Pictures today have surfaced of an Amazon first-party controller, which strongly hint at (if not confirm) rumors of an Amazon-branded set top box for your television being true. The controller is...well, it's not too attractive. The plain grey-black finish looks a bit cheap, but it's hard to say if this is a finished model, or how it feels in your hands. More about the controller itself can be found here, but don't expect any compliments on its appearance.
What exactly that set-top device is, we're still not sure. I would expect there to be some sort of integration with their Amazon Prime video streaming service, but it's possible this is a gaming-centric affair. They recently acquired a game studio, driving these rumors on in the first place. The question is, who exactly would such a device be aimed at?
Given their large library of media, I would expect the box to be a hybrid gaming and media-streaming platform for your TV, with this controller as the input. So, people who subscribe to Amazon Prime and stream media might be interested in the product as method to view their content on, theoretically.
My issue with this thinking is that anyone who has Prime and has been using the service for a while likely already has a way to watch their movies and shows, and has been doing so for weeks, months, or years. Even if right now they only watch on their laptops, I don't see many people clamoring for a specialized device to stream their media, especially one that comes off partially as a gaming machine.
Those who don't play games at all may be turned off by the idea of a controller-based platform and not have any interest, even though I'm sure Amazon will price this relatively cheaply. In addition, I don't think most people would choose it over a Roku or Chromecast--simple, USB plug-in sticks that achieve the same task, minus the gaming.That is, if they don't already own one of those devices.
Amazon is playing against itself here: people have bought or found solutions to make use of their Prime accounts long ago, and likely own a Roku or other device that they have no reason to replace by buying a new product. I can't foresee the gaming aspect of this unrevealed box driving too many sales on its own, and that's if they manage to make it a viable gaming platform.
There are a lot of unanswered questions about their plan, but they could show features when they announce the device that make it fall into place. I don't really see an obvious way forward with the facts we know right now to make this a hit, but it's too early to give a final judgment--we'll have to see what Amazon has in store.
