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OUYA Console Starts Shipping To Kickstarter Backers
First time accepted submitter Patch86 writes "The team behind the Android-based OUYA games console have announced last week that they have begun shipping their first consoles. As the console originated as a Kickstarter project the first consoles will be shipped to backers; the console is due to be released for general sale for the 4th of June with a $99 price tag. As the BBC notes, this is the first of a series of major new entrants into the games console market, with others on the horizon including fellow Kickstarter Android project Gamestick, Nvidia's CES surprise Project Shield, and of course Valve's 'Steambox.'"
now I have to look at angry birds on the TV as if it wasn't enough everywhere else! :OP
I've heard people mention that the Ouya won't really be all that - but I disagree. For the first time in a while, we have a console designed for the tinkerer and independent developer in mind, and it should be interesting to see what it brings to the table. Sure, when it launches, it won't be all that exciting - but given the resources available to Android developers of late, there is a lot of potential.
Of course, potential and five bucks gets you a coffee at Starbucks - but perhaps the Big Three need to feel the nipping of an indie console at their heels to get their butts in gear on new genres, new stories, and fresh ideas.
Finally a reason to kick my kids off my PS3.
I can never remember if thats a Kit Kat or Kool Aid commercial but thats how I pronounce the system - oh yeah.
We recently talked about the 'Ouya' console — a conceptual Android-based gaming device that's had a massively successful Kickstarter campaign. While most people are excited about such a non-traditional console, editorials at 1Up and Eurogamer have expressed some more realistic skepticism about the claims being made and the company's ability to meet those claims.
Sooooooo ... when do we own up to spreading FUD about this Kickstarter campaign? I mean, look at some of the highest rated comments.
;)
Well, I'm glad I got on board. Also glad I got in on the RFduino early on! I'll let you know how it handles when I get my hands on it
My work here is dung.
I'd like it more if these consoles rand Python based games so that hobbyists and new game makers could write them easily and get them out into the world.
I'm still waiting for my ouya to ship and I was a kickstarter backer. Apprently they missed the DELIVERY estimate of march 28. They also only shipped about 250 units to hand picked high profile people for review while everyone else gets the shaft. They've had my money for a long time now, other people have ouya, where's mine? They have horrible communication and leave everyone in the dark unless they donate thousands of dollars. We started their company and they can't even email us back when we send an inquiry as to what is going on with our units. Horrible company. Horrible PR. Horrible console because it REQUIRES a credit card to use. just bad. very disapointed. It'll be an emulator box for me, that's about it.
I am not sure I would consider ANY of those devices major new entrants, maybe with the exception of steambox but it is looking increasingly likely it will be priced out of the console market. These devices all seem to be aiming at niche markets within the console market, as such I am still somewhat sceptical that any of them can succeed in a way that would have a significant impact (that is not to say they won't succeed in their niche).
This (mostly negative) review insinuates that the Ouya is, as of now, only half-baked, but has potential:
http://www.theverge.com/2013/4/4/4180242/ouya-review
I'm still waiting for my ouya to ship and I was a kickstarter backer. Apprently they missed the DELIVERY estimate of march 28. They also only shipped about 250 units to hand picked high profile people for review while everyone else gets the shaft. They've had my money for a long time now, other people have ouya, where's mine?
You ... should probably just stop using Kickstarter. If you get upset when people miss deadlines, if you get upset when a fledgling company tries to build press, if you are not interested purely in helping something that otherwise wouldn't happen happen then do not use Kickstarter. Do yourself and the people trying to use Kickstarter and Kickstarter a favor and stop using it!
They have horrible communication and leave everyone in the dark unless they donate thousands of dollars. We started their company and they can't even email us back when we send an inquiry as to what is going on with our units. Horrible company. Horrible PR.
They're a small company, you want them to spend money on a call center or the device?
Horrible console because it REQUIRES a credit card to use.
That's not quite true, it sounds like it requires a credit card to download video games ...
just bad. very disapointed. It'll be an emulator box for me, that's about it.
So it's "just bad" and you're very disappointed despite never having used one or held one in your hands? They tried something bold and they succeeded. You should be happy about that. You don't understand what Kickstarter is and I hope this experience teaches you a valuable lesson -- stay off Kickstarter, it's not a goddamn store.
My work here is dung.
With so many excellent value priced entrants to the console gaming market, the big names (Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo) should be worried. It is becoming harder and harder to justify high price points with this kind of low priced competition.
Steam's entry seems more likely to get market share over the longer term, but all these options together make it clear that a TV-connected computer is available to run whatever you want, to any market that will pay. The financial barriers to entry are disappearing, and I think that's wonderful.
--Jaborandy
Considering that you've apparently NEVER done a new product from the ground up, you might want to cool your jets.
1) Hardware doesn't always fit a schedule, nor does firmware- the OpenPandora handheld missed its initial mark by a bit because of this.
2) The date was an estimated date.
3) If you wanted to have it "immediately" upon availability, you should've waited (like me...) to see if they were going to deliver.
4) Given the above four...perhaps using Kickstarter's not your thing.
Its life in my home is to become the new streaming media player with the added bonus of retro gaming.
Quad core goodness against my very tired & laggy ATV 2 = I'm happy to buy one from you angry early backers who no longer see a need.
