OUYA

[Gee!]

Anyone heard about this? Home gaming system for $99 and runs on Android..

http://www.ouya.tv/

 

[Mathew81]

I've been hearing about it for awhile now. It was a kickstarter project that got a lot of momentum last year.

Interesting to see if they can get some of the major game developers to make console type games for it.

 

[dreamcastrocks]

Yeah. At the moment, there are more like tablet/smartphone type games for it. I'm sure I'll get one.

 

[azsouthendzone]

I have had this for about two months and I absolutely love it. It is one of the best purchases I have made in a long time. Bought it at Target for $89 and its a steal.

Let me preface this by saying two things; it is not for everyone and I am not the gamer I used to be. I have a 360 that my kids play and a Wii that is a coaster. I stream through Roku 3 and I have a Chromecast because, well why not. I have zero interest in COD.

This system rules if you know what you are getting ahead of time (NOT XBOne or PS4) and if you are semi-tech savvy. I bought it because I liked the idea, I like quick indie games, love emulators, and love messing around with stuff.

To make a long story short, if you know what you are doing, you can side-load tons of games and apps from Google Play and the Amazon Store like GTA Vice City, "tablet games" with controller support are way better on a big tv, you can play Dreamcast, PS One, N64, SNES, Genesis, NES, Atari, whatever on this. You can surf the web, stream home movies through Plex, run XBMC among a ton of other things. This thing is openly hackable, easy to root, and has a lot of possibilities.

What surprised me is that the games that you can buy for cheap through the Ouya Store are actually pretty good especially if you are into multi-player games and every game is free to try. My family plays Bombsquad and Towerfall more than anything else in years. The games are also cheap.



So yeah. Not for everyone, but for $89 I am beyond satisfied.

 

[BigRedRage]

I have had this for about two months and I absolutely love it. It is one of the best purchases I have made in a long time. Bought it at Target for $89 and its a steal.

Let me preface this by saying two things; it is not for everyone and I am not the gamer I used to be. I have a 360 that my kids play and a Wii that is a coaster. I stream through Roku 3 and I have a Chromecast because, well why not. I have zero interest in COD.

This system rules if you know what you are getting ahead of time (NOT XBOne or PS4) and if you are semi-tech savvy. I bought it because I liked the idea, I like quick indie games, love emulators, and love messing around with stuff.

To make a long story short, if you know what you are doing, you can side-load tons of games and apps from Google Play and the Amazon Store like GTA Vice City, "tablet games" with controller support are way better on a big tv, you can play Dreamcast, PS One, N64, SNES, Genesis, NES, Atari, whatever on this. You can surf the web, stream home movies through Plex, run XBMC among a ton of other things. This thing is openly hackable, easy to root, and has a lot of possibilities.

What surprised me is that the games that you can buy for cheap through the Ouya Store are actually pretty good especially if you are into multi-player games and every game is free to try. My family plays Bombsquad and Towerfall more than anything else in years. The games are also cheap.



So yeah. Not for everyone, but for $89 I am beyond satisfied.

when emulating SNES and etc, what controller do you use? Do you have to download emulated games and install them to the system?

 

[dreamcastrocks]

when emulating SNES and etc, what controller do you use? Do you have to download emulated games and install them to the system?

 

[azsouthendzone]

when emulating SNES and etc, what controller do you use? Do you have to download emulated games and install them to the system?

The emulators are mostly free in the Ouya store and are special versions optimized for the Ouya controller. I use the Ouya controller but I have also paired a PS3 Dualshock.

You need to supply the game roms which are easily available on sites like Coolrom.com. I have all my roms on a connected USB hard drive which is a must. When Ouya was released it didn't support external storage but now you can use any usb drive.

 

[puckhead]

This looks cool but every time I see the name of this thing, I think of

 

[BigRedRage]

The emulators are mostly free in the Ouya store and are special versions optimized for the Ouya controller. I use the Ouya controller but I have also paired a PS3 Dualshock.

You need to supply the game roms which are easily available on sites like Coolrom.com. I have all my roms on a connected USB hard drive which is a must. When Ouya was released it didn't support external storage but now you can use any usb drive.

that sounds very tempting for the kids living room. We currently have an NES in there and the 360 is headed in there but I want to play SNES, n64, sega and more with them.

Are the roms legal? I have always seen rom stuff and always avoided it..

How did you pair the controller, it has bluetooth?

 

[BigRedRage]

hmm wifi and bluetooth

10/100 Ethernet (8P8C),[26][31] 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth LE 4.0

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouya

360 controllers are not bluetooth I dont think but says I could use them...

Alternate controllers may be used with the console (including those from the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Wii) but only for compatible games

 

[azsouthendzone]

Roms are technically legal if you "own the game." Trust me, they are easy to get and I am not really sure that Sega gets all that worked up if you download Michael Jackson's Moonwalker from Cool Roms. Old game roms are extremely widespread and easy to get and it isn't like you need to go get them from a shady torrent site either. Cool Roms actually has a heavy advertising aspect to it and I wouldn't doubt that the game developers are in on it. They know it exists, and if there was an issue you would see a big backlash like in the music industry. Ultimately it is up to you with how you want to approach it.

