Ouya to Launch Second Kickstarter Campaign for Games

By Jane McEntegart
published

Ouya wants to give devs a million dollars.

Ouya is probably one of the most well known Kickstarter success stories. The $99 Android console started out as a campaign on the crowdfunding website last summer and has since blossomed into a successful product. Now the company behind Ouya is returning to the well in an attempt to boost its library of titles for the console.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Ouya will be launching its second Kickstarter campaign in August. The goal is to jump start the development of games for the platform. As such, this Kickstarter is a little different from most. For one, Ouya isn't just asking fans for money. Instead, the company's million dollar campaign will match funds from developers. Ouya said that any dev pledging between $50,000 and $250,000 will have their funds matched by Ouya, and the highest pledging developer will receive an extra $100,000 from Ouya.

Of course, Ouya isn't going to just hand over hundreds of thousands of dollars without getting a little something in return. WSJ reports that developers taking part in the campaign will have to make their games exclusive to Ouya for the first six months of availability. Still not a bad deal, but a sure advantage for Ouya.

Jane McEntegart
11 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Spooderman
    We'll see how this one goes based on the feedback so far.
    Reply
  • Johmama
    "Ouya is probably one of the most well known Kickstarter success stories."

    1. Isn't it 1 of only like 3 Kickstarter projects to even get fully completed?
    2. "Success" is subjective. Look at rating of the Ouya after launch. You can't even play all the games developed for Android (why would that do that?)
    3. What are the terms of the money-match? If I'm just some guy with an extra $100,000 lying around and promise to only develop games for Ouya for the first 6 months, will they match me? I guess what I'm getting at: is there any clause that specifies the quality of the developed games, or can it just be Tetris Clone IV: Blocks of Doom?
    Reply
  • They should just give it all to the team that made The Amazing Frog lol.
    Reply
  • aoneone
    Ouya still around? Jeezus, I thought they tanked harder than Virtua Gameboy. I mean.. who's going to buy Ouya when Oculus Rift, PS4, Xbox One is just around the corner? =(
    Reply
  • IndignantSkeptic
    OUYA needs to die. They've totally tricked everyone because it is not Android compatible. WTF?!
    Reply
  • DRosencraft
    The fact that they even need to crowd-fund a game project for a system that launched only a month or so ago tells you just about all you need to know.
    Reply
  • antilycus
    to all the cry babies that want an android based option for the TV. Go buy a tegra3 enabled phone or tablet and hook it up via HDMI. There, now shut it. Good luck finding one for 100 bucks, btw.

    I don't want the 10000000 rehashed craptacular games that Android and iOS have to offer ON PHONES. That's not what kick starter was about. It was about bringing fun games back to the TV and giving all developers a chance. (it's 250k for a dev kit for PS3 or XBOX 360, then if you have an update on XBLIVE it costs 15k per update, its not a system designed for Indie Developers).

    I like OUYA, alot. It reminds me of when games where great and not just money making rehashes, lacking soul. THe problem they have is that it's a linux O/S (like all android devices are) that requires Windows to develop games on. OUYA probably grabbed more people that use linux (as kickstarters) than windows. Blender needs help. I reached out to OUYA and they said that it's up to Blender to figure it out. But they two need to work together.

    If you want your $500 PC in a box (PS4, XBOX One) go ahead and buy it. I have 100 bucks and i want fun games, not to mention OUYA will probably be able to play way more "powerful" games than either of those two, soon.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fZQGuVHyAE
    Reply
  • teh_chem
    11188386 said:
    to all the cry babies that want an android based option for the TV. Go buy a tegra3 enabled phone or tablet and hook it up via HDMI. There, now shut it. Good luck finding one for 100 bucks, btw.

    I don't want the 10000000 rehashed craptacular games that Android and iOS have to offer ON PHONES. That's not what kick starter was about. It was about bringing fun games back to the TV and giving all developers a chance. (it's 250k for a dev kit for PS3 or XBOX 360, then if you have an update on XBLIVE it costs 15k per update, its not a system designed for Indie Developers).

