Since the days of the great Atari crash, the history of game consoles has been one of increasingly powerful walled gardens. Massive companies exercise tight control over what games can be released on their platform, how often, and at what price. But that model is starting to look a little outdated. We live in a world where iOS is succeeding as a game platform with thousands of lightly regulated titles, where even hardcore games like Team Fortress 2 are making the free-to-play model work, and where PC developers often make more money when they control the price of their own games.

Those are the kinds of business developments that are motivating the team behind Ouya, a $99, Android 4.0-based TV game console project launching on Kickstarter today. Ouya is promising to provide a more open, hackable, and flexible gaming environment than the console market has ever seen before.