Angry Birds Rio 1.2.2 is available starting tonight in the App Store, with the game developers implementing no less than 15 new levels for players. The update also contains some bug fixes for the previous version but also new achievements plus a Boss fight. Angry Birds Rio was specially designed for the artistic film Rio which was released in the spring of this year and the game is available in the App Store for only €0.79 for iPhone/iPod Touch.
Going over the update, I remind you that this week EA Games acquired the company Pop Cap Games for 650 million dollars in cash, 100 million dollars in shares plus another 550 million dollars that would be paid if they are reached certain sales thresholds. The CEO of Rovio revealed that EA Games and several other companies were interested in the acquisition of Rovio and the game Angry Birds, but last year the CEO of Rovio refused to sell the company and this year he considers that its value is greater than that of Pop Cap Games. Although it only has one game, Rovio is preparing several other interesting projects outside the game industry, but don't be afraid, we will have plenty of news for Angry Birds. Here's what he declared for Eurogamer Rovio CEO:
I wouldn't say EA has approached us with any offer – obviously we've discussed with many different companies," Heijari informed Eurogamer.
About a year ago, in the summer of 2010, Angry Birds was already quite successful. At that point it started to look like a really, really feasible and desirable IP. So we had a lot of inquiries from many, many different parties. But we've had an overall strategic goal of growing this company and moving into different areas of business beyond games. I don't think there's ever been a really relevant discussion of whether somebody is going to buy us. Of course like any business if the price is right, ha!" he exclaimed. But we've set the bar pretty high from early on, because we really think we have a lot of opportunities with our Angry Birds IP and there's a lot of creativity at the studio beyond Angry Birds. It was never a strategy here to quickly cash in on anyone who comes waving a wad of cash our way. "But the valuation from our point of view is somewhere, I don't know, maybe north of PopCap.
A lot of people look at our game and say, "Who do these guys think they are with their one title?" There's a lot of different stuff going on, we have a lot of different stuff in the pipeline. We already have quite a big reach with this one title. We want to now leverage that reach and bring more social experiences, more delightful games to an already established audience. Not to say milk the Angry Birds titles as long as they can go, but really create sustainable characters and sustainable property and build a really massive brand out of Angry Birds.
It is an awful lot of money!” said Heijari of the $1.3 billion deal. "But then if you consider where the growth is at the moment, obviously consoles are not dying, PC gaming isn't going to disappear overnight - the growth right now, the dynamic, is in the social and mobile gaming.
EA have definitely taken, I wouldn't say aggressive, but quite bold steps towards gaining more foothold in new domains to them. I don't see this as either negative or positive, it's obviously a really, really strategic move from EA.
If you look at the valuation – Zynga is aiming for a $1 billion IPO. PopCap already has a lot of really successful titles that are still going strong, a massive catalog of titles [and is] probably not going to slow down in creating new games either. I don't know, if the price is right for EA, ha ha, then it must be right!
These kind of price tags just go to show that the value is also perceived.
