OUYA (store) to start embedding in other hardware

[James Andrew Coote]

I get why Ouya are looking at divesting themselves of being a hardware maker; the money is in the software royalties (see: Sega). However, I don't see this being a success simply because many people already perceive Ouya as being an unnecessary middle-man between them and standard android games. We've all seen the standard ignoramus criticism of Ouya: "why should I bother buying this when I can simply play crappy android games on my phone/tablet with a PS3 controller?" While that mentality completely disregards the spirit of what Ouya is all about, it's what a lot of people think.

Google Play is actually pretty bad as a store. Curation is non-existent. Even if GP was to add in a "controller compatible" tickbox for developers when submitting their games to the store, there wouldn't be any enforcement. Some devs might tick it, even though their games don't work with controllers.

So actually, OUYA Store solves a number of problems that gamers face, and isn't a useless middleman.

Getting rid of the hardware might actually convince some of these people to give Ouya a try since, presumably, the Ouya software will be free (or very cheap), and then they can play games with whatever hardware their little hearts desire. However, I think the hardware is what gives Ouya an identity, even if that identity was largely negative at first. Losing that risks them becoming a complete non-entity, as many consumers very much like the idea of being able to buy a physical device from a store.

I think it'd be limited to specific hardware where OUYA has arranged with the manufacturer to have OUYA store come pre-installed on it. I'd personally like to see OUYA Store on other Android microconsoles, like NVidia Shield and Madcatz Mojo. But also embedded into TVs. So when you buy your LG or Panasonic TV, it comes with OUYA store pre-installed (won't be Samsung since they're too big and already doing their own thing, and definitely won't be Sony).