OUYA - Android console

One of the complaints of the Raspberry Pi is that where it has hardware decoding for h.264, it can't manage other codecs like MPEG2. That's very limiting in playback options.
 
Shifty Geezer said:
One of the complaints of the Raspberry Pi is that where it has hardware decoding for h.264, it can't manage other codecs like MPEG2. That's very limiting in playback options.
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I think you can use the HW to decode anything, but the (closed) GPU drivers only has h264 decoding in them. So you would need an open GPU driver to fix this.
 
You're right. I went looking and found this:
Codecs

Two licensed codecs will be provided at launch, MPEG4 and h.264. Codec licences have quite an impact of the cost of the device which is why there are only two at this stage. There are non-licensed Codecs such at MPEG2, VC1 etc, but for the moment they will not be accelerated by the GPU.

Dom adds: As an aside, the GPU can hardware decode H264, MPEG1/2/4, VC1, AVS, MJPG at 1080p30. It can software (but still vector accelerated) decode VP6, VP7, VP8, RV, Theora, WMV9 at DVD resolutions. We are restricted due to licensing what we can support. We should be able to support VP8, MJPG and Theora, as I believe they are license free.
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Arwin said:
I understand why they do it, but they still lost me pretty much completley as a result of this.
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Well they gained me as a customer because of this as I won't be locked into an underpowered platform in the future.

I can decide if it is worth spending $99 to have upgraded hardware. I can then either sell, give away, or reuse the older OUYA. This is no different to my laptop purchases and $99 is a fairly cheap price to upgrade.

And from a gaming point of view when newer games are released they perform better on newer hardware especially GPUs. That is why gamers upgrade their GPUs in their PCs and at a much higher price than the $99 for a new model OUYA.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
A1xLLcqAgt0qc2RyMz0y said:
Well they gained me as a customer because of this as I won't be locked into an underpowered platform in the future.

I can decide if it is worth spending $99 to have upgraded hardware. I can then either sell, give away, or reuse the older OUYA. This is no different to my laptop purchases and $99 is a fairly cheap price to upgrade.

And from a gaming point of view when newer games are released they perform better on newer hardware especially GPUs. That is why gamers upgrade their GPUs in their PCs and at a much higher price than the $99 for a new model OUYA.
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Sure, but I don't have a good experience with this model. It means there will be a huge inconsistency in quality and framerates, and a huge focus on creating forward compatibility at the cost of efficient use of hardware.

Of course there are upsides too ... But it is just not for me.
 
It is possible that...

The OS-limited/specific game console concept may be rendered outdated by cross-buy in the future.

Generally speaking, I want to be able to buy a game and play it on Playstation, PC, Mac, iOS and Android. The weight may shift towards the publishers and developers instead of the OS platform.

Forward compatibility may not be as important as a result.
 
Arwin said:
It means there will be a huge inconsistency in quality and framerates...
Click to expand...
We have that on fixed hardware consoles though. There are games on PS3 that are terrible in framerate, with no option to play them in better quality. On Ouya, any game that plays at a poor framerate, you can play at a better framerate in two years time on a $99 box. Limit yourself to 2 year old games and you'll be playing in 60 fps all the time. ;)

There is a disadvantage in hardware utilisation, but the framerate issue I don't see as a problem of the upgradeable console concept. It just means that the latest, greatest box doesn't get used for anything other than playing the old hardware games better. The other way of thinking of that is that you gain a 2 years advantage of speed for current-gen games. If you don't think of it as a new box but an old box turbo charged (like a $99 upgrade to your PS3 to make it run faster), then it's no loss.

Not to get bogged down with the upgradeable console concept, which has its own thread. My concerns with Ouya are software library. Android is replete with what I consider garbage games, nickel and diming. Resource management used to be fun on Amiga, but Android uses it to milk people. I don't believe the market dynamics are going to promote a good library, but I may be proven wrong.
 
Shifty Geezer said:
We have that on fixed hardware consoles though. There are games on PS3 that are terrible in framerate, with no option to play them in better quality. On Ouya, any game that plays at a poor framerate, you can play at a better framerate in two years time on a $99 box. Limit yourself to 2 year old games and you'll be playing in 60 fps all the time. ;)

There is a disadvantage in hardware utilisation, but the framerate issue I don't see as a problem of the upgradeable console concept. It just means that the latest, greatest box doesn't get used for anything other than playing the old hardware games better. The other way of thinking of that is that you gain a 2 years advantage of speed for current-gen games. If you don't think of it as a new box but an old box turbo charged (like a $99 upgrade to your PS3 to make it run faster), then it's no loss.

Not to get bogged down with the upgradeable console concept, which has its own thread. My concerns with Ouya are software library. Android is replete with what I consider garbage games, nickel and diming. Resource management used to be fun on Amiga, but Android uses it to milk people. I don't believe the market dynamics are going to promote a good library, but I may be proven wrong.
Click to expand...

Yup, people that hate DLC and in game microtransactions (pay to win) are likely to have a field day with Ouya, as I suspect most of their games will follow that direction in order to make money.

Regards,
SB
 
Shifty Geezer said:
We have that on fixed hardware consoles though. There are games on PS3 that are terrible in framerate, with no option to play them in better quality. On Ouya, any game that plays at a poor framerate, you can play at a better framerate in two years time on a $99 box. Limit yourself to 2 year old games and you'll be playing in 60 fps all the time. ;)
Click to expand...

Yes, it's one of the advantages that I had in mind, but in the end it's worse, because some games will launch with terrible framerates because new hardware next year will run that fine, and then if you don't buy that, etc. To use your own words, in that case I don't see much gain versus having a PC and using that money to upgrade the PC, while getting vastly better looking software, almost none of which was originally depending on a touch interface.

Not to get bogged down with the upgradeable console concept, which has its own thread. My concerns with Ouya are software library. Android is replete with what I consider garbage games, nickel and diming. Resource management used to be fun on Amiga, but Android uses it to milk people. I don't believe the market dynamics are going to promote a good library, but I may be proven wrong.
Click to expand...

Perhaps Ouya could make use of that sentiment by being a more targeted platform, allowing developers perhaps to be more confident in releasing games at a higher price with the nickel and diming mode disabled?

There's certainly potential for the platform, but first and foremost I'm just worried about the controls.
 
Developers, submit your game to Ouya now

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/...e-to-ouya-now-to-get-it-in-the-store-march-28

Developers hoping to be a part of the launch of the Ouya platform can submit their games beginning today to be available when the console ships to Kickstarter backers. In a blog post on its official site, head of developer relations Kellee Santiago wrote that any game uploaded and placed in the store starting today will be available to download on consoles shipping to backers March 28, and through June when the device hits both online and brick-and-mortar retailers.
Click to expand...
It will be interesting to see what games are available for the Ouya at the end of March.
 
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