
The $99 Ouya game console: Exciting, innovative — and probably doomed - evo_9
http://www.extremetech.com/gaming/132751-the-99-ouya-console-exciting-innovative-and-probably-doomed
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jerf
Personally I wouldn't consider it even remotely controversial that by XBox
360/PS3/Wii standards, the thing is doomed. There is an effectively zero
chance that this is going to sell into the tens of millions.

But that's a completely uninteresting observation, really. Who cares? The
question is, will they be successful on their own terms. That's probably
"profitable" rather than "took over the video game industry". Since they're
building on the Android base, their "success" or "failure" won't look like a
conventional console. If the entire thing is a miserable failure, games will
still be made for it, because there doesn't need to be Ouya-specific games. If
the company ships hardware, then blows up, it'll probably still have games
coming out for it, if for no other reason than the fact you can probably root
it. Conventional consoles don't have that characteristic. It changes things a
lot.

No, that new corner restaurant going in downtown probably isn't going to
threaten Applebee's... but... so?

~~~
JVIDEL
No console out there failed because it wasn't #1, it failed because it takes
money to support hardware, lots of money, and the companies behind those
consoles couldn't keep losing money and had to cancel it. The first Xbox lost
about $4 billion, but with MSFT behind it money wasn't a problem.

Even before the Wii Nintendo had been either #2 or #3 for the past 3
generations without a problem, because it was still making more than enough
money to even make their own games and design new hardware.

The new corner restaurant you mention _is not_ going to beat Applebees, but is
not going to stick around for too long if nobody goes there to eat either.

~~~
SoftwareMaven
Designing your own hardware (and the entire OS on top of it) is expensive.
Using off-the-shelf components and an Android base will help that immensely.
If Ouya can manufacture its console for slightly less than its $100 price
(assuming the kickstarter pledge level to be the price goal), it can build its
profits off the game store.

If they can make it reasonably easy to Ouya-fy an existing Android game, there
will be reasonable incentive to add games to the store. In my mind, this is
the riskiest part. Tablet and phone games are designed around touch. Many of
them won't convert to a controller well, which will limit the number of games
ported and make them more dependent on made-for-Ouya titles. They'll need to
be a good-sized market for that.

~~~
slantyyz
That they made the system hackable and open, however, means there's the
possibility that the Ouya can use a smartphone or tablet as a controller in a
similar fashion to the Wii U.

I think that the creativity from the side projects that come out of Ouya have
more potential to be disruptive than the console itself.

~~~
JVIDEL
Why not play the game on the smartphone/tablet then?

And you could get the same deal with XLIG and Smartglass

~~~
SoftwareMaven
Having hooked my iPad up to the tv so my boy and I can use our iDevices to
play Fifa Soccer, I can attest that the differences between playing on the tv
and playing on device are significant.

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gamble
Ouya reminds me of that open-source smartphone project everyone got excited
about a few years ago, Openmoko, before everyone also realized that it's
extremely expensive and difficult to put together a modern smartphone, and
that openness isn't compelling enough to make people tough it out with a half-
baked device.

~~~
omgsean
People only want to carry one phone, but dropping $99 on an Ouya isn't going
to prevent me from also being able to buy other consoles or PC gaming
hardware.

I'm thinking of buying one for the emulation alone.

~~~
laserDinosaur
"I'm thinking of buying one for the emulation alone."

Holy hell, I didn't even think of this. Android already has a bunch of emus.
Exciting!

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farinasa
This article is written on the assumption that if someone can get it free,
they won't pay. I find that truly hard to believe. The piracy demographic is
usually limited to two groups- people who believe they are beating the system,
and people who don't know they're hurting the system.

I think the attitude of the company plays a big role. For instance, music
companies won't fund music unless it is guaranteed to produce insane profits.
If people know that the company is offering good services at intentionally
fair prices, they will be more willing to not cheat the system.

Look at Louis C.K.: I'm a huge fan of him so I would have bought anyway, but
since he cut the cost down to $5, I think many people bought simply because
they believed the price was worth the content.

I think piracy is a result of a disconnect between users and creators. The
more middle men there are, the less people will care about the people
involved. When the writer is appealing to you that hey, please don't steal
from me, more people will have a heart about it.

