The $99 OUYA game console hit store shelves Tuesday, months after a mega-successful Kickstarter that got backers and developers excited about open-source game production. The OUYA team said they have learned tremendously from developer feedback and improved the console prior to retail launch. But is the hackable Android console ready for mass market?
Maybe, depending on the audience. While the OUYA demonstrates versatility when plied with a little elbow grease from the user, it may not be a plug-and-play system for everyone. In this review, I spent a lot of time with the retail boxed OUYA, after having played with the Kickstarter backer unit, which the OUYA team referred to as "preview mode."
What does $99 get you? Here's the full teardown.
The Console
The OUYA is amazing for its size and portability alone, and the console's short stature is a surprise to everyone who encounters it. The team even had to add extra weight to improve its physical stability.
The HDMI port, USB port, micro-USB port and Ethernet provide everything you'll need, though its singular USB port means you'll want to invest in a USB hub.
The console is easy enough to set up until you turn it on; I was waylaid for almost an hour by a day-one system update that failed to download until the seventh try. You must also enter a credit card number before reaching the main menu, though the console promises it won't make any charges without obvious cues.
The Controller
The OUYA controller combines many different ideas, some of which work better than others. First of all, the consumer version made significant improvements to the Kickstarter model, which suffered from sticky, loud triggers, lag and front plates that didn't quite fit on correctly.
The OUYA controller has very distinctive, wide handles, which I found to be an interesting yet divisive design choice among those who picked it up. If your hands don't fit comfortably around the handles, you'll find yourself fighting against the controller to reach every button.
The controller includes a touchpad at its center, which I found pretty useless. It's rarely incorporated into gameplay, and is very oversensitive when browsing menus. The triggers and D-pad still feel strange and inaccurate, although they are improved from the previous version. The analog sticks feel solid and are easy to use.
The strangest part of the controller is the fact you must remove the two side faceplates to get to the battery compartments -- there is one in each side. While the lack of battery hinge makes the controller smoother, it's a weird placement, and I found they weren't always easy to snap back on.
The Menus
The OUYA menu system is simple, and nicely designed with great typography. On the home screen, you're greeted with "Play," the home of your game library; "Discover," the OUYA's game store; "Make," the section to test game builds and sideload software; and "Manage", the OUYA's system settings.
The OUYA store has been dramatically redesigned since its Kickstarter release, and games are simply organized into playlists. These playlists are organized by topics like "Trending," "OUYA Exclusive" or "On the Couch" for multiplayer gaming. The store also features lists curated by publications or OUYA developers, and seeing people's personal recommendations is a great way to find content.
Clicking into a game brings up big, bright screenshots, another recent change, as well as a description. Players can also "thumbs up" and "thumbs down" games, though I think it could use a five-star rating system for more nuanced reviews.
One of my huge gripes was the OUYA's game installation process -- a two-step relic of Android -- along with multiple simultaneous game downloads usually failing. Both of these issues have been fixed, and games are also now easy to update from your Play menu. I'd love to see a way to organize games in your library as well, especially since everything is free to try.
Image courtesy Matt Thorson
The Games
The OUYA launched with about 170 games on the system, with more on the way, CEO Julie Uhrman told me. The main problem is that there is a wild mix of quality. The ability for anyone to publish on the OUYA is the console's best and worst feature. And while games have to make it out of the system's "sandbox" to receive wider promotion in the store, that doesn't always guarantee quality. I want indie developers to get experience, and opening the platform is a beautiful sounding idea, but you need a few stakeholder games to get people in the door.
There are a couple gems on OUYA, like TowerFall, a four-player fighting game that has creative mechanics and snappy controls. There are also some well-down ports, like Organ Trail, a zombie-infested RPG, or trivia franchise You Don't Know Jack, which allows players to join via their smartphones.
But for every great game, there were several that lacked any sort of polish -- unique ideas hampered by half-baked control schemes, wonky game physics or garish graphics. It's a good thing every OUYA game must be free-to-try, because I might be mad if I paid for some of these undercooked games. If you are taking the time to experiment and try new things, you'll be more intrigued by the prospect of testing each game, but consumers uninitiated with the quirky indie scene may be turned off by what they get in the OUYA store.
There are also several emulators available in the OUYA store, which open the legally murky waters of ROMs. Android owners have long been able to play ROMs on their phones, so it's no surprise that emulators have popped up in the OUYA store so quickly. While the emulators don't come with any software, it took maybe 20 minutes for me to find some N64 ROMs online, put them on a USB stick, and configure the control schemes to my liking before I was playing Super Mario 64. (Technically, this is legal because I own a hard copy of the game.) If you just want to use the console as an emulation box and plug in your own USB controllers, that would be worth the $99 price tag. There's also Bluetooth compatibility, which means PlayStation DualShock 3 and 4 controllers are easy to sync.
Other Software
The cool parts of OUYA can be unlocked with a little diligence, just like with the ROMs and emulators. Media management software like XBMC and Plex are available to install, and because the OUYA has been in the wild since as early as last December for some developers, someone has already done the hard work with installation guides.
The fact the system can work with any USB device without much fuss means you can use a mouse and keyboard for easier navigation when you want to go deeper with software. I'm sure in the next few months even more unique homebrew solutions will pop up for the OUYA, similar to the awesome community surrounding Raspberry Pi.
What concerns me about this scenario is that when OUYAs are sold in traditional stores like Best Buy and Target, less informed consumers may pick it up as a cheaper alternative to an Xbox 360 and expect the same level of quality. When I asked Julie Uhrman about that, she said that's when the OUYA will turn on the "marketing machine through online channels," but will that be the first place those buyers go to look for information?
It's also true that the OUYA team has been slow to respond to issues raised by Kickstarter backers, arguably the console's core audience. Many still haven't received OUYAs despite promises they'd get them before the console launched to the public.
This is a key time for OUYA, and if it secures a stronger lineup of games and smooths out some hardware glitches, it may be ready for the mainstream. Right now, it's stuck in limbo as a fun toy for hackers or those who want to explore indie games.