 wrote: I'll never give up my consoles, you'll have to take them from my cold dead hands.

Haha! I'm not saying you should. I'm just saying that there are other options out there for people not satisfied with the standard console experience.

Right.

arthus1 wrote: OnLive Lives On Under Massive Restructuring Plan Ecommercetimes.com

That article is just as outdated as the last one. OnLive is now owned by a random venture capital group, who bought it for almost nothing - the service is still available but it's continued existence is somewhat tenuous. In any case, the company that promised Ouya support no longer exists, and it remains to be seen whether OnLive will ever take off.

Ouya is basically mobile phone hardware. It's price point is nice and cheap, but there are already similar rival devices with better backing appearing. I suspect Ouya is really going to struggle to amount to anything.

ambershee wrote:

arthus1 wrote: OnLive Lives On Under Massive Restructuring Plan Ecommercetimes.com

That article is just as outdated as the last one. OnLive is now owned by a random venture capital group, who bought it for almost nothing - the service is still available but it's continued existence is somewhat tenuous. In any case, the company that promised Ouya support no longer exists, and it remains to be seen whether OnLive will ever take off.

Ouya is basically mobile phone hardware. It's price point is nice and cheap, but there are already similar rival devices with better backing appearing. I suspect Ouya is really going to struggle to amount to anything.

The only rival devices I've heard of is the gamestick which is a copycat of Ouya, it wasn't announced until after Ouya dev consoles started shipping out, Ouya has a lot more backing than gamestick it's no threat, it won't even go on sale by the time everyone gets they're Ouya consoles, I'm afraid gamestick is a victim of poor timing. Can you name some other rival devices?

I don't get why you're obsessively pushing Ouya so hard. It's a nice concept and I'd like to see it fare well, but I strongly doubt it has the means to succeed.

Gamestick is a viable rival. It has the financial and backing to succeed that Ouya lacks. Playjam is not a small company and they aren't new to this market either - their integrated games hardware is already in tens of millions of devices and they have a back catalogue of well over 500 games from various developers. Their third party lineup includes Disney franchises and developers like Relentless, who are pretty established in this market.

On top of that, Playjam have the means to distribute their product to retail; it'll be on shelves on the high street and they'll have the marketing power to push the product. Their kickstarter campaign was little more than publicity and it paid off - if you search for 'android game console' in google, Gamestick is what's leading the search results. It doesn't matter if the first handful of people get their Ouya consoles, because the average person hasn't heard of either of them, and it isn't being advertised and sold in stores. Given it's launching end of March, I suspect it's actually going to beat Ouya to market too given how much they're dragging their feet and are only pushing out dev-kits now.

The real rival are integrated games devices and services offered by cable television. These are the same kinds of games and they're already in people's homes. Funnily enough, it's where Playjam has their business and it's quite successful. Failing that almost every Android device (and other mobile platforms to boot) have HDMI and USB ports, so Ouya itself is a victim of redundancy (why buy Ouya when your existing device already does the same job and plays the same games?). The Xbox 360 is also already being sold for $99, which isn't going to do either of the two any favours.

He either really believes in it....or he's being payed to act like it.

I'm going to have to agree with you on all counts ambershee. I do like the concept of it, and it is exciting that it's being targeted especially to indie developers, and it's nice that some are already taking advantage of that, but it's not all that certain that it's going to thrive, or even live much beyond launch. Not going to stop me from wanting to get one, but I wouldn't be too terribly upset or surprised if it failed, unless there were some stellar games on it.

Here's the final nail in the Ouya coffin:
Gamesindustry.biz

I paid $99 to pre-order Ouya and it better be a success or it'll be they're asses. And I'm very confident this is going to be big. And no I'm not being paid.

But I have my doubts about it too, I'm worried that too many devs will develop too many old retro games which would really diminish the quality of Ouya, I want to see BIG games on it like Battlefield, Dead Space, I'm for anything 3D. But I don't want Ouya known as the retro console. And Ouya has a Tegra 3 processor which can handle big games, but NVIDIA just announced the Tegra 4, maybe the Boxer8 team will refit it for the Tegra 4, they got the money to do it.

And stop being such debbie downers, can you at least try to be a little optimistic? Nobody knows what the future holds. All of you act convinced that Ouya is destined to fail? Gamestick and Shield are not consoles En.wikipedia.org

Gamestick and Shield are handheld are they not? which is a class of itself. Ouya is an actual console box with a controller. There is a good chance that Ouya might get some competition with Steam Box (which is an actual console box) but Ouya is going to release before Steam Box (Valve) does.

Gamestick and Shield are handheld are they not? which is a class of itself. Ouya is an actual console box with a controller. There is a good chance that Ouya might get some competition with Steam Box (which is an actual console box) but Ouya is going to release before Steam Box (Valve) does.

10-20 years ago, yes. Lately technology is to the point where I can have my cellphone connect to my tv and play games on it using a bluetooth controller if I wanted. The lines between console, handhelds and computers are pretty blurry now. I think part of the reason we're hearing of several new consoles popping up is because it's pretty common now to have some kind of cheaper computer already hooked to your tv if it's not directly built into the thing, and it doesn't have to be expensive if you're not aiming to directly compete with the kind of next gen technology that people will be expecting from Microsoft and Sony.