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Eurogamer Offers Mobile Games Coverage

Eurogamer has struck a deal with PocketGamer to add mobile games to it's line up of games news, previews and reviews.

From today's press release:

Eurogamer.net, the UK’s most popular videogames website, today announces the launch of a full channel dedicated to the fast-growing and exciting world of mobile gaming.

Featuring news, reviews, previews and features on mobile games, Eurogamer.net’s mobile proposition will provide readers with all the information they need to enjoy games on their mobiles. The mobile channel is also a perfect solution for companies in the sector looking to directly target avid gamers with an interest in mobile games.

Mobile gaming specialists Pocket Gamer will be supplying additional content for the new channel following the completion of a syndication deal between the site and Eurogamer Network. The launch of Eurogamer.net's mobile channel is the second phase of Eurogamer Network's entry into the mobile games space following the launch of MobileIndustry.biz – a site fully dedicated the mobile games trade – in 2005.

“Mobile gaming is a huge growth market," said Patrick Garratt, Eurogamer Network’s Business Development Manager. "We are firmly committed to providing consumers with the information they need to make proper buying decisions with the new Eurogamer.net mobile channel. We're delighted to be entering into this content agreement with Pocket Gamer and look forward to fully supporting the mobile games market with both Eurogamer.net's mobile channel and the trade with MobileIndustry.biz.”

Former Gamespot Mobile Editor Reappears With New Company

Steve Palley, the former editor of Gamespot Mobile has reappeared, several months after leaving the company and -apparently - vanishing.

Steve's now running a new company called Focimobile, which offers game evaluations, design advice and competitive analysis.

The site features a regular blog looking at the mobile gaming industry, which has just made it into my 'check daily' list.

The most recent entry is featured on GamaSutra (which is where I found the link to Focimobile and hence Mr Palley).  Steve takes a look at the most recent market research looking at the mobile games sector and finds huge discrepencies between the results announced by M:Metrics and Telephia.

You can read the whole thing here or here.

The first paragraph alone sums things up...

If you’re one of the mobile games industry’s many curious onlookers, your head must be spinning these days. M:Metrics and Telephia, two respected mobile content analysis firms, recently issued high-profile reports on the overall health of the business, and the conclusions they draw from their respective sets of data are diametrically opposed. One set of number-crunchers seems to think that the proverbial glass has gone bone-dry, while the other guys make it sound like we’re looking at a vast underground aquifer that’s started to issue geysers of money (PDF link). 
 
Yes, these reports make use of different methodologies, but the fact remains that they examine at the same industry over the same three-month time period...and yet, the impressions these reports offer of the industry couldn’t be reconciled by anything less than a flaming vision in the sky.

Carmack Likes Mobile Games

Eurogamer TV has just posted an interview with John Carmack, focusing on his new mobile title 'Orcs & Elves'.

Mr Carmack had this to say about mobile gaming:

"When I first played the games on mobile I was appalled," he blasted. "[I thought,] this phone is more powerful than a Super Nintendo - why do these games suck so badly? There was an element of moral indignation there. This is a cool little platform and the games at least on the phone that I had were rotten."

Carmack was at E3 promoting his new mobile project with EA, Orcs & Elves, which he called "a game for everybody who loved Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter."

And following his success with first mobile title, DoomRPG, Carmack is confident the work of id and others in the space is finally set to establish the platform as a serious, credible option for developers.

Mobile phones have been a new, different and viable platform since the days of SMS and WAP gaming.  Maybe now that a recognised industry figure has said as much, people might start listening...

EA @ E3 - Rejecting Casual Gaming?

From MoCo News' E3 coverage:

There was also a rejection of Robert Nashak’s (Glu) assertion that people don’t want high-end 3G games but casual games. “Lincoln Wallen, CTO of EA Mobile (said): “If you have a game that someone’s playing casually, the game’s failing.”

I fundamentally disagree with this approach.  Gaming on phones is always going to be an added extra, which the majority of people will access when they have time and - more importantly - when they don't have anything else to do.

As a hardcore gamer and true believer in mobile gaming, I still find myself making calls, sending texts and checking my e-mail on my phone before I even consider firing up a game.

I think this is true of most people.  Games are nice to have, but if a game makes too many demands on my time, it will eventually get relegated to the bottom of the pile, reserved for major traffic jams, flight delays and mobile conferences, while the more immediate and accessible games will be played far more often.

If a mobile game *cannot* be played casually, then it's not going to break into that all important mainstream audience.

N-Gage - The Plan Revealed

Ewan Spence over at AllAboutSymbian has an interesting article up on Nokia's strategy for gaming and for the N-Gage platform. 

As a device, the N-Gage drew a huge amount of criticism, much of which was unjustified (though then again, a lot of it was spot on).

The fact that pretty much all of the new S60 phones will be able to play N-Gage titles  - alongside connected java games - give the company a very strong position in both the Smartphone market and in the rapidly evolving mobile multiplayer space. 

This is something that Nokia has been saying for a while now and it still isn't sinking in.  People were entirely blinded by the handset/s instead of the backend technologies and the experience Nokia have given themselves.

Within the next twelve months, the number of S60 handsets sold around the world promises to be in the tens of millions.  That immediately puts the company alongside Sony and Nintendo is terms of units sold. 

If they can get the balance of titles right across the casual and hardcore sectors and make the online play as transparent as possible, Nokia may yet turn into one of the world's biggest games publishers.

Yay!

E3: Gamevil CEO Speaks

Gamasutra has just added an interview with Kyu Lee from Gamevil in Korea. If you're not familiar with Gamevil - they're the creators of a number of novel one button mobile games, including Skipping Stone and NOM2 (which, fingers crossed will get a European release SOON).

Skipping Stone picked up awards a rave reviews from everyone who played it - and rightly so.  It's lovely.  However I was lucky enough to get a handset from the company for last year's Edinburgh Games Fest (where Ewan, Dave and I showed off the world's best mobile games...) which let me play NOM.

It's Skipping Stone on acid and is quite probably the most bizarre mobile game yet created - and one of the most enjoyable. 

Your character runs from left to right and you have to make it to the end of the course, avoiding numerous obstacle and enemies.  However, the sheer joy is in the details...

There is only one button used to control your character.  Your action is context sensitive.  So if you're faced with a short flower, you hop over it.  A burning hoop - you dive through it. A bizarre eyeball monster, you kick it - and so on.

When you see a sheer wall coming up, you think 'end of level' and relax - but NO. You have to jump, you land feet first on the wall and continue running, the screen now scrolling vertically.  You have to spin the phone and carry on playing.

Everything is seen in silhouette.  Your character, the obstacles, the monsters - everything.

However, that's not all.  In Korea Gamevil will take your high scores and send them into space via a satellite.  As

It is entirely strange and utterly compelling.

Skipping Stone managed to avoid mainstream success, despite the praise heaped upon it, which may mean that NOM2 is simply too weird for the average phone user. 

However, if it does reach these shores, I would urge everyone with even the remotest scrap of gaming joy in their thumbs to download it and play it till their battery fails...

You can find the interview with Kyu here.

More about Gamevil's one buttons games here.