Nokia's N-Gage game system finally ready for smartphones

Although the announcement won't go out until next week, Nokia's retooled N-Gage mobile gaming system for smartphones has finally reached its full release.

"There will be an official announcement on Monday, but for you, the N-Gage faithful, we wanted to let you know we're up and running," according to a posting on Nokia's N-Gage blog site.

The readiness of N-Gage for smartphones has been a long time coming. Nokia first rolled out N-Gage back in 2003 as a cell phone-enabled competitor to Game Boy Advance. But the dedicated device was largely a flop, as it was neither a very good game device nor a very good phone.

Then, in 2005, the mobile phone maker announced plans to move N-Gage gaming capabilities onto a series of smartphones with a software update.

A prerelease version of the smartphone gaming system has been available since early 2007 for five Nokia smarphones: the N95, N81, N81 8 GB, N82, and N95 GB.

But also last year, Nokia pushed back the full launch of the N-Gage smartphone system twice, each time pointing to delays in software testing.

Mobile gamers can now download the new N-Gage application. Nokia has also reopened the N-Gage Forums and live chats.