Vietnamese indie game developer Dong Nguyen has announced he intends to take down Flappy Bird, presumably both for iOS and Android.
Flappy Bird was originally uploaded on the iPhone App Store on May 2013, but did not get any attention until a sudden spike in interest in November that year. As of this month, the game had been making $ 50,000 a day, but Nguyen admits he does not even know what made it a success. Nguyen has also been the target of much criticism, with people questioning if he got this attention using bots, if he stole assets from Nintendo games, and just a lot of general, but unsavory, trolling.
Nguyen has been tweeting about his growing restlessness over the attention he has been receiving over the game. He tweeted earlier this week that he considers Flappy Bird one of his successes, but because it is ruining his simple life, he ‘hates’ it.
And so, we come to the recent announcement. Nguyen makes it clear that he is not taking the game down for legal reasons. He has no plans to sell Flappy Bird to another person or entity, and he will still make games. You can read his tweets below.
I can call ‘Flappy Bird’ is a success of mine. But it also ruins my simple life. So now I hate it.
— Dong Nguyen (@dongatory) February 8, 2014
I am sorry ‘Flappy Bird’ users, 22 hours from now, I will take ‘Flappy Bird’ down. I cannot take this anymore.
— Dong Nguyen (@dongatory) February 8, 2014
It is not anything related to legal issues. I just cannot keep it anymore.
— Dong Nguyen (@dongatory) February 8, 2014
I also don’t sell ‘Flappy Bird’, please don’t ask.
— Dong Nguyen (@dongatory) February 8, 2014
And I still make games.
— Dong Nguyen (@dongatory) February 8, 2014
