N-Gage QD - Nokia's Answer To The Critics?

JayBonci writes "According to CNET News, Nokia is preparing the N-Gage QD for release at the end of June. The redesign is an attempt to address design criticisms; such as 'side-talking' and the need to take out the battery to replace the game. Will this signal new life for the console, or is it too little, too late?" We linked to leaked pictures of the N-Gage follow-up late last week on Slashdot Games, and there's further information at GameSpot, which mentions: "When bundled with a service contract, the QD is expected to sell for $99. Without subsidy from a service provider, the phone will go for $199 (with the platform's Tony Hawk title bundled in at that price)."

Comments

Too little, far too late

[mao che minh]

There was almost no interest in the N-Gage due to inflated prices, poor design, demand miscalcualtion (hardly anyone was actually looking to buy such a device), and corny marketing. Removing the idiotic features won't help this late in the game.

Re:Too little, far too late

[thesaur]

I disagree. Nokia is well known in Europe for their innovations, and they've been targeting young consumers (i.e., pre-teens and teenagers). This revision of the N-Gage may just be the ticket to getting young people to buy it.

It's amazing how often young people I know get new phones. All it takes is for one kid in the school to get it and think it's cool. Then the hundreds of others will "need" it. That's the way cell phone marketing works over here, and I think it's very compatible with the N-Gage.

Though you might think otherwise, the main thing young people use the phones for is games and sending SMS's. Calling each other is too expensive. And Nokia is well aware of that fact.

Another thing is the price factor. If, as has been stated, it retails for $199 without a service contract, it will be available in Europe probably for 1 EUR with a 24-month contract. That's a decent price, and very afordable for the young. I know many who regularly pay 100 EUR to buy phones on ebay. The phones are usually worth about 300 EUR.

If Nokia is smart (and I think they are), they'll have easy access to this huge market. If not with this revision, with the next.

Re:Too little, far too late

[Jace of Fuse!]

I'd say that they have a much bigger PR problem to tackle than the Virtual Boy or the 32X ever had.

I'd say the Virtual Boy and 32x may even have a better chance of success than the N-Gage. :)

I speak not only as someone who buys just about anything game related, but also as someone who has many like-minded friends. The major issue that gamers have with the N-Gage isn't the shape, and it isn't the location of the memory card, though both of those issues ARE major turn offs, they ALMOST might could have been overlooked if it weren't for a few other serious factors.

The first buzzkill was the screen. Tall and Skinny Works for early 80's upright cabinets and that's it. It doesn't work for handhelds, and there's almost nothing you can do to make it work.

In a day and age were video is making a push for "WIDE SCREEN", doing the total opposite is the kiss of death. Human vision is wider than it is tall, and we've become spoiled by a wide field of vision. For that reason, the screen layout of the N-Gage pretty much prohibits it from having games most people are going to stand playing for very long.

Next, the button layout is crap. It had all those buttons (in the form of a number pad) and they wasted the chance to do something really innovative by trying to turn the interface into a stylish phone. Only it's not a stylish phone, so they failed that too.

If the N-Gage actually has a future, it won't be in it's current, or even it's newly announced form. It'll require a MAJOR overhaul.

Re:Too little, far too late

[Anonymous Coward]

Certainly not enough to overcome the might and innovation of PSP.

Is there anything on N-Gage 2 (nee QD) that couldn't have been technically and commercially implemented on the original N-Gage, released around 9 months ago? Nope.

Did Nokia listen to the critics who pointed out the faults inherent to the original (pre-release) N-Gage. Non, non, non!

Is N-Gage 2 "revolutionary" or "innovative" in any way? Nein, danke. No aspects to the interface are compelling in any way - there are no shoulder buttons, analogue input (as per PS2, perhaps?), wide aspect screen (try tunnel vision for side-scrolling platformers), or anything remotely beyond the expected. For example, in the era of transparently mobile digital media why are we constrained to carrying numerous and valuable MMC cards around just to play games? This is analogous to the old days of tapes and Wlakmans. Why could Nokia not implement a satisfactory online distribution channel? They do have the expertise, but sadly not the capacity for original thought...

Beyond the removal of added-value features such as the radio and media support, numerous design faults are still inherent - e.g. there is no satisfactory Hold switch or function, therefore the user is required to traverse up and down through interface trees for even the simplest action (i.e. removing and replacing the phone from a pocket), etc etc

In my view Nokia are 9 months behind where they could have been, and are distancing themselves (in the wrong direction) even further from the competition.

Re:Too little, far too late

[Lumpy]

Nokia had a horrid design from the beginning and I guarentee that the new one sucks just as bad. They need to put 4X the processor in there at MINIMUM. Crips the GameBoy SP looks like a cray supercomputer compared to the NGage. They need to more than double the memory.. and the LCD just plain sucks.

