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Cellphones Portables (Games) Games

Nokia's N-Gage Service To End After 2010 44

Posted by Soulskill from the putting-a-suffering-dog-to-sleep dept.
negRo_slim writes "Who knew the N-Gage was still kicking? Well apparently it still is — however, it looks like 2010 will be the end. From the announcement: 'While the N-Gage.com site together with the N-Gage Arena and other community features will remain in operation throughout 2010, the Ovi Store will be the new central place for all the mobile games that Nokia and other publishers offer from this point forward. We will no longer publish new games for the N-Gage platform.'"
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Nokia's N-Gage Service To End After 2010 More

Nokia's N-Gage Service To End After 2010

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  • No big deal (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Tellarin ( 444097 ) on Friday October 30, 2009 @05:44PM (#29929269) Homepage Journal

    This is not big news. It is more of a re-branding anyway.

    Nokia is just consolidating all their online offerings under the Ovi brand, in hopes of competing with efforts like Apple's App Store.

    Now there will be one single place for Nokia users to buy apps, be they games or regular apps. Ovi also covers maps, photo sharing...

    Again, nothing to see here. What they currently call the N-Gage platform is not that taco-phone, it is the online selling place and the networking support for games. The new ones will use the service under the new name. That's all.

  • Sidetalkin' (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Nooo, do not say it looks like 2010 will be the end of sidetalkin' [sidetalkin.com]!!1!

  • Not surprised (Score:3, Interesting)

    by edxwelch ( 600979 ) on Friday October 30, 2009 @06:03PM (#29929419)

    Only big companies were allowed to make N-Gage games, and that shut out the indies. Also, they tried to implement a very complicated platform on very slow and buggy devices (like the N73).
    Even EA critisied the N-gage platform: http://www.t3.com/news/nokia-n-gage-summit-ea-point-out-the-problems?=37094 [t3.com]

    • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

      by tacarat ( 696339 )
      I wonder how this will affect their "exclusives". Palladium books had a little Rifts game done for that platform (such a waste) and I wonder if this will free it up for other platforms.
  • Isn't that what he said at the end of every episode of ST:TNG? "Set course and N-Gage." Meanwhile, all these years I thought he was talking about his model train layout.

  • We will no longer publish new games for the N-Gage platform

    I thought this thing bombed and was scrapped like 3 months after release?

    Like the author, I am shocked to hear that N-Gage is even still around. I think I want one just to put on my mantle piece as a conversational topic as one of the biggest video game blunders ever.

    • Re:You did in the first place? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Etherized ( 1038092 ) on Friday October 30, 2009 @06:37PM (#29929717)

      No, it's not N-Gage the device, it's N-Gage the platform.

      A while back - 2 years, maybe - Nokia decided that they wanted to seriously push gaming on S60 phones. I think this was even before the iPhone opened the app development floodgates, but I'm not sure.

      For some reason, they decided that the best name for this brand new gaming delivery platform would be... well, would be the same name as one of their most famous hardware failures of yesteryear. It would be akin to Apple calling the iPhone's browser "Cyberdog" or something equally ludicrous.

      At any rate, Nokia "soft launched" the new N-Gage throughout various markets, finally making it to the US only late last year (Nokia's really ignored the US market in recent years). Of course, by the time this project was starting to ramp up, the iPhone had already proven itself a capable gaming platform and... well, you can guess how well it went over.

      Don't worry, though, if you're a hardcore Nokia gamer. Everything that "N-Gage" the "platform" does will continue to exist, presumably, in "Ovi," which is their new unified branding for app delivery / social networking / whatever else. This is really more of a branding change than anything.

      • For some reason, they decided that the best name for this brand new gaming delivery platform would be... well, would be the same name as one of their most famous hardware failures of yesteryear.

        I did not know any of this, and I don't know how I can facepalm any harder.

      • So, from trains to eggs?

        • Yeah... it's an odd name to English speakers, who will either associate it with the Latin "ovum" (and modern derivatives) or just be perplexed by it. Apparently "ovi" means "door" in Finnish, which makes a great deal of sense, as it's a portal service of sorts. But what percentage of Nokia's sales come from people who will actually recognize this?

          Despite being the world's largest mobile phone manufacturer, from my perspective Nokia takes a very Euro-centric (and even Finn-centric) approach to their design a

  • And nothing of value was lost.

  • If only.... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SoCalledNotion ( 1548979 ) on Friday October 30, 2009 @07:57PM (#29930533)
    Now if only they can get the Ovi app store to stop being a clusterfuck. Seriously? Have you seen the damn website? It's horribly unorganized. They may have hundreds of apps available for your specific phone, but you can only view a handful at a time on the page. They really need to improve their interface if they want this Ovi crap to take off

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Tellarin ( 444097 )

      Not only that, but some apps that would be compatible with your phone simply do not show up. It is slow as dead (at least it was last time I tried).

      Also, what with having to login again every time you click on a link to other part of Ovi? If you go from store to photos, maps, or any other subdomain, you have to login again. Even though it's the same credentials.

      I do think they finally moved in the right direction with the current efforts, but there is still a looooong way to go to make the Ovi "experience"

  • T-Gage [wikimedia.org] is much cooler..

  • Product failure (Score:1, Redundant)

    by dUN82 ( 1657647 )
    Nokia was quite insightful to discover the unique niche of mobile phone gaming market,which was suggested to be next hit of the gaming industry with the iPod Touch and iPhone as a gaming platform and further diversified gamers. However, the failure was foreseeable as well since N-Gage was not build on a solid foundation of users and the lack of support from the gaming industry. The hardware was also a big failure as well, you cannot make a phone call comfortably since you had to put a brick sideways to your

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Actually, N-Gage gaming "platform" emerged before Apple store, but they were (and still are) dumb enough not to use 10% of its potential. I hope they will score with their "Ovi" platform, whatever it is. So far it does a good job backing up contacts and calendar.
      And for the N-Gage "sidetalking" device -- even though it looks ridiculous to brainwashed by-standers, the concept of 'sidetalking' was one of the most innovative and common-sense in mobile industry -- it did look stupid, but with sidetalkin' yo

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by dUN82 ( 1657647 )
        Clam down dude, no body said it's stupid, it's just not very conformable, that's all I'm trying to say in comparison the good-old-fashion-way to make a phone call...
  • N-Gage was about as useful lately as a bottle of chipotle sauce without a pile of clean underwear to go with it.

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