7 ms·

The lesson of Flappy Bird for games developers

37 points by joelbro 13y ago

CompleteMoron2 13y ago
isnt this just a Mario Bros Mini Game? Seems to be very much in the IP realm of mario!
pcunite 13y ago
The lesson here is: "Free is the new black". I have an application that, once I begin to charge for it, fell off the radar and into hacker's greedy hands. Must we all simply be media containers?
Mikeb85 13y ago
The key to success is essentially, word of mouth (or the internet equivalent). And addicting gameplay. Every single person I know in the real world (ie. not on the internet) is playing this game. I know more people playing this game, right now, than Angry Birds in its heyday, or Candy Crush right now. It's funny how such a simple game can capture people's attention - I'm addicted, my high score (from yesterday) is 90 :-0
- DanBC 13y ago
  Very short bursts of activity are brilliant for mobile gaming. That "just one more go" feeling is strong.
- code_duck 13y ago
  Wow, I am super out of the loop as this is the first I've ever heard of it.
  - benched 13y ago
    Even though I don't know people in real life, I couldn't miss it. The only sites I visit are HN and Kotaku, and it's front page on both. And now it's on HN twice. Success flows to success, but good luck creating either a chicken or an egg from nothing.
    - code_duck 13y ago
      I visit this site and facebook every day, and reddit now and then so I'm surprised I haven't encountered this. Um... not sure what you're getting at, but I'll try to work on that chicken. Or egg.
prezjordan 13y ago
It's interesting to take a closer look at this game. Make something intuitive enough where people think "Of course I can beat your high score in this, look how simple it is" and then it make it insanely difficult. Side note: I wonder if the developer meticulously chose the "flap height" and pipe width such that it would drive us all insane, or if he just got lucky.
- Mikeb85 13y ago
  I'm sure it was by design just as the fall rate is just quick enough to get from the highest to lowest pipes in the perfect amount of distance travelled.
- phaus 13y ago
  >Side note: I wonder if the developer meticulously chose the "flap height" and pipe width such that it would drive us all insane, or if he just got lucky. Its hard to say. I guess most people find this pretty compelling, but to me it comes across as an unplayable clone of helicoptergame.net. It looks pretty polished for a pixel game, but I don't consider bad controls, intentional or not, to be a clever game mechanic.
  - scrabble 13y ago
    It's not really polished. There's no music. And almost all of the in game graphics are borrowed from other games. So I guess it's polished in the sense that those other games did the polishing. It really does come off as someone who started out trying to clone Mario, or someone who was just trying to make their first game without expecting anyone to actually download it. The lack of a paid ad-free version shows that it wasn't really expected to be downloaded millions of times.
    - phaus 13y ago
      Polished probably isn't the right word for it. I just meant that the graphics are cohesive(even though they are copied) and the animation is smooth. Most popular games fail to achieve even that much.
joelbro 13y ago
Imagine if the developer added a challenge feature in the game where can share score with friend? it'd be twice as popular. i think the pipe width was picked based on how it was in a certain nintendo game, he got lucky, but he's also talented developer (his other games really fun as well.
- oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
  Doesn't it already have a score-sharing feature? My nightmare earlier was the addition of IAP to decrease the difficulty ever-so-slightly; combined with score oneupmanship, that would probably lead to the end of civilisation as we know it.
iamwil 13y ago
I found that the audio for this game made it much more fun. The coin sound is pleasant and familiar, and reinforces me to want to play. The punching sound when you die is pretty hilarious, and makes me want to try again. Because, hey, if I got a good laugh from dying, maybe I'll have another laugh from it again. The death punch is accentuated by the slight screen shake as well. nice little touches. There are other mechanics that make it rather addicting, but I found the sound and other little touches added a lot.
aresant 13y ago