The financial barriers to entry are disappearing, and I think that's wonderful.
In a comment to the last Steam box story, CronoCloud explained to me that after the North American video game recession of 1983, console makers have traditionally used financial barriers to entry as a way to sort out original, entertaining games from the sort of me-too crap that was plaguing the Atari 2600. Ability to surmount barriers to entry has been correlated with ability to produce a game that isn't a "hello world" or a clone of some 1980s arcade game.
It was Twix cookie bars (using "Oh Yeah" by Yello) or Kool-Aid soft drink mix.
But based on seeing various trailers posted by the Ouya team, it's closer to /u:j@/ "OO-yuh", or like Japanese "uuya". (I can't show proper IPA or kana here because Slashdot uses a strict character whitelist to avoid abuse of bidirectional override characters.)
Bring it on.
If I want a platform that has 50% FPS, then I'll go with one of the majors. I think Nintendo didn't learn the right lessons from the Wii and DS - they could've cornered niche markets of non-hardcore gamers, but failed to execute after years of visionary leadership.
Let's see some really innovative games that torture the myth that games require bleeding edge hardware power and a hefty investment north of $500. iOS really opened up the casual market, now it's time for the console to shine again.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
It is easy to be KS skeptic - because all these ideas are risky, people doing it for first time, underestimating risks, schedule, etc. etc. People *love* to say "I told you so", because, well, then we can say we can see the future a little bit (thus ensuring our survival a little longer).
While not all stuff on KS (and other crowdfunding sites) makes sense to me, I personally think these are great tools to get and/or test out lot of good ideas. In age when investors look for fast buck, when "that another social networking tool which will make us insanely rich" lottery attitude dominates, it is actually only way to do something unusual, something really risky.
Some ideas will definitely fail. However, we are yet to see big fiasco in crowd funding business. Usually people who are asking for pledges know that it is one shot they got and they don't wanna waste it (or they are really scam or jokers and you can easily tell them apart and usually their project is taken offline even before KS finish line). And sometimes they even have everything ready and just need money for scaling things up (mass production for example).
Will it change way how business is handled today? Hardly, at least not in nearest future. Will it help some really creative people to get their ideas out and see how they could work? Definitely. Some of these ideas will bear small yield, some of them - might change industries. In overall, it lets you try to make it work without middleman's mercy. Because middlemen - although not as evil as lot of us would think - are not infallible. They are humans like us and quite often make mistakes, especially when deciding not to doing something.
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
Let's wait until it proves itself against Nintendo and Sony before she start sacrificing pure white animals by it's bed. Other projects, like the Steam Box, are just as nebulous until they actually appear. Other consoles have come and not gone, and it is WAY too soon to call the OUYA a competitor for the venerated consoles.
I am a long time gamer and hardware/software nerd. I like the idea of a new console, but this not live long. I just dont see a market. The big three have their new consoles coming out which means the previous gen will be around $100.
They need to come out of the gate with must have games that all the kids talk about.If they dont get some pro developers on board the oyu will die a quick death. Games sell consoles, not the other way around.
The concerns I've Oyua have not been of non-delivery, well other than the Kickstarter haters that claim everything on there is a scam. The concerns I've seen are over functionality. Will it really go anywhere? Will anyone care? Many fanboys just seem to take it for granted that when it comes out, tons of stuff will get released for it and everyone will want one. I'm more skeptical. I think it'll be a toy that the backers and a few others play with for a bit, and then it gets set aside. I don't think it will compete well with smartphones and traditional consoles.
I've seen no plans for how they intend to attract big game publishers and that is what you need if you want to get many games on the platform, and games is what will sustain it long term. It is all well and good to crow on about open source but when you take a look at the number of OSS games, and the quality thereof, it is not very impressive. So to sell it to the masses and keep it rolling, you need more games and I've not seen any indication of what their plan is for that. It seems to be just "Release it and everyone will make cool shit for it!"
History is littered with failed consoles that can testify to that not being the case. Goes double for something that is smartphone level power, which will leave many people saying "So why not just use my phone?"
The challenge was never shipping the thing. They got plenty of money so that was easy, I mean it uses off-the-shelf components internally. It is just standard electronics design, testing, and assembly. The challenge is getting it to sell on the mass market, to be an item of interest that people keep buying, and buy successors to.
But at least you won't know what you are missing.
Of course people would know. "I am missing the consistent fun I had on one of the big three consoles, where the presence of my favorite franchises meant that I could just pick a game and enjoy it. Even though game demos aren't costing me any money, they are costing my time, and time is money."
Sure if you don't mind a big noisy box sitting on the floor
"Big"? They make PCs in smaller cases now. For example, I own an Acer that's not noticeably bigger than a launch Xbox 360. A Mac mini is about the size of a Wii. "Noisy"? How would a PC necessarily be any more noisy than a launch PS3 or launch Xbox 360?
that still needs a mouse and keyboard
I thought that's exactly what Steam Big Picture and controller-friendly games were supposed to fix.
and the associated loading times
I was under the impression that PC loading times tended to be even faster than console loading times after the first play because games are installed completely to the HDD. Or by "loading times" do you refer to download times?
and security updates that go along with it
As if seventh-generation consoles don't have those too.