N-Gage Story

[SegaAges]

I figured that with everything that has gone on with me just simply trying to get a working N-Gage, I would share the story.

Now it all started with a DP thread (thanx guys :) )
There was a thread about 6.99 n-gage games on ebgames.com. Now I decided that I should get an n-gage (I have been thinking about it for a very long time, this was just my calling card). I ordered 6 games.

Now all I needed was a N-Gage. I searched eBay, and found a complete n-gage qd going for about 50 or so. After all the bidding was said and done, I won it for $71.

While I was waiting for the n-gage, I thought it would be cool to get some more games. I found a couple places in Omaha that sold these games, and before my N-Gage even came, I had 13 games (the places that sold n-gage games were selling them for dirt cheap).

Now seeing as I had 13 n-gage games and no n-gage, I was getting pretty excited to play some of these games.

The day happened, my QD finally arrived. The first thing I did was charged it. After charging it for a few hours, I popped a game in. When the game was loading up, I got the message "Please insert a SIM Card". I had no idea that I needed a sim card. I thought it was like any other portable. I e-mailed the person I bought the qd from and told her that she did not include a sim card. she e-mailed me back and told me that the sim card that came with the qd system she was now using for business. BUSINESS?!? I didn't care if it was for business, she said in her auction that everything would be included that she got with the qd. Now getting the usb adapter and crap like that I didn't care about, what I cared about was playing the games.

I put out a post to you guys about needing a sim card. within hours, go guys had multiple people saying they could help me out with a sim card.

Around when I found out that you guys could help me out, the woman agreed to pay me $20 for not including a sim card. I put that straight towards getting a sim card from one of you.

Kepp in mind, about a week and a half has passed since I have gotten the n-gage and I still have 13 sealed games that it would be cool to play.

I finally got the sim card and then put it in right away amd turn the qd on. New error message, "invalid sim card". Now I was just flat out frusterated. All this work, all this trouble, and still no n-gage games.

After searching online, I found out that the problem was that I needed to unlock the phone. I searched everywhere online and only found sites that you send money to, to get a code, but I knew there had to be another way besides paying for a code. I did a search through a special search and found a program that i could download that had the unlock codes on it.

now i was getting excited. at this point, it wasn't even the fact that i was going to get to play n-gage games, it was the anticipation for having another working system.

i downloaded it, and it ended up that they had an entire website. to unlock this phone, i needed to find a IMEI number inside of the battery cover and input it into the program as well as the carrier that the phone had. now seeing as the sim card i got in the mail was t-mobile, i selected t-mobile from the website, and then put in what i thought the number was. it didn't work. i tried again, and it didn't work again. i found out tha after 5 tries, i was sol and had to hook this up to my computer.

now, i was searching the website that the program was made at, and i found out a code to display the actual code i should be putting in so that i could get the correct unlock code (*#06#). i got the number and inputted that into the program. i tried a code it generated, nothing. i tried a second time, nothing.

now i am sitting at 4 tries. if i failed to get it this last final time, the n-gage would be completely useless to me without more money. after all of this hastle, i was getting paranoid about that last, final try. i ended finding out through an old e-mail that the woman's company went through cingular, so i thought, "what the hell, i have tried everything else". so i gave it one, final try.

and it worked. after all of that hassle, i got a working n-gage. now i did not say a neo geo aes or anything like that, just a n-gage. i now have a working n-gage.

i went through so much crap within the past 2 weeks that i fogured i would share this story with you guys.

[Steempy]

After all that, what did you think of the games?

[Enixis]

My n-gage qd had already included the sims bustin' out when i got it. And from just that one game alone i realized it was not worth my while buying games for that system, let alone playing it. I still use my n-gage qd as a phone though :)

[hydr0x]

eeeeeh am i stupid?? it's a god damn mobile phone, every 2nd mobile phone has a simlock and needs to be unlocked before using another SIM card.. don't tell me you didn't know that??

and about getting a SIM card?? wth didn't you just get a pre-paid package or sth for next to nothing (10 bucks) from t-mobile or some other company and use that one??

and how are the games? oh and btw, maybe getting 13(!!) games wasn't such a good idea LOL

[jajaja]

eeeeeh am i stupid?? it's a god damn mobile phone, every 2nd mobile phone has a simlock and needs to be unlocked before using another SIM card.. don't tell me you didn't know that??

