Earlier this week, from out of the blue, a website and YouTube video popped up on the interwebs that announced the upcoming return of Flappy Bird. The original version of the free-to-play mobile game, where you simply tapped the screen to move a bird so it could avoid hitting a series of floating tubes, launched in May 2013 but became a massive hit in early 2014.
Today, the original creator of Flappy Bird, South Korean-based Dong Nguyen, posted a message on his X account. His brief post made it clear he has no relation to the revival of the title.
No, I have no related with their game. I did not sell anything.
— Dong Nguyen (@dongatory) September 15, 2024
I also don't support crypto.
The message also stated, "I also don't support crypto." That could be a reference to Michael Roberts, who is reportedly leading the development of the revival under the Flappy Bird Foundation name. VGC reports that Roberts is also the head of a crypto company called 1208 Productions.
The original version of the game, which Nguyen stated in the past was created in just a few days, caught the attention of the entire mobile gaming world in early 2014, several months after its debut for Android and iOS. It was estimated that it got 50 million downloads. Nguyen reportedly made as much as $50,000 a day on the free-to-play title via banner ads for a while.
However, Nguyen decided to pull the game from Google Play and the iOS app store in February 2014, claiming the unexpected success and attention the game was generating was "ruining his life".
Meanwhile, the new version of Flappy Bird, which is supposed to add new characters and modes compared to the simple original version, will still be a free-to-play game. It is scheduled to launch sometime in 2025 for iOS and Android.
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