Apple had the Newton. Sony struck out with the Betamax. IBM blew it with the PCJr.
Every technology giant has one or two failed products it would rather the world forget. But Nokia, the world's largest cellphone manufacturer, wants everyone to remember its most famous misfire, the 2003 taco-shaped video game-cellphone hybrid, the N-Gage.
This week, Nokia, based in Espoo, Finland, will revive N-Gage as a multiplayer gaming service that will work on its popular line of smartphones. The service will offer games from major publishers like Electronic Arts, as well as smaller developers like Digital Chocolate that focus on the mobile gaming market.
The unspoken kicker in the article quoted above is that the Newton, Beta, and the PCJr didn't come back from the dead. At least, not directly.
Given the way that mobile gaming has taken off in the last three years, I'd put even money on the 3rd Gen Nokia N-Gage to actually be a hit this time, provided that they actually get some, you know, designers to work over the hardware and make it ergonomic, attractive, and useful. The 1st Gen N-Gage was a perfect example of what happens when you let the engineers design the interface.
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