JOEL JOHNSON — New York game developer Greg Costikyan spends some time discussing everyone’s favorite whipping boy, the Nokia N-Gage. Greg, an industry veteran with quite a bit of mobile wireless game development experience under his belt, makes quite a few salient points about the storied device: Nokia should have postponed the launch, as no console has ever recovered from a botched start; being used to the mobile industry, Nokia may not have realized the marketing position (e.g. Nokia vs. Nintendo) launching a game console put them in; one of the strongest selling points, the wireless connectivity, wasn’t exploited by any of the launch titles; the general reticence of game publishers to support the device may actually be helping and encouraging those that are already making games for the N-Gage (less titles to choose from equals more sales to those that have already taken the plunge).
All-in-all it’s a very even-handed look at a device that is viewed as a failure now, but may be remembered in the end as Nokia’s practice run before their big success.
Read [via games.slashdot]
