14 DAY TRIAL // There is some bad news for those that own a Nokia N73, N93 or N93i. Although originally planned to receive an N-Gage compatibility, it seems that these devices will not sport support for the popular platform after all. Owners of such a handset that have been hoping to be able to experience N-Gage gaming on their phones will certainly be disappointed by this.
What has determined the N-Gage development team to eventually not come up with support for these devices is the fact that they haven’t been able to provide them with the level of gaming experience originally expected from them. The handsets include a rather old operating system version, and their hardware configurations do not offer enough performance either. At the same time, the Nokia N93/N93i haven't sold that well, which might have influenced the decision as well.
In addition, we should also compare a little the phones that are N-Gage-capable and those that are left aside. The Nokia N97 is one of the devices that should receive support for N-Gage in the near future. And the product offers a very high resolution touch screen display, which would look rather awkward when put beside handsets that are about three years old.
On the other hand, Nokia has made a public promise that the N73, N93 and N93i will receive N-Gage support, and has announced this not only once, one of the occasions being a launch video at the Go Play event in late 2007, supervised by Nokia's CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo. Those that have one of these devices have been expecting the company to keep its promise, and now have all the reasons to feel mad about it.
Not to mention that Nokia should have made a public announcement to inform about the fact that N73, N93 and N93i will not receive N-Gage support after all. The one that has revealed the bad news is a forum moderator on the N-Gage forums.