February 8th, 2014 may not have meant anything more than the second day of the Olympics to some. However, for others, this was the beginning of the end. On this date, Dong Nguyen, creator of the game Flappy Bird, tweeted his official plan to remove the game from both the Apple and Google Play App stores. Although, for some people, this removal meant nothing, it was quite an astonishing decision for others.
The game was created as early as November 2012, but it wasn’t until February 2013 that it was released for IOS. By December of that year it was rated as one of the most popular games available in the free apps section. The massive media explosion began to bombard Nguyen and interviewers became extremely aggressive. An outburst of hatred for the game was developing, because of the exuberant amounts of money it was putting in Nguyen’s pocket, despite his claims that he was doing no “self-promotion”. Each of the aggressive interviewers received the same answer when confronting Nguyen about his earnings per ad and if he was planning on making the game cost $0.99. After all, most free apps become paid after they reach this level of popularity. To each question, Nguyen responded with a simple “no”. The $50,000/day Nguyen was receiving resulted in multiple death threats and anger towards both him and his game.
The game’s popularity was increasing at an unbelievable rate, with addictions beginning to develop. Alongside the multitude of hate filling Nguyen’s inbox, fake stories of murder and deaths arose in response to the game’s difficulty level.
On February 8th, game lovers were shocked to find Nguyen’s tweet proclaiming that he would be removing the game. He believed that it had taken over his life and changed him for the worst; probably true considering the hate and negative publicity he was receiving. As an avid Flappy Bird player, I was sad to hear about the removal of this ever-so-addictive game. Given more time to think about it, I believe that the removal of the game was for the best. Overall, popular online games are often unhealthily addictive and this game was clearly affecting people in very negative ways. The health of the game creator, I find, is constantly overlooked in the assessment of its removal. His constant tweets apologizing about errors in the game coupled with the ridiculous workload he was forced to deal with as peoples’ addictions grew, were certainly unhealthy. Shortly after the game’s removal, Nguyen gave a final interview where he stated the game was removed because it was making users addicted. It is also important to note that, throughout its lifespan, it remained a free app, proving Nguyen’s genuine intentions regarding his fans, whom he clearly cares about.
Now, if you were dying to give Flappy Bird a try, but didn’t have the chance to download it before its abrupt removal, don’t worry. There are over 25 adaptations of the game by different game creators. And if you’re exceptionally desperate to try the game, you can even go to the lengths of purchasing an iPhone on eBay with the game already installed (Editors’ Note: This is no longer an option, as these have been removed by eBay). As for the Dong Nguyen’s diehard fans, he has proclaimed that he will continue creating games, so this is not the end of the fun, dangerously addictive games saga.
While these games can be dangerously addictive, they can also be super fun. Like all other things, we advise moderation above all else. If you choose to download a variation of flappy bird or have it already (or another game you cannot stop playing), try to limit yourself to a specific amount of time each day. If you really see a problem arising from your inability to stop playing a game, try deleting it. It may seem drastic, but after deleting the game, you really get a sense of how often you played by resisting the temptation of re-downloading or opening the game. Now, if you’re able to control yourself and simply enjoy playing a few times a day, that’s great. And if that’s the case, then try beating my high score of 40!
Images Retrieved from: http://www.destructoid.com/flappy-bird-creator-says-he-s-taking-the-game… and http://guardianlv.com/2014/02/flappy-bird-creator-is-taking-game-app-dow….