In August of last year, we got word that Amazon was going to enter the fairly new Android game console market. The device would help the company get a better foothold in the living room by offering a device that played games, movies and music. We haven’t heard much about it since then, but a recent report indicates that the project is still alive.
VG24/7 reports that Amazon and its subsidiary – Lab 126 – are still hard at work on the rumored Android game console. According to VG24/7’s sources, the console is being built to compete directly with the new consoles from Sony and Microsoft as well as consoles from Ouya and MadCatz.
So, what will Amazon’s console look like? It’s said that it currently looks like a PSone with sharp edges, but that design will surely change before launch. Amazon doesn’t want to be caught with a hardware design that seems old fashioned compared to its competitors and will likely come up with something similar to its Kindle design.
As for its specs, all we know is that it will likely use Qualcomm’s Snapdragon SoCs and cost less than $300. If Amazon uses a Snapdragon 800 or the new 805, we could have a pretty powerful games console on our hands. Of course, the quality of the games would still be dependent on the developers themselves.
Speaking of which, Amazon has its own game development studio as well as an extensive set of developer tools for Android game developers. If Amazon was smart, it would combine the two to help bring exclusive games to its device that really sell the hardware. The competition seems content to just have tablet games on their consoles so Amazon has a chance to do something special here, but it’s really up to how open Amazon wants to be. If it lets anybody publish games on the device, we might end up with another Ouya.
That being said, Amazon still has a while to get this right. While there’s no specific mention of a release date, the console will likely not see a release before summer.
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