    I like OUYA, alot. It reminds me of when games where great and not just money making rehashes, lacking soul. THe problem they have is that it's a linux O/S (like all android devices are) that requires Windows to develop games on. OUYA probably grabbed more people that use linux (as kickstarters) than windows. Blender needs help. I reached out to OUYA and they said that it's up to Blender to figure it out. But they two need to work together.

    If you want your $500 PC in a box (PS4, XBOX One) go ahead and buy it. I have 100 bucks and i want fun games, not to mention OUYA will probably be able to play way more "powerful" games than either of those two, soon.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fZQGuVHyAE
    But the problem with what you mentioned is that, price aside, the Tegra3 architecture has severe bandwidth limitations when it comes to cloning a display output whilst doing 3d graphic processing for a built-in display. It simply lacks the bandwidth to process 3d acceleration for games AND clone the display to the port in addition to the built-in screen. This is where OUYA has a leg up. A lot of Tegra3 phones have problems with graphically-simple game performance on an external monitor. Plus, OUYA has a slight advantage with a small clock bump, and not being in a tiny phone enclosure.

    That being said, I think OUYA wasn't a properly thought-through project. It was built with an aging processing platform (even a Snapdragon S4 Pro would have been a much better option IMHO), so its quasi-doomed to not being able to run the more-advanced software/games at released (vs. its idea of being an advanced android gaming console; there are already phones and tablets that beat it with graphical capability). It went from a "let's try this neat thing on a small scale," and was turned into a multi-million dollar project that (I think) has suffered from its own success.

    What makes you say that OUYA will be able to play more "powerful" games than a PS4 or XBoxOne? Nvidia Grid hasn't advanced beyond an internal R&D project yet, and the initial demos are very basic to claim to play more "powerful" games, or even work on a consumer-end anytime soon.
    Reply
  • IndignantSkeptic
    Antilycus, there are going to be Android consoles that are not just Android-based like OUYA. Everyone should have just bought those instead of the OUYA.

    I don't see that it is possible for OUYA to play more powerful games than PS4 and XBox One until a future version of the OUYA is more expensive than those next generation consoles at that same time. Assuming OUYA consoles will always be released new at $100 then we would have to wait until the next generation consoles are being sold new for less than $100. That is going to take a long time considering current generation consoles still haven't even gone down that low in price yet.
    Reply
  • somebodyspecial
    If they are really revving yearly, it will be T4 next July, T5 2015, T6 2016, T7 2017 (and NV should be a year ahead of this schedule, ouya is T3), merely half way through consoles lives for next gen. I'm thinking little ouya will be very impressive in a few years. We will be talking nearing 10nm. That's 3 die shrinks on current consoles chips, surely faster die shrunk memory, on chip large caches, etc etc to help them catch next gen consoles which will be stuck in stone for 8yrs from today. This should be a close contest in 2017 if not surpassed by tablets/arm consoles etc. Not to mention if they made the thing a little bigger they could get far better cooling and even more watts. I'd like to see what a $150-200 version could do in 2017 :) At least some Volta tech should be in Tegra7. We may even have 3D chips and transistors then. Anyone thinking your tablet won't catch a console before 2021 is in denial. What is that like Tegra 11 based on tech not even announced (volta's 2nd or 3rd replacement tech?). We will be under 10nm by 2021.

    From a 28nm chip in PS4/xbox1 we will be talking 4 die shrinks before 2021. If ouya, shield etc survive that long we will be talking some serious freaking horsepower especially if they enlarge the box by your TV to anywhere near xbox1/ps4 size (why not?). There is no need for ouya to be in such a small box. Another few dollars in plastic can't matter that much and you can put a huge fan inside then to expel heat and raise the watts. Think T7 with 100watt psu with 16GB of memory, 500GB HD etc (500gb on newegg is only $46 now, how much by 2017? 1TB for $30?). With the next rev or two they need to shoot for 1080p and add a psu so you can up the power, then charge say $150 next year, $180-$200 a year or two later (that's a good $40 for psu $40 for HD and $5 for a fan right?). You'd be blowing away a 360/ps3 and charging less just due to a console that is created 10yrs later than these two without media/bluray etc and cheapo games to woo people vs next gen $65-70 games. Easy pickings. Graphics could be scalable for older gen at 720 and new gen 2yrs out at 1080p. But I'd rather see NV do this or ouya needs to drop the walled garden. Just charge an extra buck or something for games bought through googleplay/tegrazone (or do some deal with them for a fee) so you get the huge game/app library from there.

