Publishers praise N-Gage platform

Glu Mobile and EA Mobile have praised Nokia's N-Gage platform, in advance of the Nokia Games Summit later this month in Rome.

"In many ways the N-Gage design reflects an insider's view of how to solve the merchandising challenges that we have all seen in this business for so long," says Glu CEO Greg Ballard, in an interview with Reuters.

Meanwhile, EA Mobile's head of mobile publishing Javier Ferreira agrees. "All the right pieces are in place from our perspective. We're very excited about this platform. It is very difficult for this not to be successful."

The execs' positive mood is mainly down to Nokia finally shipping handsets in bulk with the N-Gage client preloaded, particularly the N96 and N85.

Meanwhile, there's speculation that Nokia will unveil its latest N-Gage handset later today. It's related to a viral website published by Nokia promising a phone that will 'unlock' at 5pm GMT today.