Razer Forge TV Gains Cortex Game Store, Absorbs Ouya Titles

News
By Michael Justin Allen Sexton
published

In an effort to expand the software available for its Forge TV game console, Razer released the Cortex Game Store with hundreds of games.

Initially, the Cortex Game Store will offer over 240 games that can be purchased by anyone who owns a Forge TV. Many of these games are carried over from Ouya’s proprietary marketplace, which Razer obtained earlier this year when it bought out Ouya. This additional content strengthens the Forge TV’s position in the Android gaming market by providing content that is not available on the Google Play Store.

Over time, Razer plans to extend the Cortex Game Store with new titles curated for the Forge TV. Unlike some other Android gaming alternatives, like the Nvidia Shield TV that has numerous PC games available over a proprietary streaming service, the Forge TV has to rely solely on the content available on the Google Play Store and on the new Cortex Game Store to attract users.

This makes the success of this new service vitally important if the company wants to differentiate itself from other Android devices. Even with its own marketplace, Ouya struggled in the heavily overpopulated and highly competitive Android market, so the new content Razer adds later may be key to the success or failure of the Forge TV.

Forge TV users will be able to access the Cortex Game Store after installing the latest system update that was released today. Razer is offering users a $10 credit in the store to first-time users (which is everyone) to help get the store going.

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Michael Justin Allen Sexton
Michael Justin Allen Sexton is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He covers hardware component news, specializing in CPUs and motherboards.
6 Comments Comment from the forums
  • nycalex
    no, no, and no!.

    i can play all of those android games on a cheap android tablet.

    and if i make purchases on their cortex store......do i get to play them on my phone as well? most likely not.

    These casual TV consoles are all a joke. that includes nvidia shield.
    Reply
  • burkhartmj
    The only reason I cared about the Forge TV was GPU agnostic game streaming. It seems they've completely given up on that feature though, as the marketing for Cortex doesn't mention it and the dedicated page has been killed. Useless device that never lived up to its potential.
    Reply
  • plasmastorm
    Current gen aint much better tbh. If I want any of the stuff I bought on PSN to work on my ps4 it's buy it again too. Utter joke.
    Reply
  • antilycus
    Do you even own a Shield? The Shield offers SHIELD ONLY games, the Google Play Store and ALL games from your PC. Including World of Xeen on floppy disk (if you still have it). And with Shield Tablet, I can go to a friends house all (even multiplayer multi controller) games work from my PC. SO no, this isn't even remotely close to Shield Devices. It's also what Makes NVIDIA SHIELD significantly better than the rehashed google play store options found on OUYA (and yes I have a OUYA)
    Reply
  • therealduckofdeath
    The reason no one should support and buy Nvidia Shield devices is the fact they're creating closed ecosystems within an existing ecosystem. In two years when Nvidia drops their Android foray, what extra will you get out of your Shield device then? They really should rename it Walled instead of Shield.
    Reply
  • sylentz199
    The reason no one should support and buy Nvidia Shield devices is the fact they're creating closed ecosystems within an existing ecosystem. In two years when Nvidia drops their Android foray, what extra will you get out of your Shield device then? They really should rename it Walled instead of Shield.

    You can stream your entire PC gaming library to your Shield; over LAN or WAN. The Android games and Tegra/PC Ports are just gravy that you can run on your powerhouse on top of it being a HTPC for Koki/Plex/Netflix etc...
    Reply