OUYA: a hacker-friendly Android console seeking Kickstarter funds
A new Kickstarter project has launched for "OUYA," an Android-based, open-source console.
Update: The campaign hit its goal at 2 p.m., less than 10 hours after it launched.
A new Kickstarter project is making waves, by proposing an open-source, hacker-friendly platform using Android as its backbone. "OUYA" merges the "satisfying" experience of a console with the developer-friendly nature of the Android marketplace. The project is seeking nearly a million dollars in funds, but it's already managed to reach more than half its lofty goal within just a day.
The project's goal is $950,000, a figure it's likely to hit. It's been less than a day, and it's hit more than $590,000. That's no doubt because the higher dollar amounts, $95 and $99, offer the console itself as a reward. So far, the project hasn't outlined any stretch goals, but they seem likely.
The funding will go towards converting the prototype to production models with approvals from regulatory agencies, development kits, production orders, and possibly some first-party game development. It also claims that games will be required to offer a free element, be it a demo or the full game with microtransactions.
OUYA has already specified its technical specs, including a Tegra3 quad-core processor, 1 GB of RAM, 8 GB of flash storage, an HDMI connection, and Android 4.0. The controller looks fairly standard for consoles, with eight action buttons, two analog sticks, a D-pad, and the addition of a touch pad.
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Steve Watts posted a new article, OUYA: a 'hacker-friendly' Android console seeking Kickstarter funds.
A new Kickstarter project has launched for "OUYA," an Android-based, open-source console.-
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They're hoping indie devs jump on this like they did iOS and even put their effort here instead of XBLA. To me this could tap the casual market if it's successful, and undercut WiiU like iOS undercut 3DS.
I can see the appeal, cheap way to get it onto the homes largest screens and easy to port to. But I think it has a tough go ahead of it getting into places like Wal-Mart where most consumers purchase consoles. If it can't get that it will be a niche product for indie enthusiasts.
It could work, but I feel like Apple will expand their TV project into this space and grab any momentum this generates.
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Don't take what I'm saying the wrong way; I love all my gaming systems and wouldn't want to be without games from major publishers. However, when I'm sitting at my computer browsing through all my games, Civ V is so much more tempting than Audiosurf. Having a dedicated box in my living room for indie games, I would plop down on my couch and play that stuff for hours on end.
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That's a good point. If it has any market traction at all it will just cause MS and Sony to make their indie dev kits better and make Apple jump into this space quicker.
Like Onlive, where it seems to me online will be most remembered for showing how Cloud gaming could work, while larger corps eat them alive once the tech is really ready for mass markets.
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I find myself very skeptical. Developers generally turn to consoles because of their huge install base and difficulty of piracy. This console has neither of those, and "built for hackers" is going to read to many of them as "built for piracy". Some indies will probably support it, but if it gets a reputation for losing people money it's going to die fast.
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They're pricing it at around $100 which is pretty cool.
To be honest this is kind of exactly what i want from a console, i want a simple, cheap system plugged into my tv that i can play indie games on.
Whether or not this will survive (it probably wont..) is besides the point, i'm pretty sure someone is going to offer this kind of device at some point, probably apple.
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They have certainly considered all those when they set their price. Perhaps it's just an incentive to get additional investors behind it when they see it's selling like hotcakes? Or they have something already negotiated that is based on a number of pledges?
How was the One Laptop Per Child thing funded anyway? Governments bought them in quantities and those $99 already covered manufacturing cost?-
OLPC is a totally different concept and fundamentally a charity. This, I assume, is a for profit business. Having a funded Kickstarter is not a measure of success. Around here we have millions of installs and that is how we generate revenue from ads and IAP. Ten thousand or even tens of thousands of consoles isn't a solid base. I know the idea is just to take normal Android games, but most Android games are touch based and there will have to be port work for a controller. For some titles that might be a major undertaking. Not worth it with that small of a base.
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Yeah but what does charity have to do with it? Were they accepting donations that were not tied to a number of laptops? It all sounds that with the right manufacturing quantity the sheer volume times the $99 would be higher than the real manufacturing cost per console and gamepad + UI development + research + marketing.
Adapting the graphics and controls to a controller is something Android developers might want to look into anyway in order to make their Android games HDTV proof. With certain frameworks on iOS the transition from touch screen to mouse on Mac OS is not too hard, but then, of course a controller is different and it entirely depends on how your gameplay is designed around the touch controls (World of Goo is something that wouldn't play well with a controller anyway.)
