Flashback: Nokia N-Gage - the gaming phone ahead of its time

18 August 2019
This phone was ahead of its time, offering MMORPGs during the height of the genre's fame, but it failed to vanquish Nintendo's GBA.

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great gaming..2D sprites comparable to 16 bit sega genesis games...but a bit expensive for $300.. thats why PS2 console still no.1 choice for home video gaming..

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    • Agbe
    • r39
    • 21 Mar 2021

    Were can will get dis phone

      Kriegsherr, 14 Mar 2021True. Sometimes I wonder? Why do these people hate Nokia? ... moreGood

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        • daredevil1
        • Bb{
        • 15 Mar 2021

        Kriegsherr, 14 Mar 2021True. Sometimes I wonder? Why do these people hate Nokia? ... moreCouldn't agree more.

          nok, 19 Aug 2019nokia will be in your phone even that you cannot see nokia ... moreTrue. Sometimes I wonder? Why do these people hate Nokia?

          If you are a real phone tech lover, you can never hate Nokia.
          To me Nokia will always be the most favorite brand of phones.

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            • AnonD-909757
            • 0JM
            • 12 Apr 2020

            I know this is probably totally false, but, I really love this "story" about this phone :
            https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EHLUVaLXUAAv5r2?format=jpg&name=large
            And if you don't know what is the the "thing" they talk about, please, for your own eyes and soul, don't google it...

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              • WedgeStratos
              • 41y
              • 30 Oct 2019

              Jim, 21 Aug 2019- Not advertised as a gaming phone. - Resistive touch scre... moreUnfortunately wrong about the OS. It is S60v1, or Series 60 1st Edition for both the N-Gage and N-Gage QD. What you may be referring to is the later N-Gage service introduced in 2007 for several of Nokia's phones at the time, like the N78-N97, E52-E75, and their Navigator / XpressMusic devices, for Symbian OS 9. That didn't really have the impact the N-Gage itself may have given us, though it's certainly closer to what we have for today's standards, with all-digital software releases, profiles for friend lists and bragging rights, and several cases of exclusive games along with ports.

                zillion, 19 Aug 2019You mean nokia ngage qd?No they are right. Yes there was the Nokia QD a revamped N Gauge and also the Sony Xperia play, because I have one and I also have bothe the N Gauge and the QD.

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                  • AnonD-731363
                  • SH3
                  • 21 Aug 2019

                  Great phone but too complex for the year of releasement.

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                    • Jim
                    • vV5
                    • 21 Aug 2019

                    SunnyB, 20 Aug 2019Although the N-Gage was marketed as a gaming phone, it was ... more- Not advertised as a gaming phone.
                    - Resistive touch screen still wasn't great for games.
                    - It runs Symbian series 90 instead of series 60. Not many games support it.

                    It's really wasn't build for gaming. But I get your point. I can see a lot of design queue comes form n-gage series.

                      My first true smartphone
                      - Multitasking
                      - Messenger
                      - Music player
                      - Video player
                      - lots of other third party apps
                      - Games
                      That included Worms world party online (YES ONLINE, with 1G/GSM wtv)

                      This was 2003. They made fun of me because of the funny phoning position, i made fun of them cause i was living the future :)

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                        • Carol
                        • mgK
                        • 20 Aug 2019

                        stobs, 20 Aug 2019i liked symbian but it was too slow. probably due to using ... moreMaybe you need to research how was the other devices in those times...

                          Although the N-Gage was marketed as a gaming phone, it was the Nokia 7710 that was the precursor hardware design to the modern gaming phone. It had touch screen, landscape display with large aspect ratio, no 1-9 keys, bumper buttons, and top-end (for the time) video and audio.

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                            • TuPapi
                            • Mh%
                            • 20 Aug 2019

                            Miguelos2, 19 Aug 2019No, you shouldn't. With the speed of the processors of thes... moreI'm using the note 8 and the sd 835 can't emulate PS2 games properly. 3ds and ps Vita emulators is what I want to test in the future since I already finished my pirate library of psx, psp and ds games xd

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                              • Aps25
                              • t1%
                              • 20 Aug 2019

                              I still have this phone. Unfortunately it doesn't work. I wish it can be made to work somehow.
                              Also this article does not do justice to the phone. This.phone was ultimate in gaming. FIFA, ghost recon, tom Clancy splinter cell, Rayman, wow so many awesome games.

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                                • pajson89
                                • S9u
                                • 20 Aug 2019

                                Nokia was years ahead of all icrap ,zam zung and wauwei

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                                  • stobs
                                  • rx7
                                  • 20 Aug 2019

                                  Carol, 20 Aug 2019I give you right in many of what you say, but Symbian was t... morei liked symbian but it was too slow. probably due to using low end hardware only but its nokia's fault again for not pairing it with high-end hardware. as i recall, the first nokia symbian phone with a 1ghz processor was the nokia 808. imagine how much time it took nokia to get to that point!

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                                    • Carol
                                    • mgK
                                    • 20 Aug 2019

                                    Kangal, 19 Aug 2019Nokia was killed twice. First, when they signed on with th... moreI give you right in many of what you say, but Symbian was too advanced for the mass, too conplicated and the "dungs" were kind of affraid of it. Henche MeeGo, with a very intuitive UI and still very feature rich. Well, that was, i wait to see whats next

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                                      • Anonymous
                                      • Y7u
                                      • 20 Aug 2019

                                      I was too busy playing my GBA to care about this gaming smartphone. I don't think I would've had as much fun playing games on the N-Gage as I did playing GBA games like Super Mario Advance, Mario Kart: Super Circuit, Metroid Fusion, Castlevania: Circle of the Moon, Golden Sun, etc. A lot of classic games from my childhood were ported to Nintendo's handheld video game console too. The latest so-called gaming smartphones will fail like the N-Gage did because of a very poor and/or limited selection of fun, original, high quality games.

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                                        • SailfishOS
                                        • 7kj
                                        • 20 Aug 2019

                                        Kangal, 19 Aug 2019Nokia was killed twice. First, when they signed on with th... moreAfter they abandoned the Meego OS, the developer continued the project and made the Sailfish OS but nobody seems to care about the Sailfish OS.