A new generation of handheld games machines is expected to do for gaming what the iPod did for music: take our favourite digital pastimes away from the computer and out into the everyday world. Where computer games were once a solitary affair, restricted to the home and prone to stifle social skills, the new handsets are about to take button-mashers and inter- active entertainment on the road. Train carriages, bus stops and the workplace are the new battlegrounds, where players can now compete against one another. There are even lessons for the schoolroom. Welcome to the mobile games club, which can convene anywhere, at any time.

“I work in a cafe, and when my friend and I have some spare time, we’ll bring out our DSs and play some Mario 64,” says the Seattle-based Michael Prior, 22, of his new Nintendo DS handset, which launches in Britain this week. “These handhelds are perfect for quick bouts because you don’t have to worry about wires or, in some cases, having multiple copies of the game. You just turn on the decks and play against your friends or anyone else in the cafe.”

The PlayStation Portable (PSP) goes one better by including music and video playback, putting a complete digital- entertainment package in your pocket. Such is the excitement among gamers that by the time the PSP reaches the UK in April, Sony will be producing 1m units a month; even so, it fears it might not satisfy world demand.

For Phil Harrison, Sony Computer Entertainment Europe’s vice-president of development, the reason is simple. “PSP will have the same impact on mobile entertainment as the PlayStation had on television-based gaming,” he claims.

“It will make something that was prev- iously specialist and niche legitimate and global.” The PlayStation led the trend that brought gaming out of the realm of the geek into the living rooms of young adults in the mainstream. Now games have grown up even further, and are ready to move out of the home.

The Nintendo DS has already enjoyed phenomenal success in America and Japan, where more than 3m units have been sold since last November. Rival handhelds from the newcomers Gizmondo and Tapwave add to a groundswell that has the potential to change the face of mobile gaming for ever.

It is about time, too. While the past

10 years have seen home consoles embracing realistic 3-D graphics and increasingly sophisticated games, handheld titles have been stuck in a rut.

However, with the new breed, the gap between handheld and home consoles is closing. The DS can match the impressive 3-D graphics of the Nintendo 64, and the PSP goes one better, producing visuals that approach those of the current PlayStation2. Bestsellers such as Fifa Soccer or the driving game Gran Turismo will not look vastly different in the handheld format.

This mobile revolution is not simply about visual enhancements, it has behavioural implications, too. Wireless- networked handsets mean that gamers can interact with each other, as they do on the internet. This immediately changes the way we play on the move. Both the PSP and the Nintendo DS use WiFi — the 802.11b standard that serves most existing wireless computer networks — to connect to other units, which means that several players can link up in seconds without any physical connection.

When the DS was launched in Japan, Nintendo advertised the last carriage on Tokyo underground trains as the DS carriage, where gamers could get together to play. Does that mean we will see commuters jockeying for pole position on the 7.15 to Waterloo? Harrison says: “Most games will support eight players, but many will support more, and you could definitely play against people in the next train carriage.”

This capability transforms mobile gaming from an isolated, head-down activity, such as reading a book or listening to an iPod, into one that is much more sociable.

“People playing games against each other always has the potential to be a social activity, and that’s certainly evident in online gaming, where there is a lot of communication,” says Mark Griffiths, professor of psychology at Nottingham Trent University. “The fact that people are playing while standing next to each other doesn’t make mobile gaming any more sociable, but if you are engaging in social interaction within the games, that is often useful.”

Explore Tech & Web

• Personal Tech

• The Web

• Gadgets & Gaming