Is Ouya butting heads with the ESA at E3?

The Ouya is generating some buzz at E3 this year – but probably not the sort the company was hoping for. See, the Ouya isn’t actually AT E3 – instead they company has been renting some spaces just outside the official grounds where E3 is being held. Which is… well, it’s a reasonably thrifty way of going about things, and when you think about it, it fits the implicit Ouya “budget” philosophy to the letter. But IGN is reporting that soon after they set up their displays, the ESA rented the spots directly in front of the Ouya’s – and promptly parked some large, vision-blocking trucks there. Team Ouya responded by renting out the spaces in front of the trucks and setting up more displays, and before too long someone called the cops – though the potential drama stopped after it was shown that yes, the Ouya team did in fact have permits for their spaces. For now the tension seems to have ended, but E3 is far from over… and the ESA probably has a few more trucks.

Ouya founder Julie Uhrman is quoted by IGN as saying, “If ten more trucks show up, we’ll come up with another idea. I have a few up my sleeve.” Keep in mind, the ESA hasn’t made any statement along the lines of, “Yeah, we were trying to block the Ouya display!” or the like. Maybe they just needed a place to park a few trucks. But we’ll be keeping an eye on the situation, just in case the whole thing spills over into wacky sitcom levels of one-upmanship.