Even if you don’t play games, if you own an Android phone you have probably heard of Flappy Bird by now. It’s the nigh impossible game that almost noone can seem to put down. After a few light hearted sessions with it and “learning the ropes”, which consists of tapping the screen and realy nothing else, you start to get into it. Then you think to yourself, “why do I like this game?” The answer is because it’s addictive. Flappy Birds is not a game for action and combat. It’s not a game that is there to provide you with an intensely engaging storyline. It’s just a simple game. That allows you to obtain a high score. As people who play games, we must have the high score. Or, at least, some fraction of a high score. The reason people can’t put Flappy Bird down is because it’s so damn impossible that if you don’t do just a little bit better, you might develop years worth of self pity and doubt. You can probably gather that Flappy Bird sounds like a popular game, and you’re right. The game has barely been out more than a few days and already it’s at 10,000,000+ downloads. You read that right.
The developer of the game says “he just got lucky” when it came to Flappy Bird. The developer, Nguyen Ha Dong is the head of Gears Studios, the dev team(which is comprised of just himself so far) behind the game and he actually makes multiple games. Two others that are doing fairly well at the moment perhaps due to Flappy Bird’s Success are Shuriken Block and Super Ball Juggling. There was a time when video games were quite frustrating, not unlike the way that Flappy Bird is now to the point that you might want to strangle yourself. The goal behind Gears studios games was aimed at making them as much like the games from this time as possible. Days of the NES, retro pixelated, 8-bit graphics, and a sense of challenge. The games were hard. Much more difficult than some are now. These are the games that Flappy bird was modeled after.
Despite the insanely hard task of achieving the platinum coin high score, the game has gone viral so much so that some people just can’t believe it. Dong admits that he has no idea why or how his games got so popular, and that most of his games are kids in schools. Whatever the case is, Dong says that a total of 2 to 3 million downloads per day are happening on Android as well as iOS for Flappy Bird. That is a staggering number for any game to achieve let alone one that is as simple as this. Yet, I find this not surprising at all. When I looked at the game yesterday in the Play Store, it was at 5+ million downloads, now the number is at 10+ million downloads, and in a couple days time it will probably rise to a new tier. If you think you can escape the calling of this game and slip away with your dignity and self esteem intact, you’re sorely mistaken. Just reading this article has planted the seed and even if you don’t download the game right away, there will come a time when you can stand the nagging voice in the back of your mind no more, and you will break. Once that time is upon you, say goodby to at least an entire day of your life at first. For those of you who were too weak from the get go, here is the Play Store link, go ahead and grab the game for free, and join the millions of others who have already committed themselves.
Source: Tech Crunch