CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
Executives from Nokia have today finally commented on their brief dabble with smartphones.
“We can’t believe the N-Gage flopped” said one executive, Phil Sigsworth.
“We spent like 500 million dollars getting that prototype right”
The N-Gage (a pun on engage) is a PDA combining features of a telephone and a handheld game system from Nokia, announced on 4 November 2002 and released on 7 October 2003 – it didn’t do very well because it was pretty hard to carry in your pocket and unnecessarily large.
Independent market research claimed that the N-Gage had sold only 5,000 decks in the United States in their first week of release, and 800 decks in the UK.
Despite the N-Gage’s commercial failings, Stephen Blyth former CEO at the time, says that there is a small underground gaming community acknowledge the N-gage as one of the most underrated devices in smartphone gaming history.
“Real gamers know dawg” says Blyth.
“Asphalt Urban GT… Code Of Duty… How many casual gamers did you know who had that shit going on in 2002 – in their back pocket”
The N-Gage was discontinued in November 2005, with Nokia moving its gaming capabilities onto selected Series 60 smartphones. This was announced as the N-Gage platform or “N-Gage 2.0” in 2007, carrying on the N-Gage name.