"the number one key to success is dumb, blind, luck" This is a red herring. The number one key to winning the lottery is dumb, blind luck. That is true. But don't categorize the entire game industry, let alone this developer's story in that framework just because it's easy for the media to generate pageviews about a lottery winner. The macro reality is that proven business models around building a studio on the back of high quality apps (or highly aggressive pay-to-play apps), purposeful marketing models, etc exist all over the place. The micro reality of this developer is the guy has run his studio for 4 YEARS, had published several games before in a variety of formats, etc. So he's a 4-year overnight success. He didn't throw in the towel, and more important than "blind luck" in his story was perseverance, and he didn't "die" (1). So please don't tell people that the most important factor in becoming successful is to go out and buy lottery tickets. (1) http://www.paulgraham.com/die.html http://www.paulgraham.com/die.html
- vannevar 13y ago
  So please don't tell people that the most important factor in becoming successful is to go out and buy lottery tickets. But that's exactly what perseverance is in this context, buying more tickets. You can't win the lottery if you buy no tickets, and the more you buy, the more likely it is you will win. You can't have a hit game if you produce no games, and the more games you produce, all else being equal, the more likely one will be successful. Luck plays a dominant role and you can't control opportunity, but you can increase your exposure to it by continuing to show up.
stackcollision 13y ago
Is Flappy Bird just a clone of that rediculously fun helicopter tunnel game that everyone used to play on AddictingGames, the name of which escapes me right now? It's funny how many of these record-shattering Android and iOS games are just polished versions of ancient Flash games.
- Mikeb85 13y ago
  Just tried that helicopter game, while it has similar concepts, the gameplay mechanics are different enough - in the helicopter game you hold the mouse button to stay aloft, versus repeatedly flapping. Also Flappy Bird has a nicer feel, the physics (ie. fall rate, because that's about all there is) feel more 'right', and of course the graphics and everything are just more fun. So no, I'd say it's not a clone.
  - coolnow 13y ago
    But the mechanics are indeed similar enough. It's obvious it was inspired by it. Look at Angry Birds and that other flash game i used to play in school. Castle, Catapult something?
    - Mikeb85 13y ago
      in gaming though, everything is inspired by something. Nothing is truly original. See all RTS games, shooters, 4x games, etc... Anything that's not an outright clone is different enough to be it's own oeuvre, IMO.
- concernedctzn 13y ago
  It's a mix of that and the bird vehicle from Machine Gun Jetpack which used the same tap/flap mechanic. Thrown together with some mario sprites and not so great hit detection.
  - drivers99 13y ago
    The flapping mechanic looks a lot like swimming in Super Mario Bros (1985), or the flying in Joust (1982), minus the ability to control your horizontal movement. So it seems pointless to compare it to more recent games. If the game involved only jumping, or climbing ladders, or shooting, would we try to figure out which other games had that mechanic?
MartinCron 13y ago
"But maybe what game players really want is a game that is fun and free, with no strings attached." I just respect any game that has no strings attached. I have mostly given up on iOS gaming because there's just so much niggling and begging and nickel-and-dining. This will be remembered as a dark age, not a golden era.
- emhart 13y ago
  This was recently posted to HN: http://honestandroidgames.com http://honestandroidgames.com Not iOS, of course, but the whole purpose is to feature games that are either free, or have a one-time purchase, whether in a marketplace, or in-app, that provides the entire game, no recurring purchases, etc.
  - FreeKill 13y ago
    Nice site, thanks for the link. I really think there is an underserved blogging market for curation of apps and games, especially with a specific theme such as this site does.
- pjmlp 13y ago
  Or as the second comming of the 1983's game crash.
  - oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
    I was thinking about that game crash myself the other day when mulling over the whole IAP mobile gaming fiasco. It really feels as if, by racing to the bottom, the whole market is running the risk of losing purchasers' confidence. There isn't really a very vibrant game review scene to prop things up either.
    - pjmlp 13y ago
      The main problem I see, it that the crash was the main reason of why Nintendo came up with gated development as a means to control quality. The model still being used in the console world. We might end up going again down that road.
DanBC 13y ago
