Nokia Talks Next-Gen N-Gage Tech, Tools

Though Nokia VP of corporate strategy Antti Vasara that the N-Gage platform performed below the company's expectations, he did indicate that the gaming technology used in the system would make its way into the company's higher-end phones as a standard feature. As a means to promoting the new gaming strategy, Nokia has begun assisting developers with N-Gage development toolkits for mobile studios to take advantage of the new expanded install base for the N-Gage tech. For the time being, only Nokia's first-party developers have access to the games development platform. Sixteen studios were given a look at the toolkit at mobile gaming workshops in Helsinki and Vancouver earlier in December. In addition to teaching developers about the uses of the new platform, the presentations acted as a sounding board for Nokia to hear feedback from the studios on various aspects of mobile game development. "Working with first party developers at each workshop is a crucial initial step to introduce the new end-to-end gaming platform," said Nokia Games head of industry marketing Kamar Shah. "Our first party developers have already worked on the N-Gage platform and know how to push the boundaries of mobile gaming to ensure that our next generation mobile gaming platform offers a plethora of rich, immersive mobile gaming experiences from launch. Our collaborative workshop format provides our developers with the tools and information to push the envelope on Nokia's new next generation mobile gaming platform." Among the developers present at the workshops were Backbone Entertainment, Barking Lizards, Bonus.com, Digital Legends, Ideaworks 3D, Razorback, Torus Games, and Two Tribes. Another workshop will be held at the 2006 Game Developers Conference in San Jose, California.