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Tiger Telematics subsidiary Gizmondo has turned the 120 developers in its newly created Gizmondo Studios division loose to create games for its eponymous gaming handheld.

The fruits of this endeavor should include several new tiles—with names like Johnny Whatever, Sticky Balls, Fallen Kingdoms, Richard Burns Rally, Momma, Can I Mow the Lawn?, Furious Phil, Milo and the Rainbow Nasties, and Future Tactics—for the highly-touted mobile console.

Gizmondo Chief Operating Officer Steven Law asserts, "With the Gizmondo being a completely new entry into the games market, we've been afforded a rare opportunity to start from the ground up, rather than inheriting unsuitable portfolios and tired sequels. These games are just a taste of what's in store further down the line."

Richard Burns Rally

Sonic: The Hedgehodee

Whether Gizmondo's newness is an advantage or not in game development is open to debate. The company is hedging its bets, however, by not just looking inward for titles. Established developers—Microsoft (Age of Empires, MechAssault, It's Mr Pants), Disney's Buena Vista Games (Tron 2.0), and Digital Media Cartridges with Sega arcade titles (OutRun, Golden Axe, Shinobi, Altered Beast, Sonic: The Hedgehode)—have all committed to the platform.

More on Gizmondo
Gizmondo , the gaming console, is part of what Jupiter Research defines as "hybrid" devices. Other handhelds in this category include TapWave's Zodiac and Nokia's N-Gage smartphones.

Perhaps the most interesting feature of Gizmondo is, not surprisingly, the integrated GPS chip that provides location-based services. As a result, some Gizmondo games will incorporate a player's physical location into the game itself-blurring the line between play and real life. It doesn't appear that Microsoft's games will be among these titles, at least initially.

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Gizmondo runs on Microsoft Windows CE.NET and is powered by a Samsung ARM9 400MHz processor that incorporates a 64-bit graphics accelerator. It boasts a smallish 2.8-inch color screen.

The handheld can also serve as a MP3 music player, MPEG4 movie player, and a digital camera. Users can send multimedia messages over a GPRS connection that also allows for wide area network gaming. This lets you play games against other Gizmondo owners worldwide.

Integrated Bluetooth lets you play games wirelessly too, except in this case the players are in the same room. 64MB of on-board storage comes courtesy of M-Systems' mDiskOnChip solution. And a Secure Digital slot delivers memory and peripheral expansion.

Gizmondo has announced several agreements to distribute its gaming console around the world. It is already shipping in the United Kingdom, and is due to hit the United States and other areas over the course of this year. When Gizmondo does ship in America, it should go for between $300 and $400.