I had no issue controlling a Shield via Bluetooth, however the best functionality comes from using a FLIRC customisable IR receiver, that allows you to map any command to any function or keypress on the receiver, including every key on a keyboard for proper control over apps like kodi, and custom shift/control macros in the receiver for mapping custom functions in android to launch apps etc.
All the remote needs to do then is spit out any IR command and the flirc can map it to any complex function.