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We don’t know what exactly China Mobile is putting in its manufacturer partners’ tea during contract negotiations, but considering how rapidly China’s largest carrier has grown its OPhone line into the most desirable single-network lineup of Android handsets in the world, we’d strongly recommend they continue to do it. Rumors of an LG entry back in August have now come to fruition in the form of the GW880, a full touch handset launching this month featuring a solid 3.5-inch WVGA display, 5 megapixel camera, and support for a pair of pretty important homegrown standards — TD-SCDMA for 3G and CMMB for mobile TV tuning. For comparison, LG’s only other announced Android phone — the GW620 Eve for global distribution — steps down to a HVGA display, so yeah, if you’ll excuse us, we’ve got a Mandarin lesson in a couple minutes.

LG bows its GW880 OPhone for China Mobile, we start packing our things originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Nov 2009 04:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Shenanigans were afoot in Sony’s efforts to throw bloggers (such as yours truly) off the scent of the just-announced PS3 Slim in the FCC, and we’ve got to give them credit — filing the thing as a “Computer Entertainment System” manufactured by “Sand Dollar Enterprise, Inc.” managed to do the trick. Well played, Sony. Anyhow, it turns out that Sand Dollar’s address is registered to Sony Computer Entertainment of America, which in turn leads us to the matter at hand: test documents for this sneaky bugger reveal a second model number, CECH-2001B, listed as a 250GB version of the console. For the math challenged, that’s over two times the storage of the only SKU announced thus far, so if they can get this out for a reasonably modest bump in MSRP (we doubt it) and get it out quickly, it might be worth the wait. Why it’s legal for a company to falsify its name with the feds like this is unclear, but we’ll admit, we respect and admire the effort. In fact, we’d be even more likely to buy a Slim if it came from a company called Sand Dollar, we think.

[Via PlayStation 3 News]

Filed under: Gaming

Sony sneaks PS3 Slim through FCC under pseudonym, 250GB model discovered originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Aug 2009 18:57:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Nokia’s Ovi Store duplicates one of N-Gage’s main lots in life — to serve as an over-the-air distribution channel of paid and trial apps — and in the long term, it certainly seems to make sense that Espoo would be looking to merge the two initiatives into one. The company hasn’t announced anything to the effect just yet (and even if it did, it’d have to find some creative way to duplicate N-Gage’s social aspect), but it’s now taken one small step by porting game trials over to the Ovi Store. If you want the full game you’ll still need to buy it using the N-Gage app, so the maddening duality of Nokia’s software strategy still basically continues as-is for the time being — let’s just hope this is a promising sign of things to come.

[Via Phone Arena and ZOMG its CJ]

Filed under: Cellphones, Gaming, Handhelds

N-Gage trials make the leap to the Ovi Store originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 19 Jun 2009 06:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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When we were breaking down the meaty differences between the old-school 3G and the 3G S yesterday, we made an assumption about support for OpenGL ES 2.0 3D graphics APIs in the original iPhone 3G based on the fact that it had been available in the iPhone OS 3.0 SDK for several betas. Turns out, though, that the graphics processor in the 3G S — the PowerVR SGX — supports hardware acceleration of both OpenGL ES 1.1 and 2.0 while the more pedestrian PowerVR MBX found in the iPhone 3G supports 1.1 alone.

What does this mean to you? OpenGL ES is the lightweight version of OpenGL, a powerful library of real-time 3D rendering APIs; many modern phones and other handheld devices support the older 1.1 specification, but 2.0 is less common — it kicks things up a notch by supporting more complex textures and shading operations, which basically means games written to support it look more badass. Here’s the problem, though: because OpenGL ES 1.1 and 2.0 are completely incompatible with each other, apps need to be written to support both if they’re going to be maximally compatible. A 2.0-only app can’t simply run on a 1.1-only device and not look as good — it won’t work at all.

Here’s where it gets interesting. The App Store has already splintered a bit with certain applications being unavailable to iPod Touch users (dialers, for example), but language in Apple’s iPhone SDK documentation leads us to believe that the company eventually intends to begin allowing it to splinter even among iPhone models, maybe as soon as the 3G S is released. That is, they’ll allow apps that are only compatible with the 3G S because they’re written to take advantage of OpenGL ES 2.0 and don’t offer a 1.1 fallback:

“When designing your OpenGL ES application, the first question you must answer is whether your application will support OpenGL ES 1.1, OpenGL ES 2.0, or both… Your application should target OpenGL ES 1.1 if you want to support all iPhones and iPod touches.”