Well.. it totaly depends on "how" you buy the phone. If you buy a phone that is locked to a operator. Its usualy 12 months, after that you can use whatever SIMcard you want.
So it would be wrong to say that every 2nd mobile have this. It totaly depend on if the buyer wants to have his/her phone locked to one operator for a time just to save some money.

As for the threadstarter, you couldnt really expect that a SIM card was included with the phone (N-Gage). But on the other hand, if the N-gage was locked to a operator and the seller didnt mentioned this I would demand a refund.

[DogP]

I bought a used N-Gage from Gamestop, and it didn't come with a sim card either... I just picked one up from a cell phone stand in the middle of the mall (for $20).

DogP

[calthaer]

This kind of crap is just one of the many reasons that the NGage was a miserable failure. I am kind of curious to find out what he thought about his 13 games, though.

[davidbrit2]

As much as people complain about the NGage, it does actually have some very worthwhile stuff for it.

Colin McRae Rally
Asphalt Urban GT
Pandemonium
THPS
Worms World Party (much better than the shit GBA version)
Snakes (free from Nokia's web site - think traditional Snake meets Rez, I guess)

Plus there are extremely competent Genesis and Master System/Game Gear emulators.

[poopnes]

eeeeeh am i stupid?? it's a god damn mobile phone, every 2nd mobile phone has a simlock and needs to be unlocked before using another SIM card.. don't tell me you didn't know that??

Eh, not really. My first QD was T-Mobile branded but was fully unlocked and worked with AT&T & Cingular. My second QD was locked to Cingular. I bought the first one at Gamestop and the second off of eBay.

I don't know about the new QD's but my original sealed QD came with a "dummy" SIM card.


Plus there are extremely competent Genesis and Master System/Game Gear emulators.

Don't forget NES and GB/C!

[PDorr3]

So in order to play games on your n gage you gotta pay for a phone service?
That stupid if you ask me.

[poopnes]

So in order to play games on your n gage you gotta pay for a phone service?
That stupid if you ask me.

No you don't need phone service at all. You just need a SIM card, which like I said Nokia used to include "dummy" cards in the package. You don't even need service to play online if you have a computer and bluetooth.

[jajaja]

This kind of crap is just one of the many reasons that the NGage was a miserable failure. I am kind of curious to find out what he thought about his 13 games, though.

Heh what you mean? How do you get a cellphone to work without a SIMcard? Remember, N-Gage IS a cellphone.

[Jagasian]

There is one piece of software that EVERY N-gage owner must have. It is called "vBoy" and it is hands down the best Game Boy emulator for the N-Gage. No other emulator can emulate Game Boy games at full speed with sound like vBoy can:
http://www.vampent.com/vboy.htm

It can also emulate every kind of Game Boy game, except GBA games. So that means it emulates: GB, SGB, and GBC games. No other mobile phone has as many great games as the N-Gage, once you install vBoy, of course. N-Gage-only games are... lacking. So emulation saves the day.

Other emulators for the N-Gage, such as NES, SNES, etc... do not run at full resolution or full speed. But the vBoy doesn't suffer from any of those problems.

[davidbrit2]

Problem: the only GB and NES emulators worth using cost money. So as far as I'm concerned, they don't even exist. Thus I will keep playing those ROMs on my PSP.

[PDorr3]

I dont have a cell phone so Im not up to date on all this sim card stuff.
So basicaly I just need any simcard, not mattering what brand, to get games to work?

And if an NGage is "unlocked" do I still need the card? IDK I want and NGage but Im still waiting for the system to come down below $50

[poopnes]

I dont have a cell phone so Im not up to date on all this sim card stuff.
So basicaly I just need any simcard, not mattering what brand, to get games to work?

