Rule #1 In Engaging Mobile Users? Don’t Build a Handset
At the Game Developer’s Conference in San Francisco earlier this week, Nokia announced a new initiative to connect with gamers, and put cell phones on par with Nintendo’s DS and Sony’s PSP as a go-to mobile gaming device. Their head of game publishing, Gregg Sauter, promised a new delivery platform, a solid lineup of games from recognized publishers like EA and THQ, and a new site to support developers, complete with a blog.
What I found particularly interesting from Gregg’s announcement is that Nokia’s platform, dubbed N-Gage, will be compatible with tens of millions of devices that are already in the hands of users- even phones made by competitors LG and Motorola. Why wouldn’t Nokia, the world’s largest cell phone manufacturer, try to own the mobile gaming space by themselves? Couldn’t they build a killer handheld console that doubles as a phone?
The truth is, Nokia already tried that. And failed. In late 2003 Nokia released a dedicated gaming phone, also called N-Gage, to a disappointed and largely puzzled gaming community. The price point was twice as high as the day’s leading handheld system, GameBoy Advance. The graphics looked muddy, the user interface was terrible, and users had to hold the device sideways to talk on the phone (which earned N-Gage the nickname “taco”). To make matters worse, N-Gage games couldn’t be delivered wirelessly, and had to be purchased as separate cartridges—a huge no-no when it comes to mobile content. The combined crummy phone and sub-par gaming device shuffled off this mortal coil in 2005.
Similarly, Disney launched Mobile ESPN in November 2005, exclusive handsets and all. While we all remember the “guy at a wedding cheers loudly in reaction to the sports clip on his phone” commercials, I’ve never met anyone that actually owned one of these. It was taken out behind the barn in December ’06. Just like N-Gage, Mobile ESPN was resurrected last month as a subscription-based service for Verizon Wireless subscribers.
Clearly, these two companies have wised up after their embarrassing attempts at hardware. Content is king, and if the media machine behind the mouse can’t build a better phone, other media companies should take their cue and explore their options on bringing their IP to mobile devices as a third party. I’m interested to see how big media companies will deliver content to the next generation of mobile phones. Open-ended, smart interfaces, like Apple’s iPhone, coupled with a constantly growing wireless infrastructure, should open up the third screen in ways we’ve only dreamed of.
March 10th, 2007 at 8:01 pm
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