Over on AAS's sister site Ovi Gaming, we've been taking a look at the long-awaited Worms World Party and can finally present our long-awaited review of the game. Lots of people love Worms to bits, and it was one of the most popular and critically acclaimed games on the original gen N-gage, but what is the next gen version like?
Ravensoft have released their Twitter client for Symbian, TweetS60. It enters a market with many smaller clients and two strong C++ clients (Gravity and Twittix). The initial feature set is not huge, but it does have a clean UI and being labelled as a public beta there could be a lot of development work planned. You can download from www.tweetS60.com.
Fring, the IM and Social Network client for smartphones has been updated to version 3.4, and the big new feature is consolidation. If you have a friend on Skype, AOL and and Gtalk, you can add those separate accounts into one single “mega profile” of your friend. This unification approach also extends to your Contacts data on the handset, with Fring able to suggest “I think person A in your phone is person B on MSN Messenger.”
Google today announced the release of Google Mobile App for S60 (3rd Edition), which allows quick access to Google search and offers shortcuts to a number of Google's other services. Features include a homescreen shortcut and automatic location context, via GPS or cell positioning, for searches. Incidentally Google's S60 YouTube application was also silently updated to version 2.0.17. Read on for more details.
A Chinese website has posted screenshots and video of the N97 running the N-Gage application, see the third video for N-Gage. It seems the N-Gage app has been redesigned somewhat for horizontal use on the N97's large touch-sensitive screen, but the only game shown (Asphalt 4) seemed to be running at 4:3 aspect ratio rather than the full 16:9. (via brainimpact on Twitter)
The Nokia 5800 has a very large high res screen which is compatible with many touchscreen Java games in full-screen mode, for example Cooking Mama works on the 5800 in full screen. Unfortunately the default setting for many Java games and applications (including Cooking Mama) seems to have the on-screen "virtual keypad" switched on automatically, which makes the game or app shrink into half-screen mode. However, there is an easy solution to this problem which should let touch-compatible Java software use the 5800's entire screen. See below for a quick step-by-step guide...
In All About Symbian Insight 73 (AAS Podcast 132) Steve, Ewan and Rafe discuss SkyFire's 1.0 release, introduce Ovi Gaming and offer some perspective on the Ovi Store 3 days after the formal launch. In the second part of the show Rafe talks about the launch of the Sony Ericsson Satio (formerly Idou) and then the team discuss the E75 in 60 seconds. You can listen to AAS Insight 73 here or, if you wish to subscribe, here's the RSS feed.
For all those bemoaning the lack of a Facebook client for S60, the void has now been filled with an official Facebook application for S60 5th Edition, now live in the Ovi Store (mobile link). Implemented as a Web Runtime widget, it's not the speediest thing in the world, but hey, it's official and it's here and it's free. Read on for loads of screenshots and additional comments.
One of the most commonly-asked questions about the 5800 from advanced users is "Where the flipping heck is that flipping blue blistering blarndarsted flipping Sync flipping application on this flipping thing?" Well you'll be glad to know there is Sync on the 5800, and it is also very easy to access but you have to know where to look. As a special tip-of-the-day we've got a guide to finding Sync on the 5800 below.
Bobba, the mobile online virtual world from the makers of Habbo, has added all non-Nokia S60 2nd and 3rd Edition devices to its official compatibility list. Practically every Nokia S60 2nd and 3rd Edition phone is on the list, and now so are Samsung, LG, Panasonic and Lenovo S60 models. There are no S60 5th Edition devices on the list yet, but the publishers Sulake say they are working on this and should have a rough version out soon, with a more touch-optimised version later.
Ovi Store can be accessed from almost any Nokia phone by just going to store.ovi.com on the phone's web browser, but certain phones also have an Ovi Store application available which lets you use Ovi Store much more easily. Some people have managed to find the Ovi Store application available through the Download! icon, but it now appears that you can also download the app directly from the store.ovi.com website. The availability of the app seems to currently vary depending on which model you have and which country you live in, and the easiest way to find out if you can get it is to visit the Ovi Store mobile site and see if the link appears for you. See the screens below for details.
Kudos to AAS friend Matthew Miller for putting together a gloriously techy article on how to rid your S60 3rd Edition FP2-toting (ho yes) AT&T-branded Nokia E71x of all of its Java trialware and bloatware. Bottom line: an hour of effort and you've got yourself a lean and fit smartphone that's more advanced in many ways than the E71 the rest of the world is enjoying.
There's a fascinating (and welcome) post by Phil Northam over on the Symbian Foundation site talking about the new i8910HD. Particularly interesting is the quote "the i8910HD is packed with a host of powerful options: Qt, Python, Ruby... All these run out-of-the box without change on the i8910HD". Good news all round, I say, though I suspect there's a degree of firmware-updating, downloadable addons and poetic license still involved. Anyone able to shed more light on this? See also Samsung's accelerating Mobile Innovator programme.
Possibly as part of the whole Ovi server shake-up, possibly as part of the new Ovi Maps server architecture, Nokia's Maps servers have now been 'fixed' and will, after a frustrating couple of months of being broken, successfully match full seven character UK postcodes. Phew - just thought you'd like to know.
Yesterday Rafe had the opportunity to attend Nokia's Design Day: The Inside Story. The event, held at Nokia's London design studio, offers a closer look at a number of design projects. This year the topics included iconography (a global design language), gestures (future interaction methods), homescreens (empowering users through personalisation), and the Nokia N97 (merging the physical and online world). We'll have more detailed coverage next week, but, as a taster, here are a few images from the day.
