Column: 'Going Mobile: Mobile Gaming's Vitamin Q'

In the latest Going Mobile column, veteran journalist and current mobile game consultant Steve Palley pens a love letter to the Motorola Q, a new mobile device which, he suggests, may well be 'America’s first true consumer smart phone', and a harbinger of change in the mobile game biz. Having declared his love for the Q, Steve goes on to explain why it may make a big different to cellphone games: "Blackberries are standard-issue for corporate wage slaves, Treos are for early adopters and gadget freaks with lots of cash, and Symbian phones are for wealthy Europeans, but the Motorola Q carries none of these associations. It’s hip, it’s affordable, it’s being advertised heavier than any other phone in history, and it works...well enough. It’s going to be a hit of monumental proportions, especially once Verizon subsidizes the price down even further and makes unlimited data a little cheaper, probably in time for Christmas 2006. The Q’s propagation (as well as the spread of competing devices that Motorola’s competitors will inevitably release) will have profound effects on the mobile gaming market. All of a sudden, the consumer has a mobile web browser that actually works, instead of a crippled WAP portal, meaning that he or she can easily browse on over to a game publisher’s site, look at preview graphics, and buy games from the source." You can now read the full Gamasutra column on the topic, including many more sage words from Palley (no registration required, please feel free to link to this feature from external websites).