Reasons why OUYA is a bad idea (at best)

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/IanFisch/20120711/173901/

by nemo1618 • 14 years ago

32 22 14 years ago

This post describes the "Captivity of Negativity"

Then there's the slamming of mobile game developers "People who do exist are the hacks who are responsible for the 99 cent garbage you see flooding the iPhone and Android app stores."

batiudrami• 14 years ago

Mobile games are garbage. They, at best, are pay-for flash games, and at worst, are a small fraction of a game designed to push you into paying money to unlock features which are a near unfeasible grind to unlock normally (if it's even possible).

The only way they shine is Draw Something/Words With Friends-style turn-based multiplayer, and even then they still suffer from the issues I noted above.

I have far more fun playing Pokemon on an emulator on my phone than I've had with any mobile game to date.

kposehn• 14 years ago

I do agree that there is something about OUYA that makes me hesitate to plonk down my $99 for a console.

However, I'm not sure it is all the reasons outlined by the article.

untog• 14 years ago

I don't disagree with any of the points raised. I think the counter to all of them is that the console costs $99. It's quite possible to have a speculative purchase of it on the basis that it might work out, but even if it doesn't, it's a perfectly hackable box you could maybe use as a media centre.

The bigger fear to my mind is that despite taking all the money, they'll somehow never ship a product. Certainly, they are not obliged to by the terms of Kickstarter. I'm sure they will, though.

TimJRobinson• 14 years ago

A lot of the same arguments were made about the wii when it first came out (specs are crap, no good games, controllers are unconventional so games have to be recoded for them), it still did quite well.

Though even if everything else fails I'll still enjoy it as a $99 media streamer.

eostyx• 14 years ago

Exactly the same as my sentiment.

Why are all these gaming tech "pundits" jumping on the internet hate bandwagon. It stifles innovation and is regressive. There's no telling if this will be a success because that's entirely up to the developers/community/designers that may or may not lead it.

I donated because I want to see that consoles by definition not need to be the latest and greatest (I have my PC for that and most people will have extensive "fanboy" wars over the next console put out by either Sony or MS). Not only that but I support the idea that Android could be THE entry level to game development. It could be an amazing learning tool for beginners, everywhere.

I'm starting to hate using HN... Anyone found good alternatives?

hello_asdf• 14 years ago

This blog seemed rather negative about the system, but I'm still excited to see how OUYA turns out. I know that I can hook up a box to a tv, and program for it. Most programmers know that. However, it's the idea that you're programming for a standalone console that just makes me want to code.

ekianjo2• 14 years ago

This is a crap of a post if I ever see one. It's easy to see the huge amount of bias in the lines. I need to say before writing further that I am not interested in the OUYA stuff, but I'm curious to see how it does, and there's probably some kind of market for it.

"1. android game list not compatible" : There are several apps on Android which enable games working with touchscreen only to be translated to physical controls by simulating touch pressure at precise points on the screen. Of course, this wouldnt work for Angry birds of game such as that, but there are a number of games for which this approach will work.

"2. The Android Game Library is Extremely Lackluster" : Yeah, maybe. But apparently there's some significant profit happening from a bunch of game creators, if not they would have stopped making games for Android a long time ago.

"3. Indies Will Not Fill the Void" : Why not? We have seen Braid on Ubuntu store even though it's a tiny portion of the market for games. There will be support from Indies. Porting something to the OUYA will be something fairly easy since the hardware is standard and the environment is already one people are familiar with. Cost of porting will be very low, I believe.

"4. The Userbase Problem" : They already solved this partly by : - adopting Android and therefore benefiting from Android market games - ensuring ports would be easy to make with standard hardware and environment, as my previous point. - and it seems, at least from Kickstarter, that there is some strong market interest for it, at least for a niche market.

"5. Some Things Just Don't Scale" : Author focuses on online capabilities, but just like on other consoles, you dont need online to enjoy great single player games like Limbo or Braid.

"6. Games are Moving Away From the TV" : Yeah, so what? There will still be always a market for TV-games. It's not like everyone is going to stop playing games on a big screen. There will be a market for it. Noone is ever considering that the games' market will be 100% mobile in the years to come. It may be decreasing because of the old business model as well, and the lack of innovation on home-based consoles.

"7. Android Specs Move too Fast" : Yeah, and so do hardware specs for PCs, yet games usually support a wide range of hardware capabilities, to be able to run in different resolutions and different processors, while still remaining playable. I don't see the big deal there. And nothing prevents them for updating the OUYA every 2 years or something while still keeping game compatibility, something impossible with current consoles.

I can't believe someone claiming to be a developper in the game industry wrote that post. Seriously.

rje2• 14 years ago

Not to mention for #1 there are some games that already support controllers through the gamepad support in Android 4.0. If the Ouya supports that they may very well work 'out of the box'.