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haha. tell me about it. i understand that their pitch is more polished, and their team more credible, but the idea is almost the damn same. i dont think they stole it by any means, just two similar ideas at around the same time.
while it validates that i had the right idea, it kicks my nutsack that they made 1.5 million on day one-
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i didn't ask through the shack directly, it was before i knew how to exactly. i think i submitted it as a tip, but signal to noise problem there.
either way, if they can pull this off, all the better. it irks me to get my ass kicked on a personal level, but i'm happy to see a new type of option available for indies
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I backed it for the price of the console, I think it has promise and I think will be a better investment then the Wii. I haven't turned on my wii in over a year because of lack of something to play in my opinion. I think this could really help with casual gaming when I just want to drop 20-30 minutes into a game and not do anything serious. Or if I want to sit for a while and play something serious I can do that too. I hope this is awesome, and I put my money where my mouth is. :)
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People don't know, its all based on an honor system.
We're still waiting to get the first big Kick starter failure, there have been small ones, but we haven't seen one of the bigger ones fall to the way side yet. It will happen, and when it does it will hurt the whole process as more eager donators realize what they're paying (gambling on) for.
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You only have to put up a little money, so even if it does fail your risk would be pretty small. But yes, at some point a project with a lot of eyes on it will either turn out to be a scam, or crash and burn, which will likely cause Kickstarter to have more rigid policies for getting projects onto the site, which will lock out the very indies they want to appeal to.
But for now it's working, and your investment is small. If a product you'd love to have isn't worth a 15 dollars of risk to see happen, then you're really leaving up to the large companies to serve you.
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Also, anyone notice the similarity of the concept with the nD? http://the-nd.com/ Except this one's less vapourware.
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Of course, I can't forget the obligatory OnLive plug. It's interesting to me that this is so hugely popular while OnLive also sells their "console" box with a controller for $99.
So what makes this project so much more popular?
Is it because it runs games locally rather than on the cloud?
Is it because it's open, free, indie/developer-friendly and such?
The marketing?
There's an OnLive client for Android so you can always use it that way too.-
While the concept for this thing is interesting, it is doomed to fail because nobody wants trashy android games to play on their bigscreen ( I don't think anyway), the console will not have a killer app and good luck attracting devs when you advertise the console as "hacker friendly". I'm sure developers will love to develop for the piracy box.
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Games are bad man :( Going through my Xoom, these are just a few games that are awesome on the big screen...
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.madfingergames.shadowgun&hl=en
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.madfingergames.deadtrigger
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.gameloft.android.ANMP.GloftM3HM
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.sega.sonic4epi
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.rockstar.gta3&hl=en
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ea.games.meinfiltrator_na
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ea.deadspace_na
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.vectorunit.green&hl=en
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.trendy.ddapp&hl=en
This is a TINY handful of whats on the market.
"Trashy" just smacks of being uneducated in terms of what can be done on the Android platform, if you've played any of these games you wouldn't make such comments.
In terms of attacking devs, why would it be hard? You have a market for gamers, you have a game. The game is already on the platform in the Google Store, and probably the Amazon Market. The majority games I've listed above don't contain in game purchases.
The better question is why wouldn't you publish your game to this platform, the work is done, and the changes you would need to make even if you did want to include in game purchases is probably minor.
You also have a misunderstanding of what "hacker friendly" is vs piracy, and as a gamer you should know better, pirating can be done on virtually any system created to this point, you should be praising this platform and the developers who are willing to try something new.
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I'll read through the thread in a minute. What do you guys thing about Ouya vs.
- Steam
- Desura
- OnLive
- iOS App Store
- Traditional Channels
- - PC Games
- - Xbox Indie games (typically 80 pts)
- - PS3 Indie & Mini games
- - Rumored expansion of Wii U reaching out to Indie devs
I'm very interested, but I wonder about market penetration and the reality that other options are already readily available. -
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Dude, check the link and read for 5-10 minutes the point is to get a console that's cheap, both for developers and the gamers and one that works on the free-to-play model.
The fact that it runs android is a big deal, take a step back an look at the big picture, sure the things you will probably see there first will be android phone games, angry birds and all that crap but the android SDK is out there now and it's free... Think that Instead of spending tens of thousands of dollars on licensing fees, dev-kits, deals with publishers etc. You can start working (for free) on something for that console RIGHT NOW, not when you get your developer console, NOW.
That means that if you get an Idea for a game about a unicorn-riding-ice-cream man on the vein of the old paper boy you can do it, you could do it on your pajamas and nobody would care.
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