When the Ouya game console first turned up on Kickstarter, many of us initially thought the device was only for playing Android games on the big-screen.
As it turns out, the Ouya console crew will be working with various devs to port games from computers and consoles to their Android-powered system, in addition to exclusive titles.
As previously discussed on TG, the folks who backed the console via Kickstarter for $99 will be among the first to get the first units produced. These early backers should be getting their Ouya in the next week or so. If you’re a retro gamer, some interesting news has turned up that may make this little $99 game console even more appealing, as it will indeed support emulators for the Nintendo 64, Nintendo Entertainment System, and other classic consoles.
To be sure, a developer named Paul Lamb has already ported his Mupen64 emulator over to the Ouya Android-powered platform – allowing gamers to play Nintendo 64 titles on the new console. Additional devs are also tipped to be working on emulators for other consoles, including the Nintendo Entertainment System.
The mere fact that the Ouya can run game console emulators isn’t that surprising, as there have been emulators available for Android for a long time. However, the good news here is that the Ouya team will allow developers to distribute their console emulator apps via the official Ouya store – as long as the developers of the console emulators don’t offer any copyrighted video games.
The problem many game developers and game studios have with console emulators is that most people download illegal copies of game ROMs to play using the emulator software.
However, gamers that have a collection of old school games can use available software to build their own ROMs for the emulators. When the Ouya reaches general availability, it will be available at retail locations such as Amazon.com, GameStop and others.
