Nokia has launched the worldwide Mobile Games Innovation Challenge, a competition intended to provoke innovation for their N-Gage mobile gaming platform as well as for Java or Symbian based S40 and S60 devices.  Sponsored by Nokia Publishing, they’re putting up almost $110,000 in total prize money, and the three eventual winning developers will be offered pre-production contracts, leading to release of their winning concept on the corresponding platform.

“Nokia enthusiastically presents this Mobile Games Innovation Challenge as a unique opportunity for the best and brightest mobile game developers worldwide to really rock the industry with innovative, one-of-a-kind concepts that showcase what you can do with our mobile platforms”Dr Mark Ollila, director of games publishing, Nokia

Games need only be developed as a concept, not fully coded, meaning anybody with a good idea (but not necessarily with the skills to produce it) is able to enter, and they’ll all be judged by a non-Nokia panel of experts according to innovation, fun, feasibility of execution, and market potential.  Closing date for submissions is August 20th; more details, and the place to enter, here: http://developer.n-gage.com/innovation