Realistically, it was bound to happen; platform aside, hardware is always improving, and it’s paralyzingly difficult to require that all apps be compatible with all of a platform’s devices regardless of age — particularly when it comes to gaming. We imagine this’ll be an issue with apps taking advantage of the 3G S’ other specific features like the magnetic compass and video recording support, too. Question is, what’ll be that must-have game (or compass, we suppose) that spurs stubborn 3G owners into shelling out a few hundred bucks they didn’t intend to?

Filed under: Cellphones, Gaming, Handhelds

iPhone 3G S supports OpenGL ES 2.0, but 3G only supports 1.1 — will the App Store splinter? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Jun 2009 05:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Launch details for the Satio was the 800-pound news gorilla out of Sony Ericsson today, but slotting in right underneath that set are another couple of phones that are still very much in the higher end of the range — the Yari and Aino. The Yari slider (pictured left) is being billed as a gaming device, featuring gesture-controlled actions in the same vein as the Wii (and for the record, that’s Sony Ericsson’s comparison as much as it is ours). It features a 2.4-inch display, GPS, and support for the company’s PlayNow services; it’ll be available in the fourth quarter for about €400 ($558) unlocked. Next up, the Aino takes some cues from the Satio with a relatively large 3-inch touchscreen — but also tosses in a numeric slider for good measure. It’s got an 8.1 megapixel cam, Sony Remote Play support, GPS, HSPA, and a scratch-resistant mineral glass display; it’ll be ready to rock in the same timeframe as the Yari in black and white, though we don’t have pricing stats just yet — needless to say, it’ll be more than the Yari.

[Via SEMC Blog]

Filed under: Cellphones, Gaming, Handhelds

Sony Ericsson adds Yari and Aino to its multimedia line originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 May 2009 16:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you’ve been getting bored of your Versa’s QWERTY module, boy, have we got some splendid news for you: as promised, the snap-on game pad is now available. It slides along the back of the phone’s body for storage (unlike the QWERTY, which requires that polarizingly-designed brown pleather wallet) and features an 8-way directional pad, four dedicated SNES-style gaming buttons, and the envy of absolutely everyone you’ve ever known. Grab it now for $29.99 — you wouldn’t want to be that one chump Versa owner who doesn’t buy it, would you?

[Thanks, Daniel]

Filed under: Cellphones, Gaming

LG Versa game pad module now available originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 22 Apr 2009 21:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Okay, yes, pardon the headline — we’re a little fired up about the 5800’s 3G situation at the moment, and at a time like this, nothing soothes the soul quite like some awesome hackery. Self-described “homebrew coder” Jamie Fuller has somehow magically turned the singletouch 5800 into a multitouch device, delivering a proof of concept in the form of a Guitar Hero-style game requiring cat-like thumb reflexes in response to the beat of one of the best songs we’ve ever heard. Considering that neither the hardware nor the software technically support multitouch here, it’s a hell of a feat — and it’s also proof that hope springs eternal for even the most seemingly hopeless limitations of your favorite gadget, no matter what that gadget might be. The developer says that the app will eventually be available for free once it’s further along, and in the meantime, he needs some beta testers and help with graphics — you know, something beyond colored circles — so if the dream of putting two fingers on your 5800’s screen at the same time keeps you awake at night, you might consider pitching in. Follow the break for a video demo.

[Via Symbian Freak, thanks mj]

Continue reading Hobbyist brings multitouch to the Nokia 5800, doesn’t fix 3G reception

Filed under: Cellphones, Gaming, Handhelds

Hobbyist brings multitouch to the Nokia 5800, doesn’t fix 3G reception originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 03 Mar 2009 07:39:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Hey, Palm, you know when isn’t a good time to brag about your rich, time-honored tradition of gaming software stretching back some ten-plus years? Right before the release of webOS and the Pre, a device you’ve straight-up told us isn’t intended for games — that’s when. A lighthearted post on Palm’s official blog today waxes poetic about the top Palm OS game downloads on Handango and mentions a few favorite classics from around the blogosphere, but here’s the thing: unless Palm wants to get serious about bringing entertainment to the Pre, this just rubs salt in our TurboGrafx-16 emulator-craving wounds. The TI-sourced OMAP3430 underneath the Pre’s skin is more than capable of knocking console-quality games out of the park, so we’ll just have to twiddle our thumbs for a few months and see how this plays out; at the end of the day, it might simply be a question of how open Palm ultimately wants to get with its SDK.

Filed under: Cellphones, Gaming, Handhelds

Palm touts its gaming roots, Pre conspicuously missing originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 28 Jan 2009 22:13:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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