N-gage platform to hit smartphones

Do you remember Nokia’s n-gage? Possibly the worst conceived handheld console in the history of gaming. I don’t even want to begin to go into the series of design flaws that went into this travesty of a hand held (like having to remove the battery to play a game. Or having to push it sideways against your face if you want to make a call. But most of all the early games really sucked).

Still, looks like there’s hope for the format (sort of, anyway) as Nokia has announced that the n-gage is being expanded to Nokia’s next generation of smartphones out in 2006. Of course the phones will have to have the right screen dimensions, but personally I’m hopeful about this one. The n-gage game library has recently improved with "Splinter Cell", and the promising "The One" on the horizon and phones could do with some better games.