Ouya wants to have a new version of its $99 Android game console every year

Ouya seems to be taking off very rapidly and after we learned the Android-based game console will be sold in Amazon, Best Buy, Target and Gamestop starting in June, now Ouya founder Julie Uhrman revealed that the plan is to have a new Ouya every year.

Just like other mobile devices, Ouya is planned to get a new model with better specs and improved performance.

“Our plan is to have a yearly refresh of Ouya where we leverage the best-performing chips and take advantage of falling component prices to create the best experience we can at the $99 price point,” Uhrman said. “If we could do it for less than $99, we would.”

The first-generation Ouya is expected to ship to thousands of Kickstarter backer in March 2013, just after a month.

And if the game console is indeed a success, we wouldn’t be surprised if future iterations come with more powerful chips like the Tegra 4 instead of Tegra 3. But even now the console has a performance advantage over Tegra 3-based tablets. While the hardware that both use is the same, the Ouya plugs into the wall and doesn’t need to worry about power efficiency, so all four cores of the Tegra 3 can run at their full 1.6GHz capacity.

Another interesting idea, the team behind the console has is to only filter for things like pornography, but not the quality of apps. This would allow everyone to develop games for the television, which is exciting. And when it comes to discovering quality games among all, it is relying on user engagement rather than sales, and that’s a hugely different approach.

Ouya will be sold for $100, and an additional controller (now, with a touchpad) will cost $50. There’s definitely a lot of excitement around Ouya, and the backing of major retailers shows that is justified. Let’s hope that it lives up to the high hopes.

source: The Verge