Ouya's first exclusive game(kickstarter.com)
kickstarter.com
Ouya's first exclusive game
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ouya/ouya-a-new-kind-of-video-game-console/posts/270629
30 comments
If you read carefully the developer is releasing a prequel to his real game. They are trying to leverage Ouya for publicity for when it releases its real game which will not be under an exclusive deal.
This is similar to movie studios providing say, Hulu or iTunes with exclusive trailers, and leveraging their platform for advertising.
This is similar to movie studios providing say, Hulu or iTunes with exclusive trailers, and leveraging their platform for advertising.
You got it; the first Ouya exclusive is interesting but the Nth is not.
From the looks of it, there's no meat behind this story other than the announcement. The developer has nothing more than words and some concept art. This is a pure marketing ploy for both the Ouya developers and the game developers - neither have anything invested at the moment, both just drumming up hype for their unreleased products.
Talk is cheap, as they say.
Talk is cheap, as they say.
Those words and pictures are now worth $5,213,248 with 20 days to go.
This is brilliant on many levels. This game, good or not, will make a ton-load of money - because of the hype/craze around Ouya.
This is Distribution 101. Find a hot platform/wave, and ride it as long as you can.
This guy is at the top of the wave and will be riding all the way to the steps of the bank.
This is Distribution 101. Find a hot platform/wave, and ride it as long as you can.
This guy is at the top of the wave and will be riding all the way to the steps of the bank.
They are releasing in 2015. The internet and the sort of hype around a gaming console is not going to last that long. Remember the internet (as a whole) has the long term memory of an intelligent goldfish. If they had a game to release right now, as the OUYA launched then you would be right but in this case it seems kind of far fetched.
If it makes the goal amount (it is currently $4M above it), the money is charged from people and is then in Robotoki's hands.
Whether those people still care about the game in 2015 is irrelevant - as a money making venture, it's quite clever (and clearly successful).
EDIT: Never mind - I got confused thinking the game had raised $5M on Kickstarter, not the Ouya. My bad.
Whether those people still care about the game in 2015 is irrelevant - as a money making venture, it's quite clever (and clearly successful).
EDIT: Never mind - I got confused thinking the game had raised $5M on Kickstarter, not the Ouya. My bad.
Yes I was confused also, it's actually an Update post on Ouya's Kickstarter project, not a new project for HumanElement.
I am sure they will get 'pre-orders' and all this other stuff - still capitalizing on the hype.
Since Unity3D already can deploy to Androd platforms I would venture to guess that we will see quite alot of games ready for the launch of Ouya.
Ouya's KickStarter feels less like you are "backing it" to make it happen than it does advertizing to potential investors. The video is what I would call more than a little vague and uncertain of itself. Are you backing what "could be" or what WILL be?
They have working prototypes. They can produce those for less than 99 dollars.
They need investors to prefinance the next batch. Buying the parts requires money,you dont have, until the finished product is sold to a retailer.
In other words: they need cash flow.
They need investors to prefinance the next batch. Buying the parts requires money,you dont have, until the finished product is sold to a retailer.
In other words: they need cash flow.
Do they actually have a working prototype? It's very unclear in their messaging, and they show no pictures of even semi-complete devices.
I could attach a ps3 controller to an omap4 evaluation board running Android tomorrow, but that wouldn't make it a proper prototype.
I could attach a ps3 controller to an omap4 evaluation board running Android tomorrow, but that wouldn't make it a proper prototype.
They've raised $5m and counting. What do they need investors for?
R&D money. Most of the $5M will go to manufacturing the consoles they've pre-sold.
For possibly ever becoming viable. Look, I'm a fan of indies as much as anyone else, but mass producing a game console- even one with this cheap of parts- is just not possible without more money. I'd be sincerely surprised if the money they've raised so far covered more than just paying the salaries of their employees and get the basic infrastructure set up.
Back in 2001 when the original Xbox and PS2 were current-generation consoles, the Indrema console failed because they couldn't get $10mil in capital. With more accessible Chinese manufacturing, more accessible venture capital, and a Kickstarter campaign that's already netted half that amount, I think Ouya stands a pretty good chance of being profitable.
The fuseproject has existed for a while, where a lot of the skills come from. They aren't building a company from scratch... just a product.
Those 5m are pre orders. For the next batch, they likely need to prefinance production.
Off course, at that stage, banks would even be willing to lend money, to keep a conservative amount of consoles in stock.
I doubt the margins on this huge first batch are big enough to prefinance the production of the next batch.
Off course, at that stage, banks would even be willing to lend money, to keep a conservative amount of consoles in stock.
I doubt the margins on this huge first batch are big enough to prefinance the production of the next batch.
How much did MS spend on just getting market penetration with the XBox? Wasn't it over a billion? Do you not get how this market works? Do you not remember the Dreamcast? There are massive, colossal flops in the console market out there. How long before MS even started posting a profit?
On the one hand it'd be awesome if they pull it off.
