(22) hours left - act now! The Flappy Bird Story - Bluff or Fact? (46)
I'm sure you guys already heard about the indie smash hit for iOS / Android, a game called Flappy Bird. For the others:
"The enigmatic and oppressively difficult mobile game Flappy Bird has turned into quite the cash cow for Vietnamese developer Dong Nguyen. In an interview with The Verge, Nguyen revealed that the game, which has been sitting atop the App Store and Google Play Store charts for nearly a month, is earning on average $50,000 a day from in-app ads. [.....] The app has been downloaded 50 million times, and has accumulated over 47,000 reviews in the App Store — as many as apps like Evernote and Gmail. Mobile games studios generally spend months coding up deliberately addictive and viral titles, but Nguyen did it by spending a few nights coding when he got home from work." (THE VERGE)
Business Insider wrote:
"For some context on the success of Flappy Bird, in the U.S. App Store, Facebook's new Paper app is number three, sitting behind Flappy Bird, and a game just like Flappy Bird called Ironpants. Facebook has 147 million daily U.S. users. It dominated in press coverage for Paper. And yet, it still can't beat some goofy app made by a Vietnamese developer in his free time."
And today's news:
'Flappy Bird' creator says he's pulling the game offline"
"Flappy Bird creator Dong Nguyen has said that he will take the game down — presumably removing it from the iOS and Android app stores — tomorrow for reasons unknown. On Twitter, Nguyen, whose surprise hit is making $50,000 a day in ad revenue, said that he "cannot take this anymore" and would remove the game 22 hours from now, or midday Sunday. He ruled out a couple of the most obvious potential explanations, saying that there were no legal problems, the game had not been acquired, and he had not quit making games."
(THE VERGE)
This guy is a true genius (i really hope so) or just a scared little boy. If he plays his cards right, it easily could be the wildest ride of his life! What do you think?
Oh, and if this is your account, then i highly suggest something for you: Talk with some of the big dogs here and MILK THE SHIT OUT of your game haha!
(22) hours left - act now! The Flappy Bird Story - Bluff or Fact?
The downloads will just be rolling now! And the media exposure he gets is incredible. Looks like a little boy, but his marketing is really smart. Let's see what will follow!
Wow $50k a day?! Must be a marketing ploy. What else would compel someone to just take down an app that makes that much money and not even sell it?
I started playing the game yesterday after hearing so many people talking about it.
But what.. $50k/day?!?!?
That's insane man!!
And yea if the guy is on the forum I'm sure we'd all love for him to do a AMA!
the funny thing is that I downloaded it because of reading about those tweets
fuck me.
EDIT: who is he using as a traffic source? 
Originally Posted by angry old lady
He's using google, I tried running some very hgh ctr ads (in other games) on it and it had the shittiest CTR ever, no wonder CPM Is so relatively low.
It's either a bluff or he got fucked by Mario Brothers company for copying their landscape.
Originally Posted by Mr Green
Originally Posted by bstrd
Originally Posted by Mr Green
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-bCGOthQ5k
^^ Haha no shit, I've seen it. Guess I felt like I was watching a game.
I feel it's more like a ploy to get more attention to the game.
Originally Posted by bbrock32
Let's hope that's the case, and he's not the Eddie Vedder of game developers.
And he did it.
"Sure enough, the game appears to be gone. And in its spot on the #1 spot on the iOS leaderboard? A Flappy Birds clone." (TechCrunch)
interdasting.... lets see if he brings it back a few days later saying he couldn't let it go. Either that or he really is a scared little boy.
Originally Posted by philme
Is this in app purchase ? how he monetised this little game ?
Originally Posted by maynzie
Originally Posted by bstrd
alright, now im curious. thats about $190k/day in revenue. how is he only making 50k?
Game is now deleted from the apps tore in real
Originally Posted by angry old lady
Also, ad networks take a big cut.
He's missing out on SO MUCH money because he's monetizing very poorly. Any half decent developer will do 3x that in advertisng
Man games are where it's at!
Amazing potential if you can get the 'addictive' formula right
Lots of guys are going to copy Flappy Bird as is, very interesting see those clones cumming up in the next few days...
Originally Posted by delash
Btw, that dude still banking on Flappy Bird. The app removed from the store currently, but still playable, and got ads in it. There goes some nice $$$ from an app which is not even listed in the appstore haha.
(App Annie)
Apple and Google on a rampage...started removing Flappy Bird clones from the app stores.
If you use any "flappy,bird" in your meta keyword tags or name - delete them now or lose your game!
lol such a simple game! ( never played just seen youtube clips) it shows u its all about how addictive the game is. not graphics, characters, multiplayer option, , how much time u put in, etc etc .. make a game with a bird and make it addictive, win?
thats' freakin awesome angry old lady 
Games gone! The guy was dead serious
Blows my mind
Interesting article on how he busted to the top of the charts.
http://venturebeat.com/2014/02/11/ho...of-the-charts/
Originally Posted by Mr Green
So what i'm getting at is games like Flappy Birds have something else, the X factor if you will.. that makes them addictive and viral, and no tactics such as mega review #'s can make that happen. It can be engineered though (sometimes).
^^^
Mega # of downloads + Mega # of reviews WILL get you the momentum needed to do this. If you don't get that initial momentum then even the most viral game will not catch on. Flappy Bird is the perfect example - its been in the app store for months and was a total dead-rubber...until it magically got a burst of downloads and reviews
http://thechive.com/2014/02/19/guy-a...e-cameo-video/
I think he might have taken it down because he was scared of legal issues. Then he used this ploy to get the game massively talked about and even still being distributed without the market. I don't know just my hypothesis haha.
A good friend of mine has made great money with a clone, Splashy Fish. He just passed 5,000 reviews in the Google play store. Also has a version on iOS too.
Interesting interview with the Flappy Bird creator on Rolling Stone: http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/...s-out-20140311
Originally Posted by ViperChill
My top score is now 290 in this game, set from a Guangzhou hotel bathroom yesterday. 
We're talking like 6-7 minutes of flapping without error.
He'll put the game up when he needs more money, and the news stories will flow... easy publicity.
Originally Posted by redrummr
We're talking like 6-7 minutes of flapping without error.He'll put the game up when he needs more money, and the news stories will flow... easy publicity.
So, will he ever need more money? I assume he made... a lot.
Originally Posted by redrummr
We're talking like 6-7 minutes of flapping without error.He'll put the game up when he needs more money, and the news stories will flow... easy publicity.
He'll get hated on even more this time and cry harder
The sequel looks set to be Swing Copters.
Check the video out in the link above.
It's funny, all the Flappy Bird knock-offs had nearly no proper creative changes. What does Dong Nguyen do? Change the bloomin' axis. He's an entrepreneur, that's for sure.
Lucky duck can say he's making anything as his sequel and will have tons of coverage!
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