After experiencing the Amazon Fire TV and the OUYA for weeks, I thought I would share my honest opinion on each of these devices. My criteria is ease of use and bang for the buck when looking at the entire package. I am talking games, streaming media, apps, side loading, emulators, the whole shebang. Now these two boxes are pretty different however they are in the same general price range and they do a lot of the same things so I think the comparison is valid.

GAMES

Hands down, and it isn't even close, the OUYA wins in a landslide. The Discover store has some great OUYA exclusive titles like Amazing Frog and simply there are over 900 games. Amazon has a few good exclusives like Sev Zero but the sheer amount of games is so minimal, it makes it hard to really take it serious as a game device. So OUYA doesn't have Google Play or Amazon Apps, but with a few tweaks you can add them and it is an easy process. Amazon on the other hand you have to go through adb and it can be tedious. Emulators? No comparison. OUYA again wins in a landslide. At the end of the day, the OUYA offers you the chance to play pretty much any game pad enabled game that is on Android. OUYA lets you experience what you want to experience. As a matter of fact, the whole Google Play argument is kind of pointless because loading it is so easy. External storage is something OUYA gets right and Amazon ignores and that is a HUGE advantage to OUYA.

XBMC and Streaming Apps

Amazon Fire streams good and has plenty of apps but it is locked down and angles everything to Amazon. If you arent invested in the Amazon eco-system it is painful. The OUYA on the other hand allows you to sideload tons of streaming apps like Netflix, Hulu, MLB.TV, Watch Disney and some can be a little more tedious to operate because they aren't controller optimized but at the end of the day they do the job. The OUYA has become the streamer of choice, with the Chromecast as a supplement.

XBMC is again a pain in the ass to load to Amazon Fire TV. Once done it is snappy as every and super fast, but you can't even load it from the home menu. Again OUYA just seems so much more user friendly.

GAME PADS

The Amazon game pad is solid and the device doesn't have any lag issues reported by some OUYA consoles. That said, when compared to the newer OUYAs I would call this a push.


CONCLUSION

Until Android TV comes out, the OUYA is simply the best micro console, media streaming, whatever the hell you want to call it on the market today. It blows the Fire TV away. The Fire TV may have better specs but they dont translate to the user experience. I feel like this box is mine and that I can customize it the way i want it. Maybe Android TV will be better, but there is a great chance it won't be. Hats off to the folks at OUYA for making a product with the consumer in mind. It isn't perfect and nothing is. But for $99, what an incredible value. I am no longer a Fire TV owner.