The latest All About Symbian podcast is up, and it includes a discussion of the recent N-Gage news, including updates from GDC. The team discusses recent game reviews, device updates, Bounce on an Accelerometer, and more. Rafe and Steve also have a fairly extensive discussion about N-Gage, iPhone, and the Ovi Store.
Download the podcast from the AAS Website or listen to it right here:
All About Symbian’s Ewan Spence has just posted a podcast interview with Jaakko Kaidesoja, Nokia’s vice president of games, from this year’s Game Developer’s Conference.
Among the topics covered are the Ovi Store, the iPhone, the number of N-Gage users, the E75, the N73, touch screen, and other topics of keen interest to N-Gage gamers. Give it a listen by clicking below:
If you have follow-up questions for Jaakko, be sure to visit the original All About Symbian post and send Ewan an email.
A quick round-up of today’s relevant N-Gage links:
1. N-Gager review of Crash Bandicoot
2. Latest All About Symbian podcast
3. Game Pages now available for:
The latest All About Symbian podcast includes a discussion of the recent launches of N-Gage games. The N-Gage discussion comes towards the end of the program at around minute 20. Other topics discussed include PC Suite, the Nokia N97, and more.
Download the podcast from the AAS Website or listen to it right here:
Here are some links to some recent RG coverage from the recently-concluded Penny Arcade Expo:
Gamespot - Scoll down a little on this, but it’s a write-up of a panel moderated by Nokia’s Scott Foe and talking about game design. The panel consisted of Nintendo, Sony, and Ubisoft veteran Mark DeLoura, Daxter producer and EA creative director Michael John, former EA designer Will Kerslake.
Thunderbolt Games - Thunderbolt interviews Reset Generation executive producer Scott Foe on the show floor (and also gets some groovy pictures of those Reset Generation arcade machines).
My Pax Blog - Here’s a short, fun audio interview with Reset Generation producer Scott Howard, who in his own words describes the game’s genesis and gist.
And finally MTV has a short post quoting Scott Foe about the game’s ambition. He says we were aiming for crack, but ended up with… ah, read it for yourself!
Embedding = the Real Launch?
Earlier this week All About N-Gage posted up an editorial called “When Will N-Gage Really Launch?” talking about the need for the N-Gage application to be embedded in as many compatible devices as possible to more quickly grow the service.
Sims 2 First Impressions
Long-time N-Gage Arena Player and all around groovy guy Emo185 has posted up his first impressions of Sims 2, the newest game available in the N-Gage showroom. He notes: “I wasn’t too bothered with the game but after a quick play it brings a smile to your face and is rather enjoyable.”
Unofficial N-Gage Theme
Earlier this year, N-Gage fan p@sco has posted up an unofficial N-Gage theme for you S60 device that intends to make your entire device look and feel like the N-Gage application. Get it here.
All About Symbian Podcast
A wide variety of topics covered this week, including a brief discussion about N-Gage games. Give it a listen here.
Sims 2 Pets Review
Nok-Nok has taken the Sims 2 Pets out for a walk. Get their take here.
GameRevolution.com is featuring Reset Generation as the lead story on its website. Here are some choice quotes:
“This has got to be some kind of a first: Game Revolution, covering ‘mobile,’ or cell phone, gaming — dogs and cats, living together, mass hysteria…
“But the news is simply this: Here’s a mobile game that aims to truly be the equal of its PC counterpart, and one aimed even at gamers of an old-school, arcade-generation mindset…
“Frankly, some of us here at GR have traditionally never given half a rat’s @$# about most mobile gaming — you may have noticed the utter lack of that kind of coverage, up until now — but Reset Generation looks like it could change some of that.”
Read the full preview here, and also be sure to check out the Game Revolution podcast (right click to save to hard drive) which also talks about Reset Generation, from about minute 20:00 on.
Next Generation has also posted up some excerpts from the recent EDGE article that first revealed Reset Generation to the world. Here’s a snip:
“Its characters are parodies of the most familiar videogame tropes — a plumber, a hedgehog, an elf, a blocky alien spacecraft. It hinges on the basic aim of having your avatar capture your opponents’ princesses and return them to your castle. It involves special powers and item drops. It features a soundtrack of crazed C64-style music with track names like Nin10do Raver. It asks you to drop Tetris-like blocks on to the board to form ‘combos’.”
There’s more here.
Need something to listen to on your N-Gage compatible device? I always enjoy the All About Symbian podcasts. This week they talk about Mile High Pinball, Reset Generation, the Nokia N82, and several other topics.
Give it a listen here.
Good morning N-Gage fans, although after spending all of this morning in a meeting planning for our next meeting, it’s rapidly becoming afternoon, but such is the Nokia way. Now, on to the rest of today’s news…
Behind the Scenes with Creebies
Pocket Gamer has put up an extensive, two-part interview with Lida de Araujo, the game designer of Creebies, which of course is the upcoming creature nurturing game for the N-Gage platform. In it, she talks about the game’s influences, target audience, dynamic breeding mechanics (heh), and community aspects of the game. Here’s a snippet:
I’m really so proud of Creebies. I think it’s an incredibly rich and deep title that could easily hold its own on a console or PC. It’s quite difficult for me to say what I’m most proud of because it was a huge team effort that everyone put so much time and creativity into.
Be sure to read Part 1 and Part 2.
All About Symbian Podcast #70
The lads at AAS have posted up podcast #70, this one goes over Nokia Q1 results, a talk about Orange, and then they discuss N-Gage releases FIFA and SIKB. I’m going to give it a listen during lunch. Here’s the link.
System Rush Review
All About N-Gage wraps their big, beefy hands around System Rush: Evolution and gives it a good shakeout. All in all, they like the game, scoring it 85/100 and noting:
System Rush Evolution sums up the new N-Gage platform perfectly. The gaming is perfectly suited for a mobile device, and offers a comparable challenge to console based gaming, thanks to the strong consideration of the devices the game will be played on.
FIFA 2008 Review
Next up, Pocket Gamer takes EA Sports FIFA 2008 out onto the pitch and gives it a thorough examination. Here’s a snip:
In true FIFA style, the game offers plenty of modes. You can set up an individual match involving international teams, or teams from a host of domestic leagues, including England, France, Spain, Germany, Italy, Holland, the USA, South Korea, Portugal and Mexico, as well as a grab-bag of teams from ‘Rest Of World’.
Asphalt Series Tops 10 Million in Sales
Congrats to Gameloft, whose ‘Asphalt’ series of racing games has just topped the ten million units in sales mark. Obviously that’s across all platforms, not just N-Gage but still an impressive number!
Here’s a GDC video podcast with some members of our games management team, who took time out of their busy GDC schedules to answer your questions.
Featured in the interview are Jaakko Kaidesoja, Gregg Sauter, and Dr. Mark Ollila. The questions are moderated by Matthew Kumar of Gamesondeck.com. It is about ten minutes long.
Click the thumbnail below to view on your PC.
The video is being hosted on share.ovi.com, a new service from Nokia that lets you easily share your content. And here’s the link to the Mobile Games Innovation Challenge that Mark references at the end of part two.