I paired my PS3 controller through Bluetooth. It works on 90% of the Ouya games but you run into issues on some games that use the touch pad on the Ouya controller.

For the emulators, just do some research. For the PS One you need to get the bios file to make it work so you need to know what you are doing. But once you get it working it is awesome. It is great to bring back some of the classics that you really can't play without something like this.

 

[dreamcastrocks]

I just bought one from Amazon for $89. I'm looking forward to emulating on it.

 

[puckhead]

 

[Shaggy]

I have 2 of them. My boy loves playing the older NES, Sega, Super NES, and so on games. Everything is downloadable and free with the older games. I haven't played any of the official OUYA games yet, but there are quite alot. I also like that I can play XBMC on it. I connect my PS3 controllers via bluetooth to it so we can play 2 player games. No way I'm paying $50 for another OUYA controller.

I think the rules when it comes to older games, if the company isn't directly selling them anymore, they don't really care anymore. So like if you download Super Mario Bros for NES, they don't care as they are not selling it anymore.

 

[bankybruce]

I think the rules when it comes to older games, if the company isn't directly selling them anymore, they don't really care anymore. So like if you download Super Mario Bros for NES, they don't care as they are not selling it anymore.

Not sure that is true since you can buy all of the classics through the Nintendo store on WII and WII U. We purchased the first 3 Super Mario Bros recently so my son could play them. They were like $5 each I think.

 

[dreamcastrocks]

I have 2 of them. My boy loves playing the older NES, Sega, Super NES, and so on games. Everything is downloadable and free with the older games. I haven't played any of the official OUYA games yet, but there are quite alot. I also like that I can play XBMC on it. I connect my PS3 controllers via bluetooth to it so we can play 2 player games. No way I'm paying $50 for another OUYA controller.

I think the rules when it comes to older games, if the company isn't directly selling them anymore, they don't really care anymore. So like if you download Super Mario Bros for NES, they don't care as they are not selling it anymore.

The Ouya controller itself leaves a lot to be desired. It is as if there is about 1/4 to 1/2 second delay between by button pushes/directional movement. The PS3 controller does not show the same delay.

It was unable to see my USB drive until I did a system reset on the Ouya. System reset right out of the box, ugh.

So far I am mildly impressed. The NES emulation is great. The N64 emulation is pretty bad. The audio skips and there isnt anything that can be done it seems.

I'll keep playing with it.

 

[Shaggy]

When I first bought mine from Target, it did that and also froze on me quit a bit. So I returned it and got a new one. Never had any issues with it since. Also, I hear that if your OUYA is blocked or to far away, the bluetooth connection can be screwy because of the metal housing the OUYA is in. Both of mine have been great with no delays with the OUYA or PS3 controllers.

 

[dreamcastrocks]

Any tips for N64 emulation?

 

[Shaggy]

Not sure if I have downloaded anything for N64 yet. I have been just messing with NES and Super NES. I will give N64 a try here and see how it goes for me.

 

[Linderbee]

The Ouya controller itself leaves a lot to be desired. It is as if there is about 1/4 to 1/2 second delay between by button pushes/directional movement. The PS3 controller does not show the same delay.

It was unable to see my USB drive until I did a system reset on the Ouya. System reset right out of the box, ugh.

So far I am mildly impressed. The NES emulation is great. The N64 emulation is pretty bad. The audio skips and there isnt anything that can be done it seems.

I'll keep playing with it.

I was playing Sonic Spinball today & there was a significant/annoying lag with the PS3 controller to the game...stupid flippers.

 

[bankybruce]

I was playing Sonic Spinball today & there was a significant/annoying lag with the PS3 controller to the game...stupid flippers.

Sure, blame it on the controller.

 

[Linderbee]

Sure, blame it on the controller.

I can, and I WILL!!

 

[azsouthendzone]

Any tips for N64 emulation?

N64 emulation is hit and miss. Not the best emulator. The rest are great, although I prefer epsxe sideloaded instead of the PS1 emulator that is in the store.

I would sideload xbmc gotham, the Amazon app store, and if you are feeling ambitious, root it and get google play on it.

What makes the Ouya sort of cool is the ability to customize it pretty well, but if you dont like to tinker, well there are certainly better options on the horizon with all of the Android TV boxes set to hit.

There is also a newer version out. The only way you know is that on the back of the box there is a picture of a family playing in front of a tv. Better controller.

 

[Shaggy]

Whats the difference between the XBMC Gotham 13 then the ouya XBMC?

 

[dreamcastrocks]

N64 emulation is hit and miss. Not the best emulator. The rest are great, although I prefer epsxe sideloaded instead of the PS1 emulator that is in the store.

I would sideload xbmc gotham, the Amazon app store, and if you are feeling ambitious, root it and get google play on it.

What makes the Ouya sort of cool is the ability to customize it pretty well, but if you dont like to tinker, well there are certainly better options on the horizon with all of the Android TV boxes set to hit.

There is also a newer version out. The only way you know is that on the back of the box there is a picture of a family playing in front of a tv. Better controller.

Thanks. I may do that sometime if I am ever bored. I seem to always have so much other stuff to do.

Has anyone tried the homebrew on the Wii U? I would hope/imagine that the N64 emulation on it would be better than a Ouya in comparision.