And if an NGage is "unlocked" do I still need the card? IDK I want and NGage but Im still waiting for the system to come down below $50

Yes you need a SIM card for the N-Gage to even boot, unlocked or not. If the phone is unlocked you can use any carriers SIM card. Basically the N-Gage is a Nokia Series 60 Smartphone that is laid out horizontally (with a lot more RAM). But note that the SIM card doesn't have to be active (ie you don't have to pay the carrier).

[Xizer]

Well, look on the bright side. The N-Gage is a taco. If you can't get it to work, you can eat it :-P

[Jagasian]

Problem: the only GB and NES emulators worth using cost money. So as far as I'm concerned, they don't even exist. Thus I will keep playing those ROMs on my PSP.

What? vBoy costs $10, and once you buy it you get free unlimited updates. A new N-Gage QD is $99, so that is only $110 for a mobile phone that can also play Game Boy games. It is also smaller, more portable and has longer battery life (10+ hours) than a PSP. I love how the PSP fanboys have been claiming that the PSP is so great because it can play Game Boy games... something the lowly N-Gage has been able to do for years now.

But that isn't anywhere near as stupid as the Nintendo Revolution fanboys getting all excited that they will be able to play old Nintendo games on their Revolution... something the Xbox has been able to do for years now.

[boatofcar]

How does the N Gage do with NES emulation?

[Xizer]

Riiiiiiight...I didn't know the Xbox was capable of running NES, SNES, N64, GameCube, and Revolution games, all at 100% speed, without any modding of any sort, and something that was officially supported.

(I do own a modded box by the way, it rocks 8-) )



Problem: the only GB and NES emulators worth using cost money. So as far as I'm concerned, they don't even exist. Thus I will keep playing those ROMs on my PSP.

What? vBoy costs $10, and once you buy it you get free unlimited updates. A new N-Gage QD is $99, so that is only $110 for a mobile phone that can also play Game Boy games. It is also smaller, more portable and has longer battery life (10+ hours) than a PSP. I love how the PSP fanboys have been claiming that the PSP is so great because it can play Game Boy games... something the lowly N-Gage has been able to do for years now.

But that isn't anywhere near as stupid as the Nintendo Revolution fanboys getting all excited that they will be able to play old Nintendo games on their Revolution... something the Xbox has been able to do for years now.

[jajaja]

But that isn't anywhere near as stupid as the Nintendo Revolution fanboys getting all excited that they will be able to play old Nintendo games on their Revolution... something the Xbox has been able to do for years now.

PC have been able to do it years before xbox so that xbox can emulate isnt something new that happend.

[CreamSoda]

Problem: the only GB and NES emulators worth using cost money. So as far as I'm concerned, they don't even exist. Thus I will keep playing those ROMs on my PSP.

What? vBoy costs $10, and once you buy it you get free unlimited updates. A new N-Gage QD is $99, so that is only $110 for a mobile phone that can also play Game Boy games. It is also smaller, more portable and has longer battery life (10+ hours) than a PSP. I love how the PSP fanboys have been claiming that the PSP is so great because it can play Game Boy games... something the lowly N-Gage has been able to do for years now.

But that isn't anywhere near as stupid as the Nintendo Revolution fanboys getting all excited that they will be able to play old Nintendo games on their Revolution... something the Xbox has been able to do for years now.

You think that's stupid? Why not just save yourself the $99 and play those GameBoy games on the GBA you already own? Just about everybody has one of those, and a cell phone. Making the Ngage's most bragged about feature pretty much worthless. Not to mention, while PSP may be overpriced/have poor battery life, ect... I don't see Burnout: Legends, GTA: Liberty City Stories, Metal Gear Ac!d, Twisted Metal: Head On, Wipeout Pure, Mercury, ect. Coming out on the Ngage. :P

Ok I admitt I made myself look like an ass in this topic, but it's something about half of the people that posted in this thread have in common with me?

[Gemini-Phoenix]

So is this also your first mobile phone?

I was lucky. I bought my N-Gage unlocked, which means I could use any old sim card in it, rather than the one which it came with.

One good thing about it is, you don't actually need a "Live" sim card. It just needs to be a sim, even if it is dead. I have a whole box full of old dead sims and would've gladly sent you one free of charge, although you would not be able to use the phone features of the N-Gage, but at least it would've meant you could play the games without all that hassle.


