Developers at Rovio have been expanding the Angry Birds franchise for years, with new releases featuring the original effort Stella and the promotional tie-in with Angry Birds: Transformers. There hasn’t been a sequel, though — but that’s changed in a big way this week.
A report from GamesIndustry International indicates that the just-released Angry Birds 2 for iOS and Android {links no longer active} set some impressive numbers, as the game has been downloaded 20 million times in its first week alone. As a result, it’s managed to become the most downloaded app in over 100 territories worldwide, proving that, yes, the Birds can still be dominant.
“When we were developing and testing Angry Birds 2, we had good reason to believe we were on to a good thing, but the enormous groundswell of enthusiasm for the game from loyal fans and casual newcomers alike has been humbling,” said Rovio creative director Patrick Liu. “It took the first Angry Birds game more than nine months to reach this many players, and we thank all our fans for growing the flock so quickly!”
Thus far, the game is ranking 37th in the grossing charts in the US and the UK, based on a new free-to-play structure that has yet to fully catch on. Regardless, complaints about this system have been minimal, and players have really been enjoying the more lively art style that comes with the game.
Over 1.4 billion birds have been launched thus far, clearing away 300 million levels.
Rovio did address its struggles last year, especially on the consumer side. “On the consumer product side, 2014 was not a satisfactory year,” said CEO Pekka Rantala. “However, the upcoming Angry Birds feature film (coming in 2016) is getting very positive reactions from major retail and license partners as well as from consumer focus groups. This will have a positive impact on licensing in the coming years. In the next few months, we expect major announcements of partnerships in the licensing space.” (A partnership with Lego certainly doesn’t hurt either.)
Here’s hoping that the Birds keep on the straight and narrow heading into next year.
