Flappy Bird creator Dong Nguyen speaks, considers return to iOS and Android

Himanshu Arora

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About a month after Flappy Bird was pulled from app stores, Dong Nguyen, the Vietnamese developer who created the game, has said that the game could make a comeback. "I'm considering it", he told Rolling Stone magazine in an interview published Tuesday, adding that future versions, if any, will come with a warning - "Please take a break".

Nguyen, who used to program location devices for taxis, grew up playing Nintendo. He was a gaming addict, with Super Mario Bros being his favorite title. According to Nguyen, he always wanted to make games for those who are busy, harried, and always on the move. "I pictured how people play - One hand holding the train strap".

His mantra was that the game should be easy to learn and difficult to master. "When you play game on a smartphone, the simplest way is just tapping", he said. And this is how Flappy Bird was born.

The game, which went live on May 24th last year, initially went unnoticed. But eight months later, it suddenly picked up and went viral. It topped the charts in February, and turned out to be a fortune turner for Nguyen, who was earning an estimated $50,000 a day.

"Seeing the game on top, I felt amazing," Nguyen said, adding that he was shocked by its rising popularity. On being asked about what he did with the money, Nguyen said that he bought a new Mac, and took his friends out for rice wine and chicken hot pot. "I couldn't be too happy. I don't know why", he said.

Despite of all the success, Nguyen remained a mystery. He refrained from the press, and refused to be photographed. While some called him a fraud, others accused him of stealing art from Nintendo.

But the biggest shock arrived when Nguyen decided to pull the game from the stores. His tweet "I am sorry 'Flappy Bird' users, 22 hours from now, I will take 'Flappy Bird' down. I cannot take this anymore" was retweeted more than 145,000 times, and the 10 million people downloaded the game in those 22 hours.

What motivated his move was messages and emails he received as feedback. He was heartbroken to learn that a mother stopped talking to her kids, people lost their jobs, kids broke their phones, and more. The simple fellow couldn't take the criticism and accusations, and pulled the game.

Nguyen said that he feels relieved after taking Flappy Bird down, and is not working on the next version. He also revealed that he is currently working on three new games -- a cowboy-themed shooter, an “action chess” game, and a vertical flying game, one of which he plans to release this month.

Image via STR/AFP/Getty Images

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This guy is like "I took the trolls too seriously and I miss my $50k a day what an ***** I am."

No... no, probably not. He never stopped receiving ad revenue from everyone who still has the game installed and still plays. I'm sure he's not hurting for money.
 
No... no, probably not. He never stopped receiving ad revenue from everyone who still has the game installed and still plays. I'm sure he's not hurting for money.

It wont be like earning $50k a day tho would it? I mean $500-1k a day is like earning $10 a day but $50k a day is like earning $12 a day compared to low income people which btw that extra $2 a day is MASSIVE!!!!
 
Damn this guy is brilliant, he makes a game that goes insane then removes it from the stores saying he can't handle the fame or whatever then a bit later he brings it back knowing people will probably go crazy over his game again for a while. Doing that his total income from this game will probably jump up a bit from last time, I need to remember this. It is basically the Coke and New Coke thing from the 80s.
 
"While some called him a fraud, others accused him of stealing art from Nintendo"
Sounds like sour grapes to me. If it was all his own doing, kudos to him.
 
"He was heartbroken to learn that a mother stopped talking to her kids, people lost their jobs, kids broke their phones, and more."

this guy... while quite a nice man, ethical, responsible, and many other qualities that are increasingly rare these days...does need to realize that he can NOT be responsible for what MORONS, *****S, DULLARDS, and irresponsible wastes of space do with their lives. if someone is going to quit or get fired from their job or stop talking to their kids because of a VIDEO GAME then maybe that person deserves to be fired...maybe we find that person who stops talking to her children because of a GAME and get the dept. of child/family services involved. these are always the types of people who blame someone else for their own stupidity. they are never the victim...of course it was the game's fault...not mine!! I hate these people.
 
Damn this guy is brilliant, he makes a game that goes insane then removes it from the stores saying he can't handle the fame or whatever then a bit later he brings it back knowing people will probably go crazy over his game again for a while. Doing that his total income from this game will probably jump up a bit from last time, I need to remember this. It is basically the Coke and New Coke thing from the 80s.
Yea, im thinking it more sounds like the guy did this as a publicity stunt that actually worked out amazingly well. The game got over 50million more downloads that day when he announced that, id say his income skyrocketed.

"While some called him a fraud, others accused him of stealing art from Nintendo"
Sounds like sour grapes to me. If it was all his own doing, kudos to him.
Its not so much the game itself as much as the graphics. Many games on iPhone or Droid have roots in old Atari or Nintendo based offerings just like this game which is similar to a helicopter game on atari where you directed the chopper around as it constantly moved down and you had to push it up through obstacles without hitting anything. The main concern was that most of the graphics (Down to pixel level) are exact replicas of the Mario fish and pipes (Minus a removal of a fin or 2) which is why alot of people are saying he took an old popular games graphics (Mario) and released his own game with it because it was already appealing to look at and was very simple to create.

Either way, it does not matter in the long run but the guy clearly took more than just a hint from the mario games. Im not going to stand at a podium and accuse the guy of copying a game, but I do think theres more to this than meets the eye.
 
..smart move!! with this public stunt, I'm sure when flappy bird hit the store again, he would generate more income than before
 
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