Julie Uhrman’s new gaming console, Ouya, is small. Enough to easily fit in the palm of your hand.
But don’t call the $99 device made by Santa Monica’s Ouya Inc. a mobile gaming unit. And certainly don’t conflate its small size with being a small deal.
The console’s public launch last month came on the heels of a record fundraising campaign last year that solicited donations from the public, a process known as crowdfunding. It took in $8.6 million through crowdfunding platform Kickstarter, which was then the site’s biggest-ever raise.
Ouya’s philosophy is a response to a gaming market that has edged out casual players and simple game play in favor of complicated blockbuster franchises.
But away from its adoring backers, the console is struggling through a rocky launch and the harsh reality that the inexpensive console market might be a dying breed.
Uhrman’s inspiration for the console was an attempt to fuse the simplicity of mobile gaming with the immersion of the TV. She envisioned Ouya to be many things, but most of all, she wanted it to be open.
“Gaming is the last digital platform that’s closed. It’s difficult for new developers to bring games to TV,” Uhrman said. “It’s about being open and allowing game developers to build how they want.”
Ouya runs on Google Inc.’s open-source Android operating system and games for the console are required to have some free-to-play element; the only place to download Ouya titles is an online digital marketplace.
The ethos behind the console is to be hacker friendly, where a hobbyist can tweak the console and its operating system to allow for modifications. For example, both Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 controllers and even an iPhone can be made compatible with Ouya.
Those kinds of hacks, said Uhrman, are an anathema to a gaming industry that’s become cloistered and derivative.
Beyond the gauzy optimism that has brought Ouya from Kickstarter project to the shelves of Best Buy Co. and Target Inc. stores, the real challenges are starting to set in.
Early reviews for the device range from lukewarm to outright dismissive. Some have griped that Ouya’s off-the-shelf internal components make for a sluggish experience. The included controllers are routinely deemed unusable (many use other console’s controllers).
Then there’s the matter of games – a console is, of course, only as good as the titles it offers and right now critics have concerns about the lack of breakout hits.
Uhrman brushed aside complaints about game selection, pointing out that just a month after launch there are already 276 titles available.
What could prove even more worrisome for Ouya is that the types of casual gamers it’s gunning for might soon have no need for a console at all.
Mike Hickey, a gaming industry analyst at the Denver office of Benchmark Co. LLC, said mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, have become the go-to device for casual or midcore gamers. With wireless interconnectivity between mobile and televisions soon expected to become standard, Ouya will become obsolete.
“It was an incredible grassroots effort to get this thing to market,” Hickey said. “But I just don’t think that Ouya really has a long-term solution and it’s unlikely they’ll get enough market share.”
Uhrman countered that her vision for Ouya isn’t just a set-top box for mobile gaming, but a new category of its own. True, it runs on an operating system designed for mobile, but its best games make real use of the TV screen. She pointed to “TowerFall,” an adventure game in the style of Nintendo’s hit “Super Smash Brothers,” as an example of a how a programmer was able to pair Ouya’s simplicity with a big screen.
For Ouya to even reach the point where it could be dismissed by reviewers is a small victory in itself.
Uhrman had never headed up a console development team before; her previous jobs were in digital distribution and marketing, including work for gaming site IGN Inc. and game rental service GameFly Inc.
Long a dedicated gamer, she found herself migrating exclusively to mobile gaming as titles for top-end consoles became complicated, high priced and sequel driven.
The Ouya, then, would be a bridge between mobile and television where indie gamers and top developers could mingle in the same marketplace. (The O in Ouya stands for “open,” though that’s as far as any acronym gets.)
Crowdfunding success
In keeping with Uhrman’s ideal, Ouya’s slate of game makers is an eclectic mix that includes both one-person shops and major publishers such as Sega Corp. and Square Enix Holdings Co. Ltd.
The idea appeared to hit a nerve in an equally weary gaming community. When the project was uploaded to Kickstarter last July, it blew past its modest goal of $950,000 within hours. By the time funding wrapped up a month later, more than 60,000 backers had taken the device to 900 percent of its goal.
For Uhrman, the most encouraging part of the frenzy was that most donations were in the form of Ouya presales. The device was yet to be built, but it already had a market.
“I was shocked and overwhelmed. We were one of the highest asks in Kickstarter; no one asks that much money,” Uhrman said. “Our backers wanted choice and creativity and didn’t want to spend $60 to try out a game. That’s what we promised.”
Earlier this year, Ouya augmented its crowdfunding with a private $15 million venture capital round led by Menlo Park’s Mayfield Fund that included Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, among others.
The company, which now has 30 employees, most working from an office above the Third Street Promenade, has tried to maintain its console-of-the-masses mindset. When backers in Europe suggested the Ouya have an Ethernet port because Wi-Fi on the continent can be unreliable, the designers quickly added one.
Ed del Castillo, founder and chief executive of Pasadena game studio Liquid Entertainment LLC, said that kind of attention to customers’ needs is becoming increasingly rare in the gaming world. Case in point: Microsoft Inc.’s upcoming console, Xbox One, which earned a torrent of criticism recently when it appeared the device would make it difficult to let people share games (Microsoft has since backed off this stance, slightly).
“The big console makers have a limited, rigid way of doing business; they only allow a certain number of publishers to fill open slots,” del Castillo said. “What we’re seeing is more and more of devices like Ouya that say consoles belong to the masses.”
Enough games?
If the masses really are clamoring for the console-publik, that has yet to be proved by sales. In a June report of gaming sales prepared by market analysis firm NPD Group, Ouya’s take was put at a “light” 19,000 units from retail. The report cited, among other factors, a lack of marquee titles as reasons for underwhelming figure.
Uhrman downplayed NPD’s take on Ouya, and argued that its numbers don’t reflect the number of units sold directly from its website. The company would not release its sales figures.
As for game sales on the unit, those appear to be mixed as well. “TowerFall” reported 2,000 downloads at $15 each. That makes it one of the console’s bigger hits so far, though given Ouya’s 30 percent cut on sales, the developer’s take has only been $21,000. Other games reported fewer downloads, but decent takes from in-game purchases. Ouya executives said 27 percent of gamers pay for content.
Michael Pachter, a media analyst for Wedbush Securities Inc. in downtown Los Angeles, said it was still too early to draw any conclusions whether Ouya will succeed. But he has no doubt there’s a market for the console.
“It’s a cool little way to connect mobile games to the TV,” Pachter said. “It’s hard to buy right now if there’s no games to play. But they’ll see sales grow as they see content grow.”
There’s also the potential that games developed for the Ouya would later be ported over to other Android interfaces. Right now, Ouya generally doesn’t ask for exclusivity with games on the console. The company did introduce a program that provide matching funds for crowdfunded indie games, and requires those titles to be Ouya-only for six months.
Analyst Hickey said that might turn out to be one of its greatest assets.
“Ouya could offer a test bed for creating franchises,” Hickey said. “If you find success in that market, you can easily migrate to a larger platform.”
Uhrman said she was confident that with more than 22,000 developers signed up to create titles for Ouya, the games and sales will soon come. As a gamer herself, she’s just pleased that people are following her vision of making console gaming what it used to be: simple, fun and on a television.
“I enjoy (mobile-gaming hit) Candy Crush like the next person,” Uhrman said, “but there’s nothing like the emotional immersive experience on the TV.”
