Flappy Birds no longer in flight

Less than a year after it first launched, the creator of the addictive and popular ‘Flappy Bird’ game has taken it down from iTunes’ App Store and Google Play.

‘Flappy Bird’ first became available in the iTunes App Store in May 2013 but it’s popularity exploded early this year once it became available for download on Android devices.

The incredibly simple game involves tapping the screen to make a bird hover through a series of tubes of different heights. It sounds easier than it is, and that’s part of the reason it became so popular and addictive!

It was downloaded more than 50 million times and it is believed that its creator Dong Nguyen, an independent game developer from Vietnam, made up to $50,000 a day from it, but the success was too overwhelming for him and ultimately led him to take it down.

Why? “I can call ‘Flappy Bird’ a success of mine. But it also ruins my simple life. So now I hate it,” Nguyen tweeted on Saturday. Shortly after he tweeted, “I am sorry ‘Flappy Bird’ users, 22 hours from now, I will take ‘Flappy Bird’ down. I cannot take this anymore.”

Many don’t understand why Nguyen took the game down. Yes, he was receiving a lot of attention but he was also very successful, making a lot of money, and built a very large customer base.

Ouriel Ohayon, a venture capitalist (a person who invests money in potentially successful startups) in Silicon Valley, believes Dong may have been under pressure from other companies telling him his idea was not original. Or he may have been bothered by threats that frustrated people were sending him through social media about the game’s difficulty.

“Every developer dreams of this shiny moment. But you don’t know how to handle this when it happens. We don’t know the whole story. This guy is a true mystery,” Ohayon said.

Fans are not happy but have figured out how to make the most of their loss– by selling phones with the game installed on them. Thousands of people have turned to eBay to make some money with their ‘Flappy Bird’-equipped phones. The most expensive listing is currently priced at a jaw-dropping $135,000, and people have actually bid on it!

Did you get to download ‘Flappy Bird’ while it was still available? Why do you think some people are willing to pay so much money for a game?