Glad you finally got it all sorted though. And the good thing is, you are already a quarter of your way to a complete collection of N-Gage games! Feel free to join in the official N-Gage collector thread HERE (http://www.digitpress.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=58236)

:)

[poopnes]

Problem: the only GB and NES emulators worth using cost money. So as far as I'm concerned, they don't even exist. Thus I will keep playing those ROMs on my PSP.

What? vBoy costs $10, and once you buy it you get free unlimited updates. A new N-Gage QD is $99, so that is only $110 for a mobile phone that can also play Game Boy games. It is also smaller, more portable and has longer battery life (10+ hours) than a PSP. I love how the PSP fanboys have been claiming that the PSP is so great because it can play Game Boy games... something the lowly N-Gage has been able to do for years now.

But that isn't anywhere near as stupid as the Nintendo Revolution fanboys getting all excited that they will be able to play old Nintendo games on their Revolution... something the Xbox has been able to do for years now.

You think that's stupid? Why not just save yourself the $99 and play those GameBoy games on the GBA you already own? Just about everybody has one of those, and a cell phone. Making the Ngage's most bragged about feature pretty much worthless. Not to mention, while PSP may be overpriced/have poor battery life, ect... I don't see Burnout: Legends, GTA: Liberty City Stories, Metal Gear Ac!d, Twisted Metal: Head On, Wipeout Pure, Mercury, ect. Coming out on the Ngage. :P

Ok I admitt I made myself look like an ass in this topic, but it's something about half of the people that posted in this thread have in common with me?

No. See the N-Gage's biggest feature is that its one less thing I have to carry around. Its always with me, and so are my games, a few tunes, and my phone. That is its true feature and it makes it totally worthwhile to anyone who owns one and gives it a chance.

Even if I carried around a GBmicro and my old Nokia 3100b (which is super small), together they would be bigger than my QD. Not to mention the fact I would have to worry about keeping them both charged.

It's true you did make yourself look like an ass in this topic. This is a N-Gage topic, not a N-Gage bashing topic. I was going to go on a long rant but f*** it. Its not worth it.

edit: No real offense meant, but for some reason that just ate me up. I'm just so tired of always hearing the N-Gage take heat. Probably shouldn't let it bother me, but obviously it does. My QD is a part of my life. I get on the internet. I make phone calls. I send text messages. I play an occasional game to pass the time when I'm away from home. And you know what? It does all of that amazingly well. Granted 50%+ of the official games are crap and the original was a taco, but I'll take that to "engineered broken" square buttons and overpriced UMD movies and *gasp* homebrew emulators.

[davidbrit2]

What? vBoy costs $10, and once you buy it you get free unlimited updates. A new N-Gage QD is $99, so that is only $110 for a mobile phone that can also play Game Boy games. It is also smaller, more portable and has longer battery life (10+ hours) than a PSP. I love how the PSP fanboys have been claiming that the PSP is so great because it can play Game Boy games... something the lowly N-Gage has been able to do for years now.

I just have a hard time dealing with the fact that a developer can be so arrogant that they expect you to legally purchase their software, which you're in turn going to use to illegally run the software of dozens of other companies. I don't get too choked up about warez-ing a shareware emulator, in other words.



But that isn't anywhere near as stupid as the Nintendo Revolution fanboys getting all excited that they will be able to play old Nintendo games on their Revolution... something the Xbox has been able to do for years now.

I think you hit the wrong thread. Recalculate trajectory and fire again.

[poopnes]

I just have a hard time dealing with the fact that a developer can be so arrogant that they expect you to legally purchase their software, which you're in turn going to use to illegally run the software of dozens of other companies. I don't get too choked up about warez-ing a shareware emulator, in other words.

I feel you there. In fact I can't say that I paid for the versions of vBoy and vNES that I have on my phone. Pirating software thats main purpose it pirating other software is no crime...or is it. =)

[Gemini-Phoenix]

Don't forget that the N-Gage can also run a whole load of other ROM's, although very crudely. Imagine my surprise when I discovered I could play classics such as Afterburner or SoR on my N-Gage ~ Although without sound, I was still very impressed!