    Either way, the 8yr stuck in stone console days are over. Games are too cheap on android (and can still make you rich, it will make many millionaires from small devs) vs. consoles and ouya etc hardware can be updated yearly. In 3yrs they should easily (anyone on arm) be able to put out a 100w box with 500GB drive and 8-16GB of memory for $200 and the full android library backing it which should be quite extensive by then (that may be a google console...LOL already coming). It might sound like selling the same thing as next gen until you consider game prices/apps etc. We should have a boatload of unreal 3 games by then on android among other engines that are running on there now.

    Consoles, if they're lucky will have sold 30mil each vs a 2.5Billion per year group to aim at as a game dev and you have to dev to some degree for each of the 3 consoles. Everything will be able to decode 4K by then too and 4K TV's will be the norm by 2017. consoles only sell ~10mil/yr each for 7-8yrs (roughly 240mil together for all 3 consoles over their lives). This gen won't sell like that vs android gaming for broke people (LOL). Devs will run from a shrinking audience as shown at GDC 2013 with 60% planning mobile stuff and less than 13% for consoles. These numbers will get worse. I suspect GDC 2014 will show 70% mobile, 10% console and 80% mobile/5% console by 2015 GDC. From there the only people making console games will be sony/ms/nintendo...ROFL. This is almost already the case for WIIU/Vita/3DS (all less than 6% planning games). All of these have been out less than 2yrs right? All already about to die even with price cuts on all 3.

    When you can charge $10 for a game and DWARF console profits you head to the masses on mobile and don't look back. Piracy nearly combats itself at $5-10. There is no point in taking the time to bother with piracy when it's just $5 for a game on android...LOL. A game like Bard's Tale is $3 right now (only $6 usually)-sure a 2004 game but for poor folks $3+100 console isn't bad if you missed xbox/x360/ps3 etc due to game prices and expensive hardware up front. Considering games like that only sold a few million on consoles they get to sell them to a Billion unit audience now and potentially 2.5B in 2yrs. You get your money's worth at these prices even with no replay value. At $60+ I read metacritic, gamerankings, and quite a few reviews before even pondering buying your game. At $5-10 I don't cry if it isn't FABTASTIC AAA quality as long as fun factor is there. At $60+ I want to kill someone if I beat it in a weekend...ROFL. There is no comparison in a crap economy. People are fairly broke and it won't get better for years. Games at $65 won't survive and neither will huge EA type companies with HUGE overhead and tons of wasted resources. Today all we usually get from them is 10hrs of flashy graphics with very little substance. You can make some great games with smaller devs and no wall street pushing companies to put out crap for bottom lines. The cherry on top for these jerks is 3-5 DLC packs for another $10each. They are basically charging you $100 for the same game you used to get for $50. Android will end this with $0-10 out of the gate and another $10-20 milking with DLC. Much better for gamers and devs with a huge audience. How do you compete with games that at the top end only cost $20? That is cheaper than Vita/3DS (which hit $40). Devs like Gameloft will rise to the top while huge devs like EA will be taken down a few pegs. Look how many have went belly up in the last 5yrs. THQ etc...

    Is there a phone more powerful than T3 for $100? I don't think so. Also it comes with a 2yr contract attached usually which costs you $1800-2400 when handed to you "FREE". Smartphones cost $2000 not free. Only Ting or others like it lessen the sting of a smartphone bill. Consoles don't come with phone bills and android consoles don't come with $60+ games :)
    Reply