Google squandered the Q - it was a great marketing opportunity, what with its unique form factor. They should've used it to create a first-party Google TV (with support for using Android phones and tablets to control it, particularly the Nexus 7) and released game controllers along with it, encouraging developers to create Android console games.
Then they should've made the Q the cable box for Google Fiber. That would've really made the headlines.
However, while it's easy for us to sit here and take potshots at Google, we have to remember that it's a logistical nightmare bringing together disparate divisions of a massive organization like Google and getting them to coordinate their efforts so that the company as a whole can present a united front to consumers.
Completely agree. Either buy OUYA, and improve the product if you can, and get even more partnerships for launch day, or build something similar (also for $99 - very important!), and release it a few months later at the next Google I/O with Tegra 4. Boom - crazy buzz around it.
The price is essential though. Screw everything else. Just make sure it's $99. And using a beefed up Tegra 4 (no regard for energy efficiency in a console), or some other next-gen GPU architecture with OpenGL ES 3.0 support (like Exynos 6/Mali T658), coupled with Cortex A15 CPU's, would be a huge bonus over OUYA, even if it arrives a few months later compared to OUYA.
But please - please - stop buying into that theory that says early adopter products need to be more expensive or whatever makes Google release such products at prices that everyone thinks are insane.
Just a few examples:
Xoom - $800
Google TV - $300
Chromebook $450
Nexus Q - $300
Google still hasn't learned that they need to introduce these new products at a "sweet spot" pricing point - much like the Nexus 7 actually! But it took Amazon to teach them that, so I don't have much faith in them repeating this, especially after seeing the Nexus Q pricing.
Google's problem regarding pricing is also that they keep putting components that are too expensive in those products, without receiving an equivalent value from it.
The Xoom was this expensive because of the 3g/4G chips and high MP cameras. The Chromebooks and Google TV were this expensive because of Intel's Atom chips. Nexus Q was too expensive because it had an amplifier (did anyone actually care about that?), and because it was "built in US". They need to stop making these kind of mistakes once and for all, if they want to be successful selling hardware.
Apple puts only the essential components in their products that 80% of the people would use, and make sure they are high quality. For example, the original iPad had a high-quality display, but had no cameras, and not even a GPS. This kind of thinking made the iPad cost "only" $500 at the time, when people thought it would be significantly more - maybe not $1000, but perhaps more expensive than an unlocked iPhone, thanks to the expected bigger screen, bigger battery, etc. Google needs to learn to do that as well.
Luckily the ouya is going to do just that, I wonder if Google will purchase them if they become profitable (or even without profits it'd be a smart acquisition for them and would give games companies more confidence in the console and building games for the Android platform in general) .
There's very little reason for anyone to have confidence in Ouya as a platform. From the developers' apparent inability to plan (still no dev documentation, still no SDK...and they're planning to release in the next eight months!) to their pimping of a port of the Android port of a DS game as the biggest thing that's happened to the platform. (I have the Android port of FF3 on my Nexus 7. It's ugly enough there. It's going to be really ugly at 40".)
I had really high hopes for this at first but this has been in meltdown mode pretty much from day one. I just hope that the hardware actually gets into users' hands, because frankly at this point I'm not even sure.
Then they should've made the Q the cable box for Google Fiber. That would've really made the headlines.
However, while it's easy for us to sit here and take potshots at Google, we have to remember that it's a logistical nightmare bringing together disparate divisions of a massive organization like Google and getting them to coordinate their efforts so that the company as a whole can present a united front to consumers.