Day: June 27, 2005

  • Quake On Mobiles: Details Please!

    There are some 19 stories on Google News about Quake being released for “a new generation of 3D-enabled mobile handsets,” all of which seem to be a regurgitation of a press release.

    Hey, guys, is it too much to ask for a little real content? Some actual information? Like, what are these snazzy new “3D-enabled mobile handsets” that I keep hearing about? I know that there are a lot of “3D-enabled mobile handsets” just hitting or about to hit the market, but which platform is this going to target?

    The closest thing to an answer seems to be at the bottom of the press release:

    The first 3D-enabled mobile phones will hit the market this summer (Northern hemisphere), with Quake Mobile available as an embedded game on the first of these handsets to be released by a Korean manufacturer in July.

    Hmm, okay, so does that mean Quake is going to end up on a bunch of crappy flippy phones that I can safely ignore? I dunno.

    The most information can probably be gleaned by following the litle blurbs at the bottom of the press release. The game is published by Pulse Interactive, who offer more information on their E3 Best In Show page. The game was developed (ported?) by Bear Naked Productions. Quake is released under the GPL and has been ported to many different platforms, some of them mobile, but I haven’t seen a port of Quake to commodity phone hardware.

    I think something like Commander Keen would be more fun on a standard old mobile phone than something like Quake. The thought of playing Quake on a mobile reminds me of how bad I am playing Doom on Nintendo 64. I tend to suck at first person shooters on game consoles after years and years of keyboard+mouse play.

    This whole Quake-in-your-pocket thing may be worth paying attention to. Or not.