Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Something to Sidetalk About

Posted by Zonk on from the adventures-in-poor-design dept.

nigelthezebra writes "The N-Gage is at it again, what with the news that the price is being dropped and that the redesigned handheld is going to be redesigned again. In "Something to Sidetalk About," AllRPG.com's Richard Goodness recounts his experiences with the N-Gage QD. To put a long story short, it's very obvious why the system is failing. When you can't even figure out how to turn something on, you know it's time to go back to the drawing board." From the article: "I've always been a big proponent of the axiom, when in doubt, see if Mr. Casual can do it. Games ought not to need big instruction booklets. They should be simple enough to figure out by picking up and fiddling for a moment or two. Turning a system on, that goes without saying."

3 of 49 comments (clear)

  1. AllRPG? Boy, you'll take anything from anywhere by lunarscape · · Score: 0, Troll
    AllRPG is a joke of a website. It's a two-bit operation that occasionally pumps out a week-old news piece (usually not about RPGs). It's obvious that this article was submitted by its author just to boost the traffic to their pathetic little site. Congratulations, Slashdot editors, you fell for it.

    Oh, and I just got a virus warning when visiting that page. Thanks again, Slashdot.

  2. Nokia by Sv-Manowar · · Score: 0, Troll

    Nokia are wasting money on trying to make the Ngage compete with the PSP and DS now, the redesign will also fail.

    Diversification into an extremely competitive market like handheld gaming without any previous experience is not a great idea, espiecally just before the next gen on handhelds

    --
    Business Voyeur
  3. Pff. by Dehumanizer · · Score: 0, Troll

    I've always been a big proponent of the axiom, when in doubt, see if Mr. Casual can do it. Games ought not to need big instruction booklets. They should be simple enough to figure out by picking up and fiddling for a moment or two. Turning a system on, that goes without saying.

    Translation: "I only like simple action games."

    I like those, too. But I also like RPGs, strategy games, MMORPGs, wargames, even flight simulators. And most of those do need manuals.

    And if you can't figure out how to turn on a QD, then your VCR is probably blinking "12:00"... :)

    --
    The Tlog - a technology blog