It looks like Sega's N-Gage titles Alien Front and Virtua Cop aren't going to see the light of day. Now before you start moaning and grumbling that this is a bad thing, think again. While both games were pretty good technically, comparing them to titles like Ashen and Pathway To Glory, they didn't help the N-Gage at all. Releasing games and spending money trying to recover from bad 20% score reviews is not what the platform needs just now. I'd say this is a good move if it's true.

There's a rule of thumb that a customer talks about a good experience to one person, but talks to ten people about a bad experience. The N-Gage, since it's launch, has had a lot of bad experiences (too high an initial price, some really poor launch titles like Puyo Pop, to name two). It appears to be over these negative views and back on a neutral footing with the mainstream press. Nokia need to build on that now. Poor, straightforward titles like Alien Front and Virtua Cop with no online capabilities and linear, simple, playing is not what is needed.

Of course, there's nothing to stop an "Arcade Smashes" MMC compilation package appearing at Christmas with all of Sega's cancelled titles (don't forget Sega Rally never got an American or European release) for £20, assuming they can do a bit more work on the titles - from what we've seen of the previews, they don't need months of work on them, and the price point would be about right.