The real beauty of the N-Gage is that with the right size memory card, you can save a handful of N-Gage games (Downloaded), plus a handful of your favourite tunes, and also do all sorts of other things too.

After all, it is also a Symbian phone, so can be upgraded with all sorts of downloadable programs that make it almost as good as a Sony P910 smartphone!


I am surprised that they have not yet updated the N-Gage a third time to also include a 2mp camera, a larger onboard memory etc...


The early N-Gage games did look a bit crude, and some games are very slow. Slower than Java games (Puyo Pop for example is a pain to play), but I think in the last year, the N-Gage has come along in leaps and bounds in terms of how great the games being released are.


It's perfect for anyone who wants to go out somewhere, but doesn't want to lug around a phone and PSP / GameBoy. After all, how long do you honestly play the games? Half an hour? Hour at most? Short stabs whenever you have a break or are on a short bus / train journey.


It wasn't all that long ago we were all amazed that we could play Snake on our 5110's!

[Jagasian]

I just have a hard time dealing with the fact that a developer can be so arrogant that they expect you to legally purchase their software, which you're in turn going to use to illegally run the software of dozens of other companies. I don't get too choked up about warez-ing a shareware emulator, in other words.

I feel you there. In fact I can't say that I paid for the versions of vBoy and vNES that I have on my phone. Pirating software thats main purpose it pirating other software is no crime...or is it. =)

By that reasoning a portable MP3 player's main purpose is pirating music. Give me a break. Think about this. What is more portable?

1. phone + GBASP + a bunch of GB carts

or

2. phone

I am going to have to go with number 2. This is one of the main reasons why MP3 players are so popular. You can fit your entire music collection in your pocket. But according to your reasoning, you should just carry around a CD player and hundreds of CDs. Yeah, that is portable. Just as you can rip your own CDs to put on your MP3 player, you can also rip your own Game Boy carts. The hardware for doing so is cheaply available. Now if you want to use your iPod for music piracy, that is up to you. You can also use a computer for piracy, but one man's use for something should never be confused with that something's main purpose.

[Satac]

I am surprised that they have not yet updated the N-Gage a third time to also include a 2mp camera, a larger onboard memory etc...


Nokia will announce something about the next N-Gage generation on the 13th this month. Just a few days to go :)

[davidbrit2]

By that reasoning a portable MP3 player's main purpose is pirating music. Give me a break.

We're talking hardware vs. software here. Huge difference. One is a limited resource produced from raw materials and labor/operations which cost money, and one is an abstract representation of computer functions that can be reproduced without directly influencing the availability of said software. So if you want to go produce your own iPod from raw silicon and resin, be my guest.

[Jagasian]

By that reasoning a portable MP3 player's main purpose is pirating music. Give me a break.

We're talking hardware vs. software here. Huge difference. One is a limited resource produced from raw materials and labor/operations which cost money, and one is an abstract representation of computer functions that can be reproduced without directly influencing the availability of said software. So if you want to go produce your own iPod from raw silicon and resin, be my guest.

You, you are now changing your claim. You claimed that an emulator's main purpose is piracy. I drew an analogy between that and a MP3 player. One of the first MP3 players ever made, the Rio, was sued out of the market by the RIAA because they claimed that is sole purpose was piracy. It doesn't matter what it is made out of.

A game player and a music player can be used to play pirated games and movies respectively, but that doesn't make it their main purpose. An emulator is nothing more than a game player that plays games of a specific format. Some emulators support more formats than others. See MESS for an example of an emulator that supports several different formats.

[rbudrick]

Well, look on the bright side. The N-Gage is a taco. If you can't get it to work, you can eat it

Mmmm, pink N-Gage....drooool.

-ROb

[davidbrit2]

You, you are now changing your claim.

I never claimed that. I implied it, because it's a fairly consistent truth.

[poopnes]

By that reasoning a portable MP3 player's main purpose is pirating music. Give me a break.

