Nuon: Game over before it began?

That's the thinking behind VM Labs Inc.'s Nuon technology, which has garnered support from consumer-appliance makers Toshiba and Samsung as well as such large content creators as Acclaim and GT Interactive.

Yet, a six-month delay and this year's arrival of Sony's (sne) PlayStation2 and Microsoft's (msft) X-box, both capable of playing DVDs, could put the skids on VM Labs' simple plans.

Consumers interested in gaming will go with proven game technology, while those interested only in DVD will be hard to sell on the interactive features of Nuon, said Jeremy Schwartz, industry analyst with market watcher Forrester Research Inc.

"People are not going to know what to do with (the technology)," he said. "Unless (VM Labs) has made some major steps forward contentwise and technologywise, they will be eclipsed by the PlayStation and the X-Box."

When Nuon first made its debut more than two years ago, Schwartz had been excited by the technology. "It was pretty powerful technology when we first saw it," he said. "But compared to the PlayStation2 now, it's not that thrilling."

Eric Reichley, director of channel sales and marketing for VM Labs, is used to such talk. The company has been extremely quiet about its plans, he said, to keep its competitive edge. The company's tight-lipped approach has hurt its image.

"There's a lot of frustration because we can't talk, but we do have a jump on everyone," said Reichley, who stressed that Sony and its PlayStation2 are not the company's competitor -- yet.

For the company, even winning a fraction of the $4 billion video-game console market could mean the difference between life and death.

"In one way or another, everyone is going to put a DVD player, a game machine and an Internet device together," he said. "There are a lot of people who do not think of themselves as gamers who want to buy a DVD player but will not want a PlayStation2."

Those are the consumers that VM Labs hopes to lure into shelling out the extra $50 or $100 for a Nuon-capable player.

Already, Samsung announced its player would hit retail shelves before the end of April, and VM Labs partner Toshiba plans to release a Nuon-capable player in the fall.

While Sony is luring hard-core gamers to its device, Reichley believes VM Labs will have a good chance of grabbing a large percentage of the rest. "Sony will have to wait a year to approach our market," he said, "because they have to please the hard-core gamers first, and then they can change gears and switch to the mainstream player."

Still, Forrester's Schwartz wonders if an unproven technology will be enough to lure buyers to the systems.

"Their marketing position is flawed now," he said. "They'd plan to put this in as a Trojan horse in DVD players." Yet, with so many other high-powered choices, Nuon could, quite possibly, get buried by the other platforms' hype.

Unless VM Labs can break its vow of silence, the company could be looking at the end, Schwartz said. "The whole sort of marketing strategy had a fundamental problem, and, of course, now they are fundamentally delayed."