The linked blog talking about the "suspicious" rise of the game misses the appearance of flappy bird on Pewdiepie. There's also a comment talking about how to monetise the game "properly" which gives advice about some reasonably ghastly monetisation techniques: > At the very least he should have added a interstitial upon opening the game, and maybe one everytime the game becomes active. He should have included a retry button. > There should have been a more games & free game button. He could have added a remove ads in-app purchase, and made it so that you can only get rid of the ads for ‘x’ amount of time before you have to buy again. > He could have provided upgrades like buying shields and/or lifes so you can get further, getting rid of peoples frustration.
- JonLim 13y ago
  Genuinely curious, what's so ghastly about an interstitial upon becoming active, and a retry button? It's a free game, I think people expect ads by now. Maybe not every time the game starts up (or having a daily limit) but that's not the worst thing in the world.
  - georgemcbay 13y ago
    Being free is likely the only thing that has stopped Nintendo's lawyers from coming down on him like a ton of bricks at some point in the past 8 months or however long the game has been out. If he wants to monetize it he really better change the graphics first (though technically he's still copyright infringing regardless of whether he is charging for his game).
    - oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
      Is the pipe graphic literally lifted from Mario, pixel-for-pixel? Or is it just very similar. TBH, I don't think he's infringing any more than King, Zynga, et al.
      - MartinCron 13y ago
        Setting a pretty low ethical bar when you compare to King and Zynga.
alexvr 13y ago
No, it's not luck. Unless we're talking about growing up in Palo Alto at the dawn of computers, luck usually has very little to do with success. It's all about persistence and market understanding. In this case, it's mostly about creating games that people actually want. Good games are challenging and fun, so people buy them. Graphics, music, etc. are secondary. It doesn't take Bungie or John Carmack to make Tetris, but it's one of the best games ever made. Why? Because it's fun. I'd probably buy a knockoff Tetris app for $20 before I buy a beautiful but completely boring game like Infinity Blade for much less.
- thezilch 13y ago
  Sure, but making a fun game can be luck. There will be developers that don't need luck (or are lucky to not need it?!). Rovio made _A LOT_ of games other than Angry Birds; is making a lot of "bad" games and then one "good" not luck? I'm sure they set out and had equal confidence in each of their games being gold mines, before they were not or, in the case of Angry Birds, were.
benched 13y ago
I have a prototype I wrote sitting on my phone right now that has very similar mechanics. But I don't believe for half a second that, had I finished it, it would have achieved one ten-thousandth of the success. In the age where anyone who wants to can create games, music, art, whatever on their computers, there's a ton of great work languishing in obscurity for every single work that finds the straight-and-narrow to the big time.
- stevenwei 13y ago
  Luck is also a huge factor. Sometimes it's just one of those 'right place, right time' moments that can't really be replicated again.
georgemcbay 13y ago
They forgot to mention Lesson #1 which is go ahead and just blatantly rip out the tile graphics from an old Nintendo game and reuse them, it is easier than wasting time creating your own and apparently you can get away with it.
- oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
  When the biggest mobile game companies in the world rip off other people's games, why on earth would an independent developer not also feel entitled to do the same?
  - georgemcbay 13y ago
    There's a pretty big difference (legally and ethically) between making a game that has similar mechanics to another game and just outright ripping out graphic assets to place in your own game.
    - oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
      First of all, that's a pretty big accusation to level at someone on public record: are you 100% certain that the graphic assets have been lifted pixel-for-pixel? Second, I agree with you on the legal point: it's much easier to 'protect' visual assets than it is a game mechanic. However, I dispute the fact that ripping off someone's game mechanics is, somehow, more ethical; in both cases, you're simply copying someone else's work and passing it off as your own. Just because one is easier to define, and therefore protect, in law, doesn't mean they're not both pretty nasty ways of operating.
      - georgemcbay 13y ago
        Not that big of an accusation when the theft is so obvious. It doesn't really matter if the graphics are pixel-by-pixel the same, modifying them a bit to make them slightly different doesn't protect you. See: EA's lawsuit against Zynga over The Ville which Zynga had to settle.
      - 13y ago

37 points by joelbro 13y ago

isnt this just a Mario Bros Mini Game? Seems to be very much in the IP realm of mario!

The lesson here is: "Free is the new black". I have an application that, once I begin to charge for it, fell off the radar and into hacker's greedy hands. Must we all simply be media containers?

Mikeb85 13y ago

The key to success is essentially, word of mouth (or the internet equivalent). And addicting gameplay. Every single person I know in the real world (ie. not on the internet) is playing this game. I know more people playing this game, right now, than Angry Birds in its heyday, or Candy Crush right now. It's funny how such a simple game can capture people's attention - I'm addicted, my high score (from yesterday) is 90 :-0

DanBC 13y ago
Very short bursts of activity are brilliant for mobile gaming. That "just one more go" feeling is strong.
code_duck 13y ago
Wow, I am super out of the loop as this is the first I've ever heard of it.
- benched 13y ago
  Even though I don't know people in real life, I couldn't miss it. The only sites I visit are HN and Kotaku, and it's front page on both. And now it's on HN twice. Success flows to success, but good luck creating either a chicken or an egg from nothing.
  - code_duck 13y ago
    I visit this site and facebook every day, and reddit now and then so I'm surprised I haven't encountered this. Um... not sure what you're getting at, but I'll try to work on that chicken. Or egg.

prezjordan 13y ago

It's interesting to take a closer look at this game. Make something intuitive enough where people think "Of course I can beat your high score in this, look how simple it is" and then it make it insanely difficult. Side note: I wonder if the developer meticulously chose the "flap height" and pipe width such that it would drive us all insane, or if he just got lucky.

Mikeb85 13y ago
I'm sure it was by design just as the fall rate is just quick enough to get from the highest to lowest pipes in the perfect amount of distance travelled.
phaus 13y ago
>Side note: I wonder if the developer meticulously chose the "flap height" and pipe width such that it would drive us all insane, or if he just got lucky. Its hard to say. I guess most people find this pretty compelling, but to me it comes across as an unplayable clone of helicoptergame.net. It looks pretty polished for a pixel game, but I don't consider bad controls, intentional or not, to be a clever game mechanic.
- scrabble 13y ago
  It's not really polished. There's no music. And almost all of the in game graphics are borrowed from other games. So I guess it's polished in the sense that those other games did the polishing. It really does come off as someone who started out trying to clone Mario, or someone who was just trying to make their first game without expecting anyone to actually download it. The lack of a paid ad-free version shows that it wasn't really expected to be downloaded millions of times.
  - phaus 13y ago
    Polished probably isn't the right word for it. I just meant that the graphics are cohesive(even though they are copied) and the animation is smooth. Most popular games fail to achieve even that much.

joelbro 13y ago

Imagine if the developer added a challenge feature in the game where can share score with friend? it'd be twice as popular. i think the pipe width was picked based on how it was in a certain nintendo game, he got lucky, but he's also talented developer (his other games really fun as well.

oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
Doesn't it already have a score-sharing feature? My nightmare earlier was the addition of IAP to decrease the difficulty ever-so-slightly; combined with score oneupmanship, that would probably lead to the end of civilisation as we know it.

iamwil 13y ago

I found that the audio for this game made it much more fun. The coin sound is pleasant and familiar, and reinforces me to want to play. The punching sound when you die is pretty hilarious, and makes me want to try again. Because, hey, if I got a good laugh from dying, maybe I'll have another laugh from it again. The death punch is accentuated by the slight screen shake as well. nice little touches. There are other mechanics that make it rather addicting, but I found the sound and other little touches added a lot.

aresant 13y ago

"the number one key to success is dumb, blind, luck" This is a red herring. The number one key to winning the lottery is dumb, blind luck. That is true. But don't categorize the entire game industry, let alone this developer's story in that framework just because it's easy for the media to generate pageviews about a lottery winner. The macro reality is that proven business models around building a studio on the back of high quality apps (or highly aggressive pay-to-play apps), purposeful marketing models, etc exist all over the place. The micro reality of this developer is the guy has run his studio for 4 YEARS, had published several games before in a variety of formats, etc. So he's a 4-year overnight success. He didn't throw in the towel, and more important than "blind luck" in his story was perseverance, and he didn't "die" (1). So please don't tell people that the most important factor in becoming successful is to go out and buy lottery tickets. (1) http://www.paulgraham.com/die.html http://www.paulgraham.com/die.html

vannevar 13y ago
So please don't tell people that the most important factor in becoming successful is to go out and buy lottery tickets. But that's exactly what perseverance is in this context, buying more tickets. You can't win the lottery if you buy no tickets, and the more you buy, the more likely it is you will win. You can't have a hit game if you produce no games, and the more games you produce, all else being equal, the more likely one will be successful. Luck plays a dominant role and you can't control opportunity, but you can increase your exposure to it by continuing to show up.

stackcollision 13y ago

Is Flappy Bird just a clone of that rediculously fun helicopter tunnel game that everyone used to play on AddictingGames, the name of which escapes me right now? It's funny how many of these record-shattering Android and iOS games are just polished versions of ancient Flash games.

Mikeb85 13y ago
Just tried that helicopter game, while it has similar concepts, the gameplay mechanics are different enough - in the helicopter game you hold the mouse button to stay aloft, versus repeatedly flapping. Also Flappy Bird has a nicer feel, the physics (ie. fall rate, because that's about all there is) feel more 'right', and of course the graphics and everything are just more fun. So no, I'd say it's not a clone.
- coolnow 13y ago
  But the mechanics are indeed similar enough. It's obvious it was inspired by it. Look at Angry Birds and that other flash game i used to play in school. Castle, Catapult something?
  - Mikeb85 13y ago
    in gaming though, everything is inspired by something. Nothing is truly original. See all RTS games, shooters, 4x games, etc... Anything that's not an outright clone is different enough to be it's own oeuvre, IMO.
concernedctzn 13y ago
It's a mix of that and the bird vehicle from Machine Gun Jetpack which used the same tap/flap mechanic. Thrown together with some mario sprites and not so great hit detection.
- drivers99 13y ago
  The flapping mechanic looks a lot like swimming in Super Mario Bros (1985), or the flying in Joust (1982), minus the ability to control your horizontal movement. So it seems pointless to compare it to more recent games. If the game involved only jumping, or climbing ladders, or shooting, would we try to figure out which other games had that mechanic?

MartinCron 13y ago

"But maybe what game players really want is a game that is fun and free, with no strings attached." I just respect any game that has no strings attached. I have mostly given up on iOS gaming because there's just so much niggling and begging and nickel-and-dining. This will be remembered as a dark age, not a golden era.

emhart 13y ago
This was recently posted to HN: http://honestandroidgames.com http://honestandroidgames.com Not iOS, of course, but the whole purpose is to feature games that are either free, or have a one-time purchase, whether in a marketplace, or in-app, that provides the entire game, no recurring purchases, etc.
- FreeKill 13y ago
  Nice site, thanks for the link. I really think there is an underserved blogging market for curation of apps and games, especially with a specific theme such as this site does.
pjmlp 13y ago
Or as the second comming of the 1983's game crash.
- oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
  I was thinking about that game crash myself the other day when mulling over the whole IAP mobile gaming fiasco. It really feels as if, by racing to the bottom, the whole market is running the risk of losing purchasers' confidence. There isn't really a very vibrant game review scene to prop things up either.
  - pjmlp 13y ago
    The main problem I see, it that the crash was the main reason of why Nintendo came up with gated development as a means to control quality. The model still being used in the console world. We might end up going again down that road.

DanBC 13y ago

The linked blog talking about the "suspicious" rise of the game misses the appearance of flappy bird on Pewdiepie. There's also a comment talking about how to monetise the game "properly" which gives advice about some reasonably ghastly monetisation techniques: > At the very least he should have added a interstitial upon opening the game, and maybe one everytime the game becomes active. He should have included a retry button. > There should have been a more games & free game button. He could have added a remove ads in-app purchase, and made it so that you can only get rid of the ads for ‘x’ amount of time before you have to buy again. > He could have provided upgrades like buying shields and/or lifes so you can get further, getting rid of peoples frustration.

JonLim 13y ago
Genuinely curious, what's so ghastly about an interstitial upon becoming active, and a retry button? It's a free game, I think people expect ads by now. Maybe not every time the game starts up (or having a daily limit) but that's not the worst thing in the world.
- georgemcbay 13y ago
  Being free is likely the only thing that has stopped Nintendo's lawyers from coming down on him like a ton of bricks at some point in the past 8 months or however long the game has been out. If he wants to monetize it he really better change the graphics first (though technically he's still copyright infringing regardless of whether he is charging for his game).
  - oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
    Is the pipe graphic literally lifted from Mario, pixel-for-pixel? Or is it just very similar. TBH, I don't think he's infringing any more than King, Zynga, et al.
    - MartinCron 13y ago
      Setting a pretty low ethical bar when you compare to King and Zynga.

alexvr 13y ago

No, it's not luck. Unless we're talking about growing up in Palo Alto at the dawn of computers, luck usually has very little to do with success. It's all about persistence and market understanding. In this case, it's mostly about creating games that people actually want. Good games are challenging and fun, so people buy them. Graphics, music, etc. are secondary. It doesn't take Bungie or John Carmack to make Tetris, but it's one of the best games ever made. Why? Because it's fun. I'd probably buy a knockoff Tetris app for $20 before I buy a beautiful but completely boring game like Infinity Blade for much less.

thezilch 13y ago
Sure, but making a fun game can be luck. There will be developers that don't need luck (or are lucky to not need it?!). Rovio made _A LOT_ of games other than Angry Birds; is making a lot of "bad" games and then one "good" not luck? I'm sure they set out and had equal confidence in each of their games being gold mines, before they were not or, in the case of Angry Birds, were.

benched 13y ago

I have a prototype I wrote sitting on my phone right now that has very similar mechanics. But I don't believe for half a second that, had I finished it, it would have achieved one ten-thousandth of the success. In the age where anyone who wants to can create games, music, art, whatever on their computers, there's a ton of great work languishing in obscurity for every single work that finds the straight-and-narrow to the big time.

stevenwei 13y ago
Luck is also a huge factor. Sometimes it's just one of those 'right place, right time' moments that can't really be replicated again.

georgemcbay 13y ago

They forgot to mention Lesson #1 which is go ahead and just blatantly rip out the tile graphics from an old Nintendo game and reuse them, it is easier than wasting time creating your own and apparently you can get away with it.

oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
When the biggest mobile game companies in the world rip off other people's games, why on earth would an independent developer not also feel entitled to do the same?
- georgemcbay 13y ago
  There's a pretty big difference (legally and ethically) between making a game that has similar mechanics to another game and just outright ripping out graphic assets to place in your own game.
  - oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
    First of all, that's a pretty big accusation to level at someone on public record: are you 100% certain that the graphic assets have been lifted pixel-for-pixel? Second, I agree with you on the legal point: it's much easier to 'protect' visual assets than it is a game mechanic. However, I dispute the fact that ripping off someone's game mechanics is, somehow, more ethical; in both cases, you're simply copying someone else's work and passing it off as your own. Just because one is easier to define, and therefore protect, in law, doesn't mean they're not both pretty nasty ways of operating.
    - georgemcbay 13y ago
      Not that big of an accusation when the theft is so obvious. It doesn't really matter if the graphics are pixel-by-pixel the same, modifying them a bit to make them slightly different doesn't protect you. See: EA's lawsuit against Zynga over The Ville which Zynga had to settle.
    - 13y ago