The Ouya Is Basically Dead

CommanderFrank

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
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In what started out as a too-good-to-be-true Kickstarter funded program back in 2012, the Ouya video game console is looking more and more like it was exactly that.

Well, early reviews for the system were far from stellar, and game developers reported that for all their effort, it was pretty much impossible to make any money.
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Glad I pulled my funding for it.
They were given far more money than they needed, then said they needed more, then sold these to end-users rather than the donators first.

These guys can all go fuck themselves.

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Dead, I saw one at Target the other day. If they are dead I am sure they have patents they can make use of somehow.
 
hcforde said:
Dead, I saw one at Target the other day. If they are dead I am sure they have patents they can make use of somehow.
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I wouldn't really think so. they really aren't anything special. They are a more powerful version of a tablet running android and playing games from the Google Play store.
 
I hearken back to the infamous quote about COD: Ghosts: "Nobody ever saw this coming."

R.I.P. OUYA. Say hi to OnLive for me.

I do admire those who really think these projects will ever be successful. That childish wonder keeps me alive. Dream little birdies, DREAM!
 
This device was stillborn. A console less powerful than an average smartphone that only plays phone games was not a good idea.
 
I never understood the people who thought this was bad just because it didn't have Nintendo, Sega, Microsoft, or Sony tacked on the front. I guess advertising does work...
 
gersson said:
I never understood the people who thought this was bad just because it didn't have Nintendo, Sega, Microsoft, or Sony tacked on the front. I guess advertising does work...
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That wasn't why we thought it was bad.. if you still haven't figured it out, well I don't imagine me explaining it again will do any good.
 
The OUYA succeeded immensely; they collected their kickstarter money and got the fuck out. Anyone who thought anything of substance would come from it was delusional.
 
Skripka said:
Ah the joys of interest free loans.
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Kickstarter monies are loans? Here I thought they were donations that in no way required any amount of recompense to backers. Oh right, that's exactly what it is.
 
Aside from my PC, the Ouya is the "console" device I use just about every day. Yes, seriously. They could have been a success, but they made some really bad choices by focusing too much on gaming and their own app-store. They shouldn't have been a "game console" so much as they should have been an "Android box that facilitated media". In this case, they would have been the best at it. All they would have had to do to succeed is...

1.Make sure the damn thing was AOSP Android compatible, and frequently updated. The biggest mistake they made was keeping it just different enough that, despite the fact that tech-savvy folks could run just about any Android app on it, it wasn't easy to do so from the start. They could have captured a huge market of people who already were familiar with Android and had installed/purchased programs. Hell, let people sideload (or make a deal with) the Play Store, Amazon Market etc.. Furthmore, develop and release with FOSS licenses back to AOSP UI elements made to be navigated via bluetooth controller and the touchpad - it worked, it just needed to be properly supported and this would have made it a common, supported feature for most apps!

2. Make the Ouya store appear less the "only game in town" but an alternative repo that people wanted to use and develop for. Technically no different than any other Android app market, it would have been able to coax devs in by taking a lesser piece of the profits, allowing a wide variety of apps including root and hacker friendly ones etc, as well as big names like Netflix for Android and the like. Unfortunately, they made it just "different" enough that it took more work than an existing Android dev submitting the same package they submitted to Play, Amazon, or F-Droid, to Ouya, because of stupid quasi-technical decisions.

3. This is more of a personal pet peeve. Back during the old days they talked originally about some sort of partnership with XBMC. I'm very sure this alone would have given them a foot in the door. My Ouya is used every day as the very best network media player in its class I've ever had - it outclasses more expensive WDTV, AsusTV, Chromcast etc... and other units in its flexibility and power. Why? Because I installed XBMC on it! 48 fps 10-bit MKV contained H264/FLAC w/ Japanese subtitles? No problem! This could have been the killer app. Unfortunately, it took someone who had the knowledge to install the correct alpha version of XBMC for Android that had the proper HW accel flags on and all that. If it was an easy install, or part of the default Ouya install and auto-updatable, this alone would have made it a winner.

Its really sad that they ran the damn thing into the ground. Its still the best networked media player in my house at the moment that isn't full-on HTPC.
 
gersson said:
I never understood the people who thought this was bad just because it didn't have Nintendo, Sega, Microsoft, or Sony tacked on the front. I guess advertising does work...
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Yeah, that's not why we thought it was bad.
If you've read any of the posts in this thread, then you would know that. ;)
 
gersson said:
I never understood the people who thought this was bad just because it didn't have Nintendo, Sega, Microsoft, or Sony tacked on the front. I guess advertising does work...
Click to expand...

Yeah it must be corporate brainwashing that made people see a terrible idea for what it was.

A smart phone that needs a monitor of some kind and can't be used as a phone. It sat nicely between a tablet and a console in a gap that didn't exist.

A product that nobody wanted, nobody asked for, and nobody cared about. A product that got funded when you could have funded a masturbation manual on Kickstarter.

WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?
 
How could it have failed with an ARM processor inside? Makes no sense.

:D
 
I help fund this Ouya like many others. Got mine early and struggled with using it from day one. It was hard to side load anything, or at least I didn't put much effort into it. The touch part of the controller of janky, It was just a mess. I ended up selling it to some kids on craigslist and they went ape shit when I pulled it out of the car. They treated me like a rockstar because I had one and they weren't on sale yet. That was probably the best part of owning the damn thing. I'm sure once they got it home, they had a serious change of heart on just how cool it was lol. Poor guys. I sold it for $125 or $135 I think. Made a little bit of money.
 
Oh I still get these annoying emails from Ouya asking me to add a bank card to my account so I can make purchases. I was smart enough to never do that.
 
This thing was such a dumb fucking idea. I just don't understand why anyone would even remotely be interested in owning this.
 
Didn't have much hope being released with an under powered Tegra3 when it was being phased out on tablets/phones at the time, redundant if you already have a tablet/phone and no Google Play access meant limited app selection.
 
They mismarketed and mismanaged this device. There was a market for Roku style boxes that ran Android. Their only competitors were Chinese models being sold on Chinese import sites.

Instead, they stripped it of most the Google features and made a games-only OS. Had it been a $125 Android box that was reliable, came with XBMC, and also played Android games .. It could have worked.
 
So we have Desktop PCs, Mini-Desktop PCs, Laptop PCs, Ultrabook PCs, Macs, Tablets, Smartphones, Standard Consoles, Handheld Consoles, and a million different configurations and brands of all of those (except Macs). What the heck did this thing offer in a significantly better way that could not be done by one or more of all the rest of those devices and was worth the money for that advantage?
 
A friend of mine supposedly saw one at a Target in the San Jose area on clearance for around $10. Personally I would've snatched it up at that price just to tinker with it, but I have to admit even then it'd be a case of me trying to find a purpose for it rather than have it fulfill any particular need or want I actually have. *Shrug*
 
gersson said:
I never understood the people who thought this was bad just because it didn't have Nintendo, Sega, Microsoft, or Sony tacked on the front. I guess advertising does work...
Click to expand...

Branding had nothing to do with it. Everything else did.
 
Spidey329 said:
They mismarketed and mismanaged this device. There was a market for Roku style boxes that ran Android. Their only competitors were Chinese models being sold on Chinese import sites.

Instead, they stripped it of most the Google features and made a games-only OS. Had it been a $125 Android box that was reliable, came with XBMC, and also played Android games .. It could have worked.
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Exactly.
If it had been a Roku style box media box first that came with XBMC and the Playstore with the option to play Android games it could have made a killing.
Instead they back shelved media functions and tried to make it a gaming console first and did a rather poor job with the controller while they were at it.
I like mine enough because of emulators but the Ouya people seriously botched it.
 
A great idea with a horrible execution is a guaranteed fail. Doesn't matter how amazing the idea is. If the final product is garbage, it's still garbage.
 
Man, a lot of people, even on these very forums, were hyping the shit out of this thing. I knew it wasn't going anywhere...there's just no real market for it.
 
Hey, hey, hey, it's a solid paperweight with a perfect design so it's not ALL bad.
 
Well, for the time it seemed to be kind of exciting since the XBone and PS4 hadn't been released yet, nor had the Steambox been pushed very hard.
A different console that was ARM-based seemed like a good idea.

Too bad the games it plays are basically everything a smartphone can already play.
Also doesn't help that a controller can be used on a smartphone, as well as connecting a smartphone to an HDTV.

At the end of the day, it was too under-powered for anything serious, and was a waste of money for those who already had a smartphone.
Oh, and they were dicks when they sold the first units rather than giving them to all of the backers first like they promised.
 
I have an Ouya, and I've used it almost every day the past week. I have mine loaded with emulators and VLC media player. I use it up at my cabin and just was on vacation there this past week. Bring up a USB drive with a bunch of movies on it and I am ready to go. They "gave" me a bunch of store credit money for being a crowd funder, so that is the only money I've used to purchase things. I've been playing "The Cave" on it. (I know I can get it on steam, but it was "free" on Ouya)

So I'm not disappointed in it, but I wasn't one of those people that was thinking I was getting a $99 PlayStation. Again, mine lives at my off-grid cabin, so having a 4.5 watt device I can play games and watch movies on is great. Not exactly a use that will have a broad appeal.
 
Twisted Kidney said:
A product that nobody wanted, nobody asked for, and nobody cared about. A product that got funded when you could have funded a masturbation manual on Kickstarter.

WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?
Click to expand...

But that's not what happened. Clearly some delusional folks wanted it. This scam was funded by donations...
 
I don't play mine much, but I liked the idea of simple games and that's why I got it. And I've been using a PS3 controller on it no problems. I collect video game consoles, so I wanted to add it to the collection regardless.

I do not play games on my phone, too small.
 
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