N-Gage to remain outside of Ovi Store, for now -- or left to die ...

Nokia has admitted there are no plans to integrate its gaming service, N-Gage, into its forthcoming Ovi Store service. Having attempted for many years to establish itself in the mobile games market, this decision not to fold N-Gage into its new, and all-encompassing, OviStore concept is perhaps an indication it will be left to quietly die.

With Ovi Store set to launch in two months' time, mobile games developers, such as EA, have already agreed to move to the new platform following Nokia's stated strategy of eventually selling all digital content via this channel. The company's VP for media, Marco Argenti, said the Ovi Store would sell mass-market games, with N-Gage consigned to catering for high-end devices and hard core gamers.

While Nokia grandly claims the Ovi Store will be pre-installed in 300 million handsets a year by 2013, it will only be downloadable to S40 and S60 devices from May, and will be pre-installed in the N97 from July. Operator reaction to the Ovi Store service has been very limited to date, and many will watch with interest given Nokia's abject failure to attract consumers to use its dedicated gaming phones or online games service opened last year.

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