What we heard: The last few years have seen several attempts to crack Nintendo's total dominance of the portable-gaming market. Few, though, flamed out as spectacularly as the N-Gage. Within minutes of being unveiled in 2003, the device was mocked for its clunky design, which forced owners to hold it sideways to talk and partially disassemble it to switch games. Then there was its staggering $299 price tag, which was triple that of the then-new Game Boy Advance SP.

　　An icy-cold consumer response led to a rapid price cut to $199 in late 2003 and a 2004 redesign, the N-Gage QD. However, not even the QD's $99 price point nor "front-talking" functionally could save it. Facing competition from both the DS and PlayStation Portable, the device had all but disappeared from retailer shelves by the time Electronic Entertainment Expo 2005 rolled around. At the event, Nokia began to refer to the "N-Gage platform" as a mobile-gaming platform for a variety of its phones. At E3 2006, several games for the "N-Gage platform" were shown off at the Nokia booth running on other Nokia phones.

　　So when a flurry of reports emerged on Monday that Nokia was readying a new N-Gage handheld, a collective chortle of skepticism erupted from many a game news forum. Most stories linked back to a February 2 post on Future Watch touting that "EA Mobile and Gameloft have committed to support the next generation of N-Gage." (Emphasis added.)

　　The official story: But while many took the mention of the "next generation" of N-Gage to be the first sign of a new phone/game handheld, regular readers of the Future Watch blog knew better. That's because the day before, the blog featured a quote from Nokia games head Jaakko Kaidesoja saying that "there are no plans for a new N-Gage device at the moment." However, when asked by GameSpot, a Nokia rep proved more evasive. "The operative word they left out was platform," was all the rep would say other than promising more information at GDC.

　　Bogus or not bogus?: Bogus that a shiny new N-Gage device will be unveiled at GDC. Not bogus that Nokia will use the event to reveal the next step in its ongoing efforts to get a slice of the game pie.