Comment by genericuser | Hacker News Reader

Comment by genericuser | Hacker News Reader

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Why would one expect the usefulness of their Ouya console to change and be anything other than useless? (this is a joke at Ouya's expense, I am pointing it out because based on my past experience making jokes here someone will take this seriously and get all defensive about how great Ouya is)

Seriously though in 12 months Ouya will be 3 years old, I don't think expecting a company to actively support a piece of cheap (affordable for those that find the word cheap insulting) hardware for more than 3 years is a reasonable expectation. Ouya had already added the play store I thought (as pointed out below, I thought wrong), and so discontinuing support will probably amount to the Ouya store ceasing to exist and a lack of future patches. I mean its a device to play games mainly in a local manner, it will continue to be able to do that as well as it can now.

> Ouya had already added the play store I thought

This is incorrect. It only officially has its own store. You can "hack" the device to install Play though.

Well thanks for the info. I unfortunately clearly didn't pay attention to the fact it required side loading when I heard about it. So yeah, no more support (if it means no more store) will suck more than I thought for Ouya owners.

Isn't it interesting how 3 years is such a long time to support things now?

In my experience it has been that way for quite a while when you look at lower price point items in developing areas of technology, due in part to the speed at which minor changes are iterated and implemented in new models of devices.

But I acknowledge it may not of been this way except recently, and my memory could be painting over the 'good ol days' so I am not any more bitter and cynical about things changing than I already am.

I just bought a washing machine with a ten year warranty, to replace one made in the 80's for which there are still official spare parts (but that I felt was better off being replaced than repaired). You can find companies who are in it for the long haul, but it is true that most aren't.

Washing machines don't have twice as much wash performance after five years, though. Apples and soup cans.

With all the indie & low tech games around, I suspect console power doesn't double the enjoyment/thrill factor every 3-5 years either.

For a failed game console, 3 years seems to be about average. It's about how long sega had the dreamcast out, about how long Tiger's Game.com is, etc. At some point, companies have to cut their losses.

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