On the other hand they have pretty pictures of controllers, mock ups and what seems like a very delusional CEO. This has all the potential of killing kickstarter forever. Watching the original video makes you think they've actually got f all at the moment and $5 mill's a tiny drop in the ocean for actually making a dent in the console market. And worse than that they've promised $99 consoles before actually manufacturing it.
But the Android angle and the massive free publicity they're getting, they could just pull it off. But their promotional video really gives me nothing but doubts.
On the one hand it'd be awesome if they pull it off.
On the other hand they have pretty pictures of controllers, mock ups and what seems like a very delusional CEO. This has all the potential of killing kickstarter forever. Watching the original video makes you think they've actually got f all at the moment and $5 mill's a tiny drop in the ocean for actually making a dent in the console market. And worse than that they've promised $99 consoles before actually manufacturing it.
But the Android angle and the massive free publicity they're getting, they could just pull it off. But their promotional video really gives me nothing but doubts.
The Dreamcast was only a failure compared to Sony and Nintendo. If Ouya sells 10 million consoles and has hundreds of games I think it would qualify as a success by their non-AAA goals.
Wait: im assuming they have a working prototype.
If no, that would be shocking.
If no, that would be shocking.
"And how far along are you in building OUYA?
Very. We expect to have a finished product ready to ship to you in March. (With the very first boxes – bugs and all – ready a few months earlier.)
We have a functional prototype, and we have almost completed our industrial design (the shape and materials of the product you see here)...."
That said any Tegra 3 device with 1 GB ram and a bluetooth game controller could qualify as a prototype.
I'm going to agree with mattmanser's skepticism. Ouya is exciting and I suppose I'm rooting for it but I'm 80% sure the last station for this train is CrunchPad-ville.
Ultimately Tegra 3 delivers a level of console graphics that's 8 years old. I may be wrong but it looks like no motion gaming is mentioned nor a big content solution, and those are literally they biggest console advances over the last 8 years.
Very. We expect to have a finished product ready to ship to you in March. (With the very first boxes – bugs and all – ready a few months earlier.)
We have a functional prototype, and we have almost completed our industrial design (the shape and materials of the product you see here)...."
That said any Tegra 3 device with 1 GB ram and a bluetooth game controller could qualify as a prototype.
I'm going to agree with mattmanser's skepticism. Ouya is exciting and I suppose I'm rooting for it but I'm 80% sure the last station for this train is CrunchPad-ville.
Ultimately Tegra 3 delivers a level of console graphics that's 8 years old. I may be wrong but it looks like no motion gaming is mentioned nor a big content solution, and those are literally they biggest console advances over the last 8 years.
Did we watch a different video?
I saw a lot of mock ups. I saw no working console.
But admittedly perhaps I'm just a cynic who only saw the worst case scenario. I only watched their launch campaign on kickstarter and have no idea where they're at but to me it looked a lot like a bunch of mock ups of what they want, not what is.
I saw a lot of mock ups. I saw no working console.
But admittedly perhaps I'm just a cynic who only saw the worst case scenario. I only watched their launch campaign on kickstarter and have no idea where they're at but to me it looked a lot like a bunch of mock ups of what they want, not what is.
Has Ouya actually gotten any other games promised for their platform yet? I don't care about exclusivity. I just want to know that there will actually be stuff to play when it comes out. I pledged originally, but cancelled after Ben Kuchera's skeptical article. I'd love to be given a reason to reinstate my pledge.
How about the fact that you simply want to see the idea succeed? That was enough for me. Even if it fails I know I was a part of the community that tried.
They passed their funding goal ages. What's your definition of "succeed"? Me pledging for a console isn't going to do much to get good games to be promised for it. I'd love to see it succeed, but it's hard to justify paying $100 for something that isn't even useful by itself.
Because I would love to see a console I could tinker with that is an open platform, (versus say trying to do XNA development), the $100 is worth feeling like I'm apart of something bigger than myself.
Sure its a gamble, but I want to see it enough that there is value to me in simply being involved. Clearly others agree with me. You don't have to feel the same way, and clearly you don't. No one is asking you to participate - which is the beauty of the kickstarter format.
At this point I don't see what good anyone is doing criticising it. Either you're on board.... or just chill out because it doesn't affect you in any way. That is, unless you work for an existing game studio.
Sure its a gamble, but I want to see it enough that there is value to me in simply being involved. Clearly others agree with me. You don't have to feel the same way, and clearly you don't. No one is asking you to participate - which is the beauty of the kickstarter format.
At this point I don't see what good anyone is doing criticising it. Either you're on board.... or just chill out because it doesn't affect you in any way. That is, unless you work for an existing game studio.
Criticizing? I genuinely want it to succeed, but it needs games. A console without games isn't a console. It seems like getting developers to promise games at launch (or at least shortly after it) should be one of the top priorities for the Ouya team right now, but I don't see any evidence of that happening.
So why would I publish exclusively only on the Ouya store and not the Play store? Is there some partnership plan somewhere that I'm missing? Robotoki is getting a lot of good marketing directly from Ouya. That sounds like an interesting partnership. But is that scalable for the rest of us?