OUYA seems to be the little console that could. Created by Julie Uhrman (who has previously worked at Vivendi Universal, IGN, and GameFly) and Yves Behar (designer of Jambox, One Laptop per Child, and other projects), OUYA is an independent, Android powered console. Funded by a Kickstarter campaign, the project has raised $5.6 million so far, with 11 days to go. It’s a budget console, which supposedly puts the power back in the hands of gamers and indie developers. You can secure your own console (with controller) for just $120, with the estimated launch date being in early 2013. Gamers are encouraged to hack and modify the console to their heart’s content, as the console is intended to be an open system. That’s not to say that it won’t have its own marketplace though, and there’s even been an exclusive indie game announced for OUYA.

The latest development involves OnLive, the Cloud-based gaming service which is widening its availability with every passing month. OnLive will be offering hundreds of games from over 50 publishers at the time of OUYA’s launch, with free 30 minute demos available for almost all of them. Gamers will be able to play the games on their OUYA console, and then continue at any time on their PC, Mac, tablet or phone. All games will be available in 720p resolution. This deal is a big step forward for the console, which has only really seen tentative support from developers and publishers so far. Whether the project will ultimately be a success is difficult to predict, but it seems to be getting off to a good start, if the amount of community support is anything to go by.

What do you think of the unusual OUYA console? Let us know in the comments.