~~~
guard-of-terra
There is also third group: people who don't have the money (think students).
But as I said they would not kickstart 100$ and therefore will not enter the
community in numbers until later in cycle.

~~~
talmand
Actually there are a large number of groups within the piracy label. That's
part of the problem because too many want to ignore that fact and pigeonhole
all those groups into the same "lost sales" bucket. That's why such people
usually have problems with addressing piracy and how to properly prevent it,
or at least soften its impact.

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yk
I surely hope that the Ouya will be a success, but I am far less sure that it
will be a success. On one hand, making a game for a regular Android device
with a touchscreen is a lot different from making a game for a gamepad. ( For
example drawing games simply do not work with a gamepad, while football games
do not work with a touchscreen/acceleration sensor). Atop of this the hardware
seems to be rather low spec, especially the lack of a real GPU seems to be a
problem.

On the other hand, with the feature list of the Tegra 3 and a bluetooth
keyboard, it would make a really nice streaming client/HTPC. And it is fairly
open, which should ensure hackability for stuff like a nice TV interface for
HN, home file server and probably even gaming ;)

In conclusion, I have the somehow wired feeling that it could be a rather huge
success but not as a gaming device but as the break through for "smart TV."
And it is somewhat raising hopes, that the developer specials (at $699 and
$leet) are sold out.

[edit] I forgot to add: The $99 price point is very nice, since this is about
the highest amount many people are willing to spend without a good reason. So
many casual gamers will probably buy one and figure other uses out later.

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Zenst
Sad thing is that whilst alot of people would love for something like this to
be available and have the games available to for it to do well. Well its too
easy to point out the mistakes or the worst case situations and play of on
those gaming more hits and adverts on a article and that maybe why the title
of the article is all doom and the content a little more pragmatic and
mindful.

If the article had the title "The $99 Ouya game console: Exciting, innovative
- a new hope" then people would read it in a different vain. Sadly that is not
the case.

Sure it's in all effect the same specs as the nexus tablet witht he added
bluetooth controller and no dsplay in many respects but thats not all what its
about.

Even if it fails, it has the potentual to create a niche android gaming
market/portal.

Good luck to them

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JVIDEL
I really don't want to see the Ouya fail, but then again I didn't want the
Dreamcast to fail either, and it did. SEGA was sort on cash back then, and
because some hackers found a way to play pirated games without a hardware mod
(the PSX needed a modchip soldered in the mainboard) it was the last straw for
that company, and when developers started to flee and hyped games like
HalfLife:Blue Shift were cancelled the dream was over.

I know some indies say piracy is not a bid deal for them, but it might be for
the Ouya: at $99 the company is either breaking even or losing money on every
unit, and the only way to get that money back is through games and
microtransactions, but if piracy is dead-easy then they may never recoup the
money, and like it happened to SEGA they will eventually run out of funds.

~~~
slantyyz
> the PSX needed a modchip soldered in the mainboard

Nope, the way people played copies on the first PS1 (before the modchips
arrived) was to use a spring loaded weight ($5) on the door sensor, boot a
legit disc and then swap to the copy after the boot sound. No modchip
required. The Sega Saturn required a mod, but it required no chip, just a few
wires and a switch.

If you didn't want to "spring for the spring", so to speak, you could do it
manually with a little more difficulty.

~~~
JVIDEL
On the Dreamcast it was all software, not even a jailbreak, just some code on
the pirated game. It left no traces, you could boot a legit disc and connect
to SegaNet, try doing that with LIVE and not get banned.

Right now pirating on a X360, either with LT, RGH or JTAG takes so much work
the vast majority of users don't bother to even try, but if it was like the
Dreamcast you would have a totally different situation.

~~~
slantyyz
IIRC, I had my import DC chipped, but shortly after, the Utopia disc came out
but by that time, I had lost interest in gaming for several years.

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pbreit
All these Ouya doomsday articles are frustrating. The team behing Ouya is
legit. The idea is reasonable. The iOS/Android-style development community is
completely different from console. Wii showed that a brand new console can
take off in a huge way with little marketing spend.

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danso
Are you serious? You don't think "Nintendo" in the name wasn't at all
beneficial? Or the library of first party exclusive games?

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pbreit
Yes. Yes. No. And my comment was about "marketing spend".

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jondcampbell
I wonder if everyone realizes that the money OUYA has "Committed" isnt really
committed yet, you can go into your kickstarter account and remove your pledge
any time before the time is up. It's a bet and a risky one at that, dependent
on the betting confidence of thousands of other people.

~~~
SoftwareMaven
I talked with a guy who raised $220k. He saw about 8% of that "disappear" in
failed charges (things like the card had expired). Of course, anybody can
unpledge, but those numbers are reflected in the current total.

~~~
laserDinosaur
So if a friend of mine had a Kickstarter project and I wanted to get it some
attention, I could use a credit card, donate $10k, and then cancel my credit
card straight after? Kickstarter would show it as a pledge but will never get
the actual money. It seems like very dangerous idea of course =)