In fact it is easier for me to carry a SP + a couple of cart's and my regular nextel cellphone than it was to carry and use the Ngage.

They can redesign all they want... I know that it will continue to suck in useability, in game selection and in quality.

Yes the ngage i have has 3 broken buttons and a cracked case... one drop to a tile floor, the same drop that my nextel takes almost weekly and that the SP has taken 3 times all with no damage.

Re:Too little, far too late

[Lemmy Caution]

Nokia has been big and powerful for far longer than 5 years. You think they made their first cell phones in a garage in Helsinki or something?

Nokia is about 140 years old, has been Finland's largest corporation for decades, and started off by making paper. They are probably no more corrupt and decadant now than they were 5 or 10 years ago - they just made a crappy phone, that's all.

Re:Too little, far too late

[Ayaress]

More ranting about the screen: In the majority of games, the interesting stuff takes place along the horizontal. In FPS, you're both generally standing on a floor/ground of some sort. In sidescrollers (like Sonic, which is one of the N-Gage's core games), you don't usually worry much about what's above you. It's what's in front of you you need to see. This is even worse in Sonic, where you regularly get up to such speeds that the narrow screen gives you roughly one frame to dodge an oncomming enemy. A TV screen gives you roughly two to three times the reaction time. Another of their major games is Tomb Raider. We all know how crappy the camera angles are in this game. It's bad enough on a wide screen when you can't see what you're shooting at (and being shot by). The narrow screen conspires with the shitty camera angles to make sure you die more efficiently. Then there's the sports games. You'd think that, knowing the screen setup, FIFA Soccer would have had the field running virtically, so you could see some distance downfield. But no, they have it running side to side, so you're seeing maybe 5 yards worth of green while you're kicking at a goal five screens away. Frankly, I think a more or less square field of view is best for sports games and (more importantly, since I don't like sports games) strategy games, as well as other top-down games, since it gives a balanced view on all sides. About the only thing the tall skinny screen is superior for is for the virtically scrolling shooters and games like Tetris (if you strip out the console that takes up half the screen in the Gameboy version) - and I'm not spending $400 to play Tetris when I can already do that on my GBA, which cost me $50.

You have got to wonder...

[m1chael]

how the first one managed to see daylight. Don't they test it with humans before release? Anyhoo, at the moment I don't see the next Gameboy or PSP so maybe this might work. I bet those people who got the first one are hoping for some kind of rebate ;P Are there people who bought it?

Re:You have got to wonder...

[Kris_J]

The parent is not insightful. The original N-Gage is a very nice peice of kit. For example: I notice nobody ever complained about how thick it is. Few, if any, people complained that the controls were worse for gaming than any other phone one the market.

Given that the new one is losing Tri-band (a must for international travellers) and the FM radio (also handy for travellers and others), I'm particularly content with mine. Meanwhile, if the updated model provokes a few more games releases, well that's great to.

It's all about the applications support

[StandardCell]

Seriously, what marketing genius decided to launch the original N*Gage with Tomb Raider and seven other mostly older games? Tomb Raider is almost 8 years old now. This is really an irrelevant piece of hardware unless it's up to the task of real 3D gaming with real apps that people want to play on the go - something that has not escaped Nintendo's Game Boy line.

Re:It's all about the applications support

[kaitsu]

Old 8-bit Nintendo games seem to be doing rather well on GBA and they are _really_ old...

Price

[Shakey_Jake33]

For me, the problem once again comes down to pricepoint. I am well aware that the price is relatively cheap as far as mobile phones go. However, I neither want, nor need, a mobile phone. I would be buying this product strictly as a games console, and from that perspective, the $199 price point suddenly seems unreasonable considering the probably short future of the product. If I'm going to spend such a substancial amount on a handheld, I'd save my money for a PSP, which promises a larger lime-up of games, from more developers, on a product line which is more likely to actually have a future. Or get the cheaper, but trusty GBA. Which is a shame because there are some games that truely interest me on the NGage... I loved the original Pandemonium! to bits, and a handheld Tomb Raider sounds pretty cool also. Ultimately unless you intend to use this as a phone also, it's just not worth the asking price, and that's a pretty sizable chunk of the market Nokia are blocking out (I mean, even if a person does use a cell phone, will they want to be limited to this one?).

Re:It's too little, too late.

