A Study on the Successfulness of Mobile Game: the Case of Angrybirds

International Journal of Emerging Science and Engineering (IJESE) ISSN: 2319–6378, Volume-1, Issue-11, September 2013 A Study on the Successfulness of Mobile Game: The Case of Angrybirds Farahwahida Mohd, Ezri Hielmi Che Daud Abstract— This research is to study on the successfulness of the The market for mobile games change radically with the mobile game. An Angrybirds game has been chosen as a case launch of the Apple App Store in 2008, giving a big boost to study. One of the reasons of using Angry Birds as a case study is develop power in particular and broadening the market from due to its high popularity worldwide, including our country niche proposition to virtually every Smartphone owner Malaysia. It is so popular that even children at the age of 5-12 years old are also very familiar with this title. Due to that matter, a downloading mobile games (European Games Developer model adopted majorly through the adaptation of mobile game Federation, 2010). features stated by Mark Overmars and some little combination the Among of all mobile games available on the market, Angry Nielsen’s Ten Heuristics were used in order to design Birds game has been one of the great runaway hits of 2010. questionnaire for surveys. This study would identify the The game topped the iTunes charts for most of the year – the relationship among Games Design, Controls, Social Features, price tag on the Apple marketplace was only a buck, making Assets and Navigational Features in determining mobile game Angry Birds very attractive to casual gamers – and a free successfulness. Based on the finding, it seems that there is a version for Android phones has also proved popular significant relationship between Games Design, Controls, Social Features, Assets and Navigational Features in Mobile Game (Matthew Shaer, 2010). On 9th May 2010, the developer Features. (Rovio) announced that downloads of all of its Angry Birds titles have topped 1 Billion. Index Terms—Mobile Game, paper-based survey , online Thus, due to this notable achievement of this phenomenon, it survey is relevant for us as a researcher too look into this mater, with focus on the reasons of this game popularity in terms of its I. INTRODUCTION usability, design and other relevant features that are related. In today’s world, we have loads of choice for entertainment. This includes television, radio, computers and other devices II. LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL that are developed for entertainment purposes such as the PERSPECTIVES MP3 player that we used to listen to our favourite music. 2.1 The Angry Birds Nowadays, it is quite acceptable to say that entertainment is “The survival of the Angry Birds is at stake. Dish out revenge quite hard to be separated with our life. Let us have a look on on the green pigs who stole the Birds’ eggs. Use the unique our cell phone, instead of just being used to communicate with destructive powers of the Angry Birds to lay waste to the pigs’ the others, cell phone’s today also work as a media player. fortified castles. Angry Birds features hours of gameplay, Cell phone today works more than just as a challenging physics-based castle demolition, and lots of telecommunication device. A sophisticated cell phone, or the replay value. Use logic, skill, and brute force to crush the so-called Smartphone also works as a mobile camera, enemy”, that is what is Angry Birds being described by the recorder, and at the same time as an entertainment tools, developer, Rovio (Apple App Store). Well, what is actually which include mobile games. Mobile games are broadly an Angry Birds game is all about? What is the classification defined as games that are played on mobile platforms such as that suits well for this game? cell phones, PDAs and dedicated gaming devices (Ola Angry Birds is a physic based puzzle video game, which is Davidsson, Johan Peitz, Staffan Bjork, 2004). developed by Rovio (Scott Rogers, 2012). It was first released Mobile phones have been game-enabled since 1997, it is the for iOS in 11th December 2009 (IGN), and on 9th May 2012, time when Nokia introduced games in their mobile Peter Vesterbacka announced at CTIA 2012 that the game hit communication for the first time. Less than 10 years later, 1 billion cumulative downloads (Matt Brian, 2012). This Smartphones came into the market and in 2001, they were leads the company to launch various versions of Angry Birds reaching critical mass, evolving games from a modest add-on for different platforms: Angry Birds, Angry Birds Seasons, to mobile phones to being a whole new and lucrative market Angry Birds Rio, Angry Birds Space, Angry Birds Friends, (Maura Bouca, 2012). Amazing Alex, Bad Piggies and Angry Birds Star Wars (Rovio). The original idea for the Angry Birds characters was actually coming up from Rovio’s Senior Game