OUYA Will Change The Way You Game, at Least in The Living Room

Gaming is expensive. Consoles cost in excess of $300 and new games cost an average of $60 per title. As the gaming world progresses even further, it’s obvious that those costs will increase.

New, and more powerful, technology will lead to the creation of more valuable content, which will also lead to higher prices for a particular game title. As the economy gets worse, and people find they have less money to spend, video game prices will still grow.

OUYA aims to change the gaming world with their brand new console that is powered by the Android OS and is designed to run low-cost game titles. OUYA claims that their revolutionary console will provide affordable and free-to-play titles.

The OUYA will pander to indie game developers through open source development and will allow them to port, or develop, their games for playback on a home television. The indie gaming scene is booming, it’s about time we got a console that supported indie titles.

Developers interested in producing content for the OUYA console have only one caveat: “at least some gameplay has to be free.” Developers can offer free gameplay in the form of demos, free items like what’s included in freemium games, and even a trial period with subscription based models.

“OUYA will offer the best games possible – and a wide range of them – including new games developed specifically to take advantage of the OUYA console. As you can see in this Kickstarter, we’re already taking to some of the best-known game developers, and beloved indie game makers. We trust them to deliver the goods!”

The best part of the OUYA console is that it will be open source, which means OUYA will allow consumers to modify their consoles without voiding the warranty. In fact, OUYA encourages hackers to play around with the console, and take the platform to new heights. You won’t get that kind of support in any version of Microsoft, Sony or Nintendo’s consoles.

“For hackers: root it. Go ahead. Your warranty is safe. Even the hardware is hackable. Want to get inside? You’ll need a standard screwdriver and nothing more. Go to town. We have standard USB ports and Bluetooth, so you’ll even be able to create your own peripherals.”

The OUYA Console Hardware

The OUYA console will run the Android OS, and is outfitted with a substantial list of hardware to run games. The OUYA specs and internal hardware are nothing to mock. Technically the hardware won’t be on par with next-gen consoles, but if the bigger companies adopt a digital-only road then the OUYA will certainly be the forerunner.

The OUYA console will be equipped with the following:

• Tegra 3 quad-core processor
• 1GB of installed RAM
• 8GB of internal flash storage
• HDMI output with support for up to 1080p HD
• WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
• Bluetooth LE 4.0
• USB 2.0 (one port)
• Wireless controller with standard controls
  • Two analog sticks
  • Directional pad
  • Eight action buttons
  • A dedicated system button
  • A touchpad (for use with touch controlled games)
  • Android 4.0 OS

The OUYA Kickstarter Program

In order to make OUYA a reality, the developers started a Kickstarter crowd-funding page that will allow interested parties to financially support the project. The OUYA contribution limit was set at $950,000, but after just eight hours, the project reached its goal and raised over $1 million. On its second day, with 28 days left to go, OUYA has raised nearly $3 million in financial contributions.

The OUYA project is in the running to be one of the most successful Kickstarter funding campaigns ever, and is currently in third place.

The most successful Kickstarter campaign of all time was for the Pebble E-Paper Smart Watch which earned over $10 million. Trailing far behind is the Double Fine Adventure campaign which raised a total of more than $3 million.

As outlined on the Kickstarter blog, the OUYA project was the fastest to meet its goal and reach a substantial financial gain; it surpassed the $1 million mark in just over 8 hours.

Since the OUYA campaign has attained its goal, its a guarantee that the console will be pushed into production and made available for consumers. The OUYA console will sell for $99 once units begin to ship, which will likely be quite some time from now.

Kickstarter, if you’re not aware, allows small companies and independent developers, to raise money for a creative project through crowd-source funding. Crowd-source funding involves generous donations from interested parties that combine to create a budget for a project. If a Kickstarter campaign reaches its goal in the set amount of time then the project is funded and all of the money is transferred to the development company.