Eidos, Rage Bringing Games To Nokia Mobile Entertainment Service

Under the terms of its deal with Eidos, the game publisher will provide five titles for WAP-enabled mobile phones over the next two years, based on new and existing game franchises. The first game, Gangsters, will be available during the first half of 2001. Rage also signed on as a provider of games for the Nokia service, although neither the number of games nor specific titles were mentioned. "Datamonitor recently estimated that four out of five mobile phone users will play mobile games by 2005," said Graham Stafford, Nokia's Senior Manager of Business Development. "In revenue terms this will mean a multi-billion dollar business. WAP has rapidly become a widely adopted standard for mobile Internet services and phones, therefore it is the ideal vehicle with which to boost a wide selection of new mobile game services." The Nokia Mobile Entertainment Service platform gives cell phone operators and service providers access to games and services developed by third parties. Nokia says it has 45,000 entertainment developers registered in this program.