OUYA, The Android-Based Home Game Console

[Beastinonyou]

The most recent and hugely successful project campaign on Kickstarter.

I like to stay up-to-date with anything related to gaming, and am subscribed to the ECA newsletter, and very frequently browse articles on sites like GamePolitics, Gamasutra, etc.

I came across this short article written soon after the campaign started.
GamePolitics OUYA Kickstarter Article

Here is the project's kickstarter page:
OUYA Kickstarter Campaign

This is easily one of the fastest growing and successful campaigns to launch on kickstarter so far, which looks like it'll pass Double Fine's campaign total by the end of the day. At the time of writing this, the campaign has 28 more days to go, 24,129 backers, and $3,050,025 pledged.

Share your opinions and leave a comment =P.

[Insectoid]

Quote:

...the $99 device...has captured the interest of Minecraft developer Mojang

Well, there goes that.


Seriously though, this looks promising. Giving the SDK away with every copy is a great way to win early developer support too, though there will need to be separate marketplaces for indy and professional games because there's gonna be a thousand 'games' that turn your TV into a giant lightbulb on day one, and I sure as hell don't want that cluttering a real game library.

[SNIPERDUDE]

As a developer, I am ridiculously excited for this. Found out just recently about it too

[mirhagk]

I saw this, and it's kinda a sad attempt IMO. It's $99 which is half the price of a professional gaming platform, and for that you get a mediocre smart phone that hooks up to a TV and doesn't do anything but play games.

BTW giving away an easy to use SDK to indie developers has been done before on a professional console. The problem was that the marketplace was filled with so many crappy games that no one even went to the independent marketplace. And the XNA platform with C# was even easier to use than android (I've used both, and android doesn't really give the user much of a leg up in terms of video game development). Giving indie developers is a good idea in theory, but in reality noone wants to sift through that much garbage (which is why most indie sales are from indie bundles which are collections of games that are probably good).

TLDR: good idea in theory, but it's just a smartphone you can hook up to your tv with a controller. Nothing more.

[SNIPERDUDE]

I'm still interested to see what becomes of it. I don't want to cast it out as an option before I even see it in action. And even if it could be compared to a "smartphone hooked up to a TV", it still has a controller going for it (I'm sick of virtual joysticks on touchscreens). At this point I think it could really go either way.

[mirhagk]

I think their target market has already been fully realized. The nerdy techy guys who want gadgets "for the people".

I agree that smartphones are terrible for gaming, their real power lies in something this device doesn't have though. Portability. Sure you can carry this around, but you can't slip it and the control in your pocket, and then pull it out on the bus.

I'm interested to see what becomes of it too, but I doubt it will really make a splash, because it simply can't compete with even console gaming, let along PC gaming.

I'm also very frustrated with their claims of being developer friendly, yet only offering the SDK early to people who pay $700. If they really wanted to be developer friendly, they would give all the specs, details and SDK's as they made them to everyone that wanted them.

They also claim this whole required free gameplay is revolutionary, except windows phones and xbox indie marketplace all have it. I agree it's something all devices should have, (not having to publish 2 apps, one "lite" and one regular) but it's not something revolutionary.

Also I think they are misleading people with talks of minecraft being on it, from the specs it has, and from how much minecraft lags on computers, it seems like a pocket edition will be released, unlike the full version for PC, and the partial version that xbox has.

[SNIPERDUDE]

I think the only real revolutionary thing going for this is the fact that an indie developer actually has the opportunity for once to create games for consoles (sure there's XBLA, but they are far from being accessible. The recent news on Fez is an example)

They are making a lot of bold claims, though I think the potential for what people want is there (to a degree). I'd be interested to see how they manage the store. Will it end up being flooded with utter crap? If some type of straining process is added, what are the requirements? Will it end up being a "pay to get front page"?

I'm going to keep on watching this thing to see if they address the questions everyone (and notably devs) are asking.

In the end, all I really want is a way to develop for a console without paying a massive sum or going to AAA (there really is something better about playing on a TV with a controller).

[mirhagk]

Fez is on XBLA which is the arcade, not the indie market. The indie marketplace has no problems with publishing games on a console. If you are a student you can download all the tools you need and get a game up and running on the xbox in a couple hours. If your not you have to pay $100 to publish games on the xbox, and xbox will take 30% (same as with all the phone marketplaces).

The problem with the indie marketplace (and the reason why Fez didn't go on it) is that it is flooded with crap, just like this would be.

I think this isn't going to be very developer friendly, they already are shutting developers out of the design and specs, and API, and how the store is going to work, and nearly everything. If paying a premium now gets you early access to the SDK, what other offers will they give to people who pay more, getting on the front page? Getting additional hardware features?