Designer, Jaakko Iisalo. Back in the early 2009, when toying around with numerous game concepts, Jaako contributed his idea regarding the character design. Later, as the concept evolved and the Birds needed some opponents, the pigs were born. Manuscript received September, 2013. Due to the swine flu pandemic at that time, this inspired the Farahwahida Mohd, Faculty of Computer Science and Information pigs to look sick and green in colour (Jon Mundy, 2010). Technology, Universiti Selangor, Malaysia. Ezri Hielmi Che Daud, Faculty of Computer Science and Information This game is basically relying on the simple concept. Players Technology, Universiti Selangor, Malaysia. are intended to destroy all the pigs on the playing field 6 A Study on the Successfulness of Mobile Game: The Case of Angrybirds stationed on or within various structures by using a slingshot (while tapping the screen) as the button will eventually cover to launch birds. As mentioned by Vesterbacka him, “The by finger. simplicity and addiction of Angry Birds is somewhat Make sure to have only a small number of buttons in order to reminiscent of Tetris” (Erik Holthe and Azamat make the game easier to play, as the game is also being played Abdymomunov, 2011). As players advance through the game, casually. new types of birds become available. Some of them are also Despite of using virtual buttons, another particular control included with special abilities that can be activated by the would be the swipe. It is used for example while scrolling player (Angry Birds v3.1.0, 2013). through options or to indicate a particular direction. Thus, it is easy for player to implement swipes, mouse press, down and A. Theories of Games Usability study release events. According to Mark Overmars 2011, there are several features Allowing tilt control is another good option for designing that should be considered while designing a successful mobile games. However, this can be frustrating when precise control game. However, it seems that there are a total of five crucial is required unless, this is the real challenge of the game. features that should be given more focus. They are the Game’s So, once again it is crucial to choose and design the controls Design, Controls, Social Features, Assets and Menu carefully. Make sure that controls used are efficient enough Screens/Navigational Features. Below are the explanations of and relevant to the theme and game’s design. each Usability Features: iii. Social Features i. Game’s Design This feature is considered as important nowadays, as people For the Game’s Design, it is important for designers to know want to let their friends know what games they play and how that people play games differently than on a console or PC. good are they at them, and at the same time competing against For mobile games, it is important to design the game which other players. Most mobile games today are connected to allows players to play in brief bursts that can be short as 2-5 worldwide leader boards. For Angry Birds case, it is minutes and are rarely longer than 30 minutes. Moreover, connected to the Game Center Leaderboards, which also a estimate that players could be having a long break time feature includes in IOS devices. Within Game Center, the between play sessions, which means they are eager to forget player can see their ranks overall in the world and also ranks what happened in the previous session. Thus, it is important to among his/her friends. Besides of viewing the ranks, a player design the game with a natural point to interrupt playing the could also shares scores to Facebook using the Game Center. game, and save the state at such a moment. One of the best Moreover, achievements are also another way in which methods is by breaking the game into many different levels. players can show others how good they are in the game. Besides, in order to avoid bigger problems, the game Achievements generally based on the basic progress aspects shouldn’t be very complex and the learning curve mustn’t be of the game such as the number of levels solved or others. steep. Begin the game with ease and slowly increase the However, there are also funny achievements included in a difficulty. Support each level with nice graphics and certain game today. Anyway, Achievements create replay animations, surprising game elements so players with high value as certain player might try to reach all the achievements playability skills won’t get bored although the game is too available. easy for them at the beginning. iv. Assets Include tutorials, but not in the form of manuals. It is better to Assets can be divided into two parts: start the game with an in-game tutorial, make the first levels i) Art and visual design extremely easy and introduce additional elements in further No matter how good the gameplay in the game is, without nice levels.

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