As a developer I'm happy to see someone trying to tap into the market in new ways, and I can't fathom why there's so much hate generated towards the product.

ekianjo2• 14 years ago

By the way, seen on another article on the subject :

"So what is Ouya, you ask? Ouya is a game console built on the Android operating system. Its creators pitched it as a platform for independent developers, and it clearly has big potential. In just 24 hours, 20,000 people bought an Ouya console — a product they had never heard of before yesterday. By way of comparison, Microsoft sold 326,000 Xbox 360 consoles in its first week after many millions of marketing dollars."

I think this clearly shows there is a market for it, just like there is a market for old-style Adventure Games a la DoubleFine.

Danieru• 14 years ago

OUYA is a startup. A startup's job is to explore new markets at a high risk.

Maybe that is too abstract, I'll reword it. A startup's job is to overcome challenges and create the non-obvious.

Each of those 'reasons' are just challenges that OUYA will have to overcome to succeed. The reasons do not make OUYA a bad idea, but rather a hard idea.

drivebyacct2• 14 years ago

This post is so bad, I have a paragraph response to each one and I'm too damn lazy to type them. The only one worthy of discussion is the first one. It seems like this publicity could be an easy way to help solve this problem if they do it right.

kerryfalk• 14 years ago

I hate to add another "this is why HN is going down the tube" post so I'm going to try and be very constructive here.

There are naysayers for every idea. For new ideas there are more of them than when the ideas are established.

Every new product sucks. All of them. Some suck less. But the good ones improve with time.

I do not want to be part of a community that rallies against people trying to do great things with passion and change the status quo.

To me as a gamer and a guy who learned to do basic HTML as a pre-teen because he loved games and learned to hack at games with others far more experience than me this seems like an absolutely brilliant idea. If I were 13 again, I would be figuring out how to build games for OUYA if for nothing else than to be cool among my group of friends.

This comment comes from the gut and is not as analytical as some of my others but this post does not belong here.

OUYA team, I salute you. I don't care about the shortcomings of your initial product, I think your idea is sound and it seems there are thousands of people who seem to agree.

maratd2• 14 years ago

I'm sorry, but your impassioned and eloquent post is wasted on the garbage you're responding to. If it was a well thought-out critique, it might be warranted, but the author couldn't even be bothered to proof read. There are horrible spelling and grammar mistakes throughout the entire article. And I'm not being picky. If I have to stop and think about what words are missing from your sentence so that I can understand it, I'm not going to bother thinking about what ideas the sentence actually tries to convey.

jdechambeau• 14 years ago

I'm not seeing any typos or missing words. Could you point out a couple for me?

saket123• 14 years ago

Common posters..lighten up..this is a start-up trying to be really bold and are making some cool stuff. Isn't that what's a start up is about. For me this post criticizes sprit and innovativeness and hence is a bad one.

postfuturist• 14 years ago

Refutations:

1. A lot of games already support the Sony Experia Play gamepad layout which is extremely similar to this controller. I own that phone, there are plenty of games. This is just plain wrong.

2. Nonsense, plenty of fantastic games. Maybe not XBOX 360 / PS3 level of library, but is that necessary for success? I think not.

3. Yeah, there's junk, but there are also a lot of gems. So what, that's what ratings are for. Plenty of crap available on all game systems. This isn't competing on having specific games, but being an open platform. Expensive dev-kit not required. People actually like that, even if they don't use it. I love low-budget indie games. Lots of other people do, too.

4. Android already has great games. The games are already there, or trivially easy to port. A lot of developers added support to the Sony Experia Play after the fact when that came out. There's a good chance all those games will work on day 1 on OUYA.

5. No real compelling argument here. Android is an open system for networked games, they can work however they work. What's not economically feasible about games running their own servers or having multiple competing server services. These already exist in the PC game world.

6. Well the success of current consoles suggest that lots of people still do (and will continue) to game in their living rooms staring at their giant HD screen. I do.

7. Specs moving too fast? The XBOX 360 is dramatically "behind" in specs (not to mention the Wii), but as we already know, the tech specs of game systems aren't really much of a limiting factor in creating enjoyable experiences.. Hell, lots of people love games made for radically out-of-date consoles. Who is going to be writing games in 2 years for Android that doesn't run on current best-in-class android devices? Idiots, that's who.

8. We'll see...

portmanteaufu• 14 years ago

It's obvious that the OUYA benefits from the existing Android ecosystem, but what I'm really looking forward to is the benefit that the Android ecosystem will get from the OUYA. If the OUYA experiences even moderate success it will draw a lot of neat games into the marketplace for people with a mobile device to enjoy.

chaostheory• 14 years ago

I think the author fails to see that OUYA isn't made to replace the Xboxes, Wiis, and PS's of the world. OUYA is not for the mainstream. OUYA is a cool and cheap experiment. It's a cheap TV gaming box for hackers and developers akin to the venerable GP32 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GP32

Reasons why OUYA is a bad idea (at best)

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