The first developer kits for the highly-anticipated Ouya gaming console are shipping out earlier than expected. As pointed out by SlashGear, one customer has posted the text of their shipping notification in a thread over at the Ouya forums, with several individuals on Twitter also remarking that their devices are on the way. Ouya had originally announced that the first batch of developer kits would be shipping out tomorrow, December 28th — but an Ouya spokesperson has informed us that deliveries will actually begin tomorrow, no doubt making a few early backers very happy. The software development kit for the gaming console will be available as a standalone download for those that don't want to purchase a hardware kit as well; it is scheduled to be released tomorrow.

Update: As promised and teased, December 28th is here and Ouya boxes are making their way around the world, alongside the launch of the Ouya Dev Portal.