We're talking hardware vs. software here. Huge difference. One is a limited resource produced from raw materials and labor/operations which cost money, and one is an abstract representation of computer functions that can be reproduced without directly influencing the availability of said software. So if you want to go produce your own iPod from raw silicon and resin, be my guest.

You, you are now changing your claim. You claimed that an emulator's main purpose is piracy. I drew an analogy between that and a MP3 player. One of the first MP3 players ever made, the Rio, was sued out of the market by the RIAA because they claimed that is sole purpose was piracy. It doesn't matter what it is made out of.

A game player and a music player can be used to play pirated games and movies respectively, but that doesn't make it their main purpose. An emulator is nothing more than a game player that plays games of a specific format. Some emulators support more formats than others. See MESS for an example of an emulator that supports several different formats.

Never changed my claim. That was someone else.

The simple fact is that 99.99% of the people who emulate are pirating. Most people do not own the means to backup their cartridge games. So you download ROMs instead. That is what's illegal. I'm not questioning the legality of emulation, because that's legal. But unless you create your own images, using ROMs are illegal.

[SegaAges]

I have returned to post a little more.

I was reading through the first page, and many of you are curious as to what I think of the games.

Well, to be honest, I kinda like a bunch of these games. I know some of you think it is crazy to have 13 games (I bought another 1 today which makes it 14).

The way I am seeing it is that I know many people did not like the virtual boy and still don't. With prices like what I am getting on games, I might as well get as many as I can while I can easily find them outside of eBay.

I haven;t played through all of my games yet (14 is alot of games). I started playing tony hawk, and it is pretty good. The only thing I do not like about it is the slowdown. I have been playing worms like nobody's business.

To be perfectly honest with you all, I own a game.com and enjoy a couple of those games. The n-gage is a fun system. I know many of you do not like it, but so far, there are not many games that I have not liked that I tried.

there are a couple games, so far, that I just did not like. operation shadow sucks. the idea behind the game is cool, but you need a game to go along with that idea.

i can already bet that i will probably be very disappointed by x-men legends, but i am not going to jump the gun already. for the most part, i am enjoying the games. i will be busy for a long time to come with this system. yes, i have games from when it first came out and later games (like operation shadow). some of the games are really good, but some are pretty bad. the games are like any other system. it is not like every single game i have played i did not enjoy. how many systems have been released with a full lineup of super awesome games and no crappy ones? well, i don't own that system, maybe one of you can answer that.

pandemonium is really fun. i think pandemonium and worms, so far, are my favorite 2 games. i used to play pandemonium on saturn, so I wanted this game. it is awesome. and worms, well if a system can't do worms, than i don't want to play the system all that much(i know that it could be done for 2600 if somebody wanted to :) ).

i am honestly really enjoying this system so far. i had alot of anticipation to play this, and it was worth it. call me crazy, but i am enjoying it so far. it is fun. and whoever said it is right , since I haven't gotten into the rpg games or adventure games, the rest of the games i play on about hour intervals.

as for some of you saying things about mobile phones and sim cards, hell no i didn't know. the only reason why i now own a cell phone is because i moved out of my dad's house. i don't know much about that stuff, you can't hold that against me.

I also noticed that the topic started changing through the second page.

[zektor]

Hey man, congrats on coming over to the N-Gage world! You have just scratched the surface of what that little beauty can do...

I didn't know anything about the N myself when I purchased it. SIM cards and whatnot. Fact of the matter is that if the phone is locked to a certain provider and you use a SIM from another, you'll get that error. You know that already. But the phone can STILL be used as a game system with any SIM card. After the error, hit the checkmark key (ok key) and you'll get into the phone, but with no service of course. The N-Gage just needs a SIM, any SIM, to complete that contact and boot up.

I unlocked mine as well. Pretty easy to do, but caution is a must...something you also know now. Glad to hear you successfully unlocked it. Would have needed a flash otherwise. Now yopu can feel good knowing the phone is worth more unlocked, as you can go with any service provider!

As I said earlier, you have not even come close to what the unit can do. Without revealing to much, I will give you one word... i-phone....if that is even a word :) Figure it out :)

Once again, enjoy. Once you see how close this unit is to virtually a handheld PC, you will appreciate it all the more.