[S3D]

There are two ways Nokia could have pulled it off. They could have either hooked up with Nintendo and sold a phone that also played Gameboy Advance games. Thus they'd have a huge library of games, and both audiences are tailored two. Or if they really wanted to compete, they should have created a standalone console that wasn't tied to the cell phone.
Both not viable alternatives. Nokia pushing Symbian OS. Switch to another OS or make an emulator with limited CPU/memory for niche product is not practical. Standalone console is not what Nokia targeting. Nokia target middle segment between hardcore and casual, people who want have handheld gaming device, but don't want carry another box.Another point is communication. The idea was online gaming through GPRS/WAP. Those games never materialize, but that is another problem (prices still too high). Overall impression of this new NGage - it's more like patched original device , not new. It should be exchanged for old for free (or with huge rebate), or original owners would feel cheated. Trouly new device should have twice bigger screen, twice faster CPU (at least 200 mHz, for now this "gaming" device have 104 mHz vs 150+ mHz of SonyEricsson P800) and, most important - Symbian 8.x OS with hardware OpenGL ES. If NGage 2 will not reach those parameters it will be another falure.

Too little too late?

[BinaryC]

This would have been a great product if it was released first, but I have to wonder if anyone will care now -- You only get one chance to make a first impression.

Nokia and Software Patents

[Serious Simon]

They push for software patents in Europe. Software patents are a threat to innovation.

I for one will not buy any more Nokia products.

misunderstandings

[child_of_mercy]

OK, I think you're all misunderstanding this product.

It's not a destination, it's a journey.

The day after tommorrow there won't be phones, mp3 players, games consoles, or even computers as we currently think of them.

As it is why buy and ipod when your phone is going to have a Gb of storage and an mp3 player next year?

Interfaces will vary according to function, so you'll still have a keyboard and montior on your desktop, and a pad and a stylus in your palm, and a TV and huge speakers in your home.

But the storage and processing and comms will all be the one package that you'll carry around everywhere you go.

Nokia want a piece of that, the N-Gage is a step down that path.

Their building expertise and experience and making relationships with crucial content developers.

Microsoft, Intel, and Sony also see themselves as possible players in the space.

who's going to win?

My money's on the guys that embrace open standards and open source, simply because all this stuff is going to have to play together really well.

Anyway Nokia are trying to make the best product they can for now, but even if the next dozen N-Gages are flops have to keep trying to get it right.

Selling Ice to Eskimos or Condoms to Lesbians

[Lord Kano]

Nokia is making a HUGE mistake with the N-Gage. They're trying to muscle in on two markets at once with this. Nintendo is the undisputed heavyweight champion of mobile gaming, and they have been for half of my life. From the time of the original Gameboy no one has been able to unseat them, dispite better products. Sega's Game Gear, Atari's Lynx, NEC's Turbo Express, and the Pocket Neo Geo were all superior to Nintendo's offering of the day; each and every one of them got their asses stomped by Nintendo. This one will be no different.

They have a large stake in the cell phone market, in a sense they're trying to sell a gaming device to people who just want a cell phone. People who want a cell phone will buy a cell phone, possibly one of Nokia's. Their cell business will eat away potential customers of N-Gage. People who want mobile gaming AND cell phones will buy a Gameboy and a cell phone.

What they've done is put themselves in a no win situation. They're trying to sell things that people either don't need or don't want.

Ice and Condoms.

LK

Headphone Jack?

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be nice... especially for train/bus/road trip solitude.

One small thing..

[superhoe]

A device which you can use to call + receive phone calls, play games (emulator as well, from gameboy to C64 and MAME), use calendar, browse net, email, listen to radio, mp3 and do pretty much anything else by installing loads of nice s60 software. F.ex. Teletext application is my big favourite.

Is even $200 (if it's even that much) really expensive for all that? For me, it is definitely not. I'm unaffiliated with Nokia; I just like this particular device because it's very useful and cheap phone which allows me to do everything I wish and lots more.

Missing it completly

[AdamInParadise]

I think you're missing the point of the N-Gage.

Think: handheld game console + cell phone = ? Mobile online gaming of course! Even the demo game shipped with the N-Gage supported that. Of course for now the GPRS charges are killing it, but it the near future, this is going to be huge!

Re:QD

[Anonymous Coward]

:-)

I'm surprised it even got out the door in the first place. So, of all the people that work for Nokia and had the chance to look at the thing before release, no one was smart enough to figure out that replacing the battery to change the cartridge was a bad idea? Or that side-talking was not comfortable at all?

Makes for a good textbook example on product failures...

Also, one of the biggest mistakes of our time: companies focus too much on what consumers say (mostly companies addicted to CRM systems). They should also listen very carefully to people that chose not to buy (the non-consumers).

Re:It's too little, too late.

[Jussi K. Kojootti]

Then you have the other type of customer: the ones who don't need a cell phone, don't want to change their current cell phone, or can't get a cellphone. Children fall into that latter category. People/Parents aren't going to buy the thing just to play games on and ignore it's functionality as a cellphone.

Boy, do we live on different planets... My (mostly european) experience says kids absolutely 'need' a cell phone, change to a new one often and would kill for a cooler devices/phones. I'm not saying this Ngage2 is that kind of device though.

Re:No MP3 player?!

[Jarnis]

It's a symbian phone. You can install a separate MP3 player.

Lack of radio is slightly annoying tho.

Re:Looks fine to me.

[BasilBrush]

The slashdot crowd are very reactionary. They make a snap mob judgement on whether something is good or bad, and then stick with it, no matter what. It makes not a damn bit of difference whether Nokia have fixed the flaws in the ngage. Nokia is evil and ngage sucks, and that is that!

Re:Convergent products

[Daneurysm]

I hate to disagree with you...as what you said just seems to make sense. People want product A, and people want product B...so why not put them both together and get product C? That's sure to win over both camps, right?

Do you remember the 'all in one fax, scanner, printer, copier, modem' units that were all the rage a couple years ago?

Do you remember which of those functions it was really good at?

Probably not. 'Cuz they sucked at all of them.

Convergence devices have always promised to be a panacea. However, in reality it comes down to this:

These devices are the jack of all trades, but master of none.

Re:Buttons

[jorleif]

Why would anyone dial a number on a cellular!?

One thing to point out

[Effugas]

Yes, the nGage itself is a steaming pile of crap -- and everyone knew it, from the moment we excitedly tried it at GDC last year. And we all know the games for nGage suck -- Nokia, memo from 1987, sprite acceleration makes Puzzle Bobble play at speeds higher than 7fps. But what's not well realized is that, for all of the Gameboy Advance's massive library, the vast majority of the content is Atari-market-crash level crap, and most of the remainder is unplayable by anyone over the age of 14.

Don't believe me? I swear on everything that is true in this world that the following was excitedly exclaimed from a Fry's in Campbell, CA, just a scant few months ago:

"Mommy! Mommy! It's American Idol for the Gameboy Advance!"

The kid was ten. The game was not purchased.

Don't get me wrong. I own a GBA. Hell, it's my second one, since I lost my first one. There's a good dozen games on the system that are actually playable -- the Castlevanias, the Metroids, some of the work coming out of Squaresoft. But even if the hardware is the spiritual successor of the SNES, the software selection is embarassing, bordering on mortifying.

And Nokia knows all this -- they know there's a pent up demand for gaming that scales to people who don't need to beg for a candy bar. Sony knows this -- and could actually destroy Nintendo on a whim, simply by releasing a handheld Playstation 1 (and re-releasing
a small chunk of the old library on new media). But everyone seems to be skipping a generation of failed machines (the "Don't Be Sega" effect?) and trying, better or worse, to do portable, multiplayer 3D gaming right.

And if you don't think MS is in this game, you're not paying attention to those "portable video players" with DRM support and space for a gamepad.

There's alot at stake here. I'm frankly surprised to still see Nokia still involved -- if nGage was any worse, the FCC probably would have refused to certify it on principal -- but you can't fault their recognition of the potential size of this market. Nintendo may have owned this space since the 80's -- but they've gone from the company that returned quality to video games ("Nintendo Seal of Quality" meant something) to ... well, one that adds another screen.

Yay.

--Dan

Now It's About The Games

[blueZhift]

While many here are counting Nokia out, they actually have a good chance of success. First, by coming out with a redesigned console so quickly, they show that they are serious about making it in the gaming market. This is not good news for Nintendo or Sony at all.

It is no surprise either that the redesign came out so fast. Nokia makes cel phones! Cel phone designs and features seem to change on almost a weekly basis. So it is likely that Nokia is accustomed to working on short design and manufacturing cycles. Indeed, this may be why they felt they could release the first N-Gage with all of the design errors. Again, this is not good news for Sony or Nintendo who are accustomed to longer cycles.

In the end, it will be the games that decide who makes real money in the portable space. If Nokia gets traction, we'll see a real fight. I would guess that Nintendo is most at risk because they haven't had a real fight in the portable space in yea...like ever. Sony I think will recognize the threat and use their muscle and money to get exclusives for the PSP early. But the PSP had better not be too late to market, or they'll be looking at the 3rd or 4th iteration of N-Gage by then. Finally, one wildcard here is Microsoft. MS has said they're not interested in the portable market. That said, MS makes the best development tools in the business, if it suddenly becomes easy to develop for Nokia using Visual Studio .Net (which it is not right now) and XNA suddenly is part of the mix, then things could get interesting.

Re:QD

[halk]

Yeah, it is conspiracy! Nokia is making batteries to explode on purpose!

Or maybe it is because Nokia is by far the biggest manufacturer (~40% marketshare) and so has by far the biggest counterfeit battery problem?