At a certain point, you have to just accept that people are unpredictable and weird, and you will never understand them. … Hold on, let me back track a bit.
If I were to ask you to describe your perfect video game, odds are you wouldn’t describe anything along these lines:
“Well, I want my avatar to be a semi-retarded one-eyed bird. I want the scenery to be lifted straight out of Super Mario World. And I want gravity to just randomly decide on how intense it feels like being that day. Oh, and also: I want it on an iPhone, I want instant death, I want pop-up ads, I want those pop-up ads to cause my instant death, and lastly, I want it to be unwinnable.”
In case you missed it, I just described Flappy Bird. Which, if you try to describe to someone, sounds like something you could only enjoy while on the pain meds you receive when getting your wisdom teeth out.
But nonetheless, Flappy Bird became the #1 free app in the world, briefly surpassing Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Doodle Jump, Fruit Ninja, YouTube, and even the freakin’ flashlight app. So, this leads me to wonder, what the hell do you people want out of a game?
What was it about Flappy Bird that was so damn enticing? Was it the difficulty? Do you like hard games? Fine! Go try out the subway puzzle of The Longest Journey (without a walkthrough) and try to get the hardest Xbox360 achievement that has ever been or ever will be.
(10 grueling hours go by).
No? Not that? Fine! You want something where you will die hundreds of times with seemingly no end? Let’s go take a stab (no pun intended) at Dark Souls!
(10 more hours, and one fist through a computer monitor later).
Hm, that won’t do. Ok, I got it! You’re looking for a game that is painstakingly simple, and has a really basic gameplay mechanic and instant death/rebirth game style? Allow me to introduce you to Fishy!
(10 hours later, and you have taken your computer out into a field and destroyed it, Office Space-style).
Nope? Ok ok, give me a second. How about the helicopter game? You know, the game that Flappy Bird and every other similar side scrolling game on the app store is based on? You might love that game. And, you might have to settle for it. Because Flappy Bird is gone from the app store, and is not slated to return.
But, because the world is cruel, here are REAL options you can use. I repeat. These are real things I’m listing here.
1. Splashy Fish — 10 points for creativity here.
2. Flappy Bee — Unless it’s voiced by Jerry Seinfeld, then I really just don’t care.
3. Ironpants — Essentially an 8-bit Captain Underpants meets Flappy Bird.
4. Clumsy Bird — Eh.
5. Flappy Wings (not Flappy Bird) — I kid you not, the words ‘not Flappy Bird’ are in the game’s title. 10 points for search engine optimization.
6. Flappy Plane — If at any point your plane is “flapping,” you are probably about to die.
7. Fly Birdie – Flappy Bird Flyer. — Again, those words are all in the title.
8. Flappy Doge (Web) — Such yes. Much Flap. Wow.
And, an honorable mention, Fall Out Bird. (Any FOB fans will LOVE that ‘honorable mention’ joke.)
That last one, Fly Birdie – Flappy Bird Flyer, is the apparent successor, ringing in at #1 on the App Store. To save you the trouble, here is what that game consists of: It has the EXACT same gameplay mechanic as Flappy Bird, but it looks like the creator of Flappy Bird had a stroke while playing with Microsoft Paint.
From trends, it seems that these are the kinds of games people like now. So, excuse me while I go take all my real games out back and hold them close while the world comes to an end.
Shh, don’t cry, it’s ok, Ocarina. It will all be ok, I promise.
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Quick note: A friend of mine recently decided he was going to “bring back Fruit Ninja.” I can get behind that. Let’s bring back Fruit Ninja. If the people behind Fruit Ninja would like to pay me for this endorsement, I would not be opposed.
