The OUYA is an Android-based game console which first became publicly visible as a Kickstarter campaign. Its selling points were these:
- it's totally open source
- it'll run any software you write for it, unlike regular game consoles
- it's compatible with many existing Android games
- it'll cost $99, which is 1/3 the price of other consoles
- it's as fast as an Xbox 360 or something, I don't remember
- all games sold on its store are required have a free version
It exceeded its goal of $1,000,000, and ended up as the second-highest-funded project on Kickstarter.
But nobody made any games for it. Since it's open source, it's very easy to pirate games on it. Since its selling points are low console cost and free games, developers were worried that consumers wouldn't actually spend any money on games. And although it raised a lot of money on Kickstarter, only 80,000 people bought it, which is too small a potential audience for a developer trying to make a living.
It ended up getting pretty bad reviews from journalists, and the most exciting OUYA-exclusive game is Chess 2: The Sequel. The OUYA is still available to buy, but nobody's talking about it, so nobody knows about it, so nobody's buying it.
It had a really good Kickstarter, though.
I'd like to point out a few things about the Ouya:
ReplyDelete- It's not 100% open-source. There's still proprietary software involved. It's as open as Android is "open-sourced"
- Because of the proprietary software, many Android apps can't run natively on the Ouya. It's much like how the Kindle Fire runs Amazon's version of Android. I have one and it can't even run certain apps or even have the Google Play store on the stock operating system without rooting and other work arounds.
-The hardware itself runs as well as a flagship Android phone did a year and a half ago. It holds a Tegra 4 processor and I think 1gig of ram. Not really a console powerhouse.
-People do talk about the Ouya, Unfortunately, they talk about how much it sucks.
The ideas and marketing were all there. That's essentially what people initially bought into. The product itself fell short of expectations.
Thanks for the lengthy reply! I wrote this based off memory, so I'm sorry about all the technical details I got wrong. I agree with all your clarifications/corrections.
DeleteI agree that the ideas and marketing were there from a consumer standpoint, but from a developer's standpoint, the whole thing seemed like a terrible idea.
A game console is nothing without games. Developers make games for platforms that have consumers, and consumers buy platforms that have games. It's a chicken-and-egg problem. And during the Kickstarter, they acted like the problem didn't exist — they didn't mention the challenge, and they didn't mention any solutions. That, by itself, is the reason I didn't try to make any games for it.
They started to address it at some point by paying developers for time-limited exclusives, like Chess 2. If they'd done that at the beginning, wayyyy more consumers and developers would've been on board. I say this as a developer who would've been on board.
Anyone with an ounce of console history knew it was gonna flop. That includes most developers and many gamers.
If they had addressed the ecosystem problems, the technical